Talk On Genetically Modified Foods

The Royal Society of NSW will hold a meeting entitled 'Dinner with the General Manager (GM)' on 4 October 2000 at 6:00 to 9:00pm at City Tattersalls Club, Sydney.

Professor Stephen Leeder, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Professor of Public Health and Community Medicine of the University of Sydney will be the speaker. He will take the view that advocates for genetically modified foods often assert that the processes of laboratory genetic engineering are really no different from those that occur naturally with plant and animal husbandry. This argument has not had the expected convincing impact.

Advocates concerned about GM food safety, claim that genetic engineering allows humans to do what nature will not and worry when scientists cut and paste genes. Scientists have the skill to transfer genes between species, which raises new safety questions making the production and marketing of GM foods a matter for consideration by public health authorities. Consumers do not know what the long-term effects of genetic modification of crops and consumption of genetically modified foods will be, either on human health or on the ecological environment.