"Then God said,

'Let the earth bring forth vegetation:
every kind of plant that bears seed and
every kind of fruit tree on earth that bears fruit with its seed in it.'

And so it happened:
the earth brought forth every kind of plant that bears seed and
every kind of fruit tree on earth that bears fruit with its seed in it.
God saw how good it was." (Gn 1:11-12 )

From the evolutionary point of view the above took a very long time to come about which involved the certain amount of freedom every creature has in the scheme of things under the pervasive presence, power, wisdom and love of God. God saw biodiversity of plants and animals as a good in which man plays a part.

A hunter and food gatherer understood biodiversity perfectly. He lived among plants and animals from which came his food, clothing, tools, medicines, etc. When man began to plow the field, he destroyed many plants that would have been naturally there considering them as weeds which interfered with the selected species he planted. Man the farmer did develop new species of plants and animals by selection and breeding but did so by borrowing traits that already existed in wild plants and animals. The genetic engineer must do the same.

"Biotechnology allows us to inject genes directly into domesticated plants and animals. At first glance, it seems that we have co-opted nature, once again substituting a clever bit of technology over a chancier and slower natural process. But the genes we insert to produce, say, frost-resistant strawberries, have to come from somewhere. You can't just go to a molecular biology facility and ask them to invent a gene that will make strawberry plants hardier. No one has the faintest idea what that gene would be, what its precise instructional coding would be, or where it might be inserted into the chromosomes of the strawberry cells." (Webpage: Why Biodiversity Matters) In other words, man cannot add to the genetic pool found in nature, he can only move it around to different species.

Although there are benefits to biotechnology, genetically modified crop have a potential to further diminish biodiversity in the world. In itself biotechnology can only add new kinds of plants and animals to the environment, how does it contribute to the reduction of biological diversity? This comes about because transnational corporations tend to develop a single genetic modification which is sold to a great number of farmers thereby leading them to abandon the native species.

Let's take India as an example. "In India ... peasant producers now cultivate some 50,000 varieties of rice, developed through traditional practices over the millennia. This astonishing variety arose from subtle differences in soil and climatic conditions through mutation, evolution, and the deliberate application of cultural preferences." (Webpage: Information About Intellectual property rights No. 1) Corporations have been trying to convince farmers to use their genetically modified rice but have met with resistance because this would pollute their genetic pool which would make it more difficult for them to sell rice on the world market. Genetic engineering has now produced yellow rice rich in beta-carotene which would help to reduce blindness in India. Pressure is now mounting to introduce so called "Golden Rice" in India. In the year 2000 Vandana Shiva has observed that "Vitamin A rice is likely to fail in preventing blindness, since it will meet less than 1 per cent of the required daily intake. Ninety-nine per cent of Vitamin A will still have to be provided from alternatives which already exist, such as green leafy vegetables and fruits coriander leaves, curry leaves, drumstick leaves, amaranth leaves -- staples of the Indian diet." So, is this gamble worth further loss of the rice genetic pool of India? " Since a prototype Golden Rice was developed in 1999, new lines with higher B-carotene content have been generated. Our goal is to be capable of providing the recommended daily allowance of vitamin A—in the form of—in 100-200 g of rice, which corresponds to the daily rice consumption of children in rice-based societies, such as India, Vietnam or Bangladesh. In other countries, Golden Rice could still be a valuable complement to children's diets, thus contributing to the reduction of clinical and sub-clinical vitamin A deficiency-related diseases." (www.goldenrice.org)

"Furthermore, an engineered organism may produce unanticipated harmful impacts on other species in its new environment. A group of scientists at Oregon State University, for example, engineered a variety of Klebsiella planticola, a bacteria known to reside in the soil and contribute to the decomposition of plant material. Their goal was to engineer a product that would efficiently convert agricultural wastes to ethanol fuel. Although the project was successful in meeting this goal, the scientists discovered in late stages of testing that the new product also destroyed much of a beneficial mycorrhizal fungus essential to the recycling of nitrogen through plant roots -- which could lead to desertification throughout the range of the product." (Webpage: Information About Intellectual property rights No. 1)

In conclusion, while there are benefits to genetically modified crops, proceed with caution with the intent to preserve the genetic pool of the earth as much as possible. God has created biodiversity for a reason which we do not fully understand.

 

7. God's Glory in Myriads of Creatures