The Columbus Dispatch, 16 September 2010
Ohioans already grow - and eat - genetically modified corn and soybeans. Could transgenic salmon be next? On Sunday, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration advisory panel begins hearings in Washington on what would be the nation's first genetically engineered food animal, an Atlantic salmon that incorporates DNA from other fish to make it grow twice as fast as its wild relatives.
To ensure the modified salmon won't stray into the ocean and cause problems for wild salmon, AquaBounty, the Boston-based company that designed the fish, told the FDA that it will be grown only in indoor tanks in inland areas. Ohio would fit the bill.
The company intends to sell eggs to growers in the United States and elsewhere, said Suzanne Turner, a spokeswoman for the company. "This is an opportunity for inland fish farmers to grow salmon, which is really exciting because it's one of the most sought-after seafoods," she said, adding that growers would have to get FDA approval for their facilities.
There would be regulatory and economic hurdles, said Laura Tiu, a specialist at Ohio State University's aquaculture research center in Piketon, but she added: "Someday, we could be raising salmon right here in Ohio." One of those hurdles is the "yuck factor." Will consumers buy meat from a genetically modified fish?
"I would have no problem eating it and serving it to my family," Tiu said. "But the American public is also fickle, and there is a portion of the consumers that is concerned."
FDA scientists found nothing to indicate that the meat is any different from natural salmon meat. The genetic alterations - one from a fish called the ocean pout and another from a Chinook salmon - allow the fish to reach full growth in 18 months instead of three years.
Environmental and food-safety groups are most concerned that the genetically modified fish could escape and compete with already strained populations of wild fish.
"The company can sell the eggs to anyone it wants," said Margaret Mellon, director of the Food and Environment Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. "Is there any way to impose regulation on other companies and sites, especially in other countries?"
Even in properly secured sites, she said, there's no way to guarantee that the fish won't get out.
"Look at the BP oil spill. That was the case of an oil well that was not supposed to be a problem because it had simultaneous redundant containment measures," Mellon said. "You need an evaluation of what would happen if they do get out and they are established."
The FDA briefing paper says the agency evaluated AquaBounty's egg nursery in Canada and its growth tanks in Panama and found that there was little chance of an escape. It found that at least 95 percent of the eggs produced sterile fish and all of the eggs were female, another means of keeping the engineered fish from breeding with wild salmon.
That's good protection, said Allison Snow, an OSU ecologist and the lead author on the American Ecological Society's 2005 report on genetically modified organisms.
"It seems like the company has done a lot to address the concerns that ecologists had," she said. "From an environmental standpoint, this one example doesn't seem worrisome."
If the salmon is approved, fish farmers will have another set of issues to consider before they choose to grow it here, said Bob Calala, president of the Ohio Aquaculture Association.
One issue is whether it makes economic sense. Besides the FDA, he said, the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and Division of Wildlife would evaluate the farms and the fish.
The biggest barrier is the seawater that salmon grow in, he said. A release could kill wildlife in Ohio's freshwater streams and lakes, and regulators will have to decide whether that risk is acceptable.
But he said indoor aquaculture of the type envisioned for the salmon is the wave of the future in Ohio, with farms for tilapia and shrimp already leading the way.
Source: The Columbus Dispatch
