14 DAY TRIAL // Besides constantly pushing for environmental projects aimed at safeguarding natural ecosystems and helping various plant and animal species escape the threat of becoming extinct, the Greenpeace organization is also very much interested in issues concerning public health.
Thus, they just made it public news that, according to findings made by members of this organization, 24 Chinese children living in the Hunan province have been fed a genetically engineered variety of rice as part of a food trial, carried out by a group of researchers who supposedly also benefited from the support of the US Department of Agriculture.
As Greenpeace explains on its official website, its members happened to stumble upon a study from The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, in which several specialists commented on the results they got by trying out a new type of genetically engineered rice.
Apparently, this golden rice is meant to help put an end to the vitamin A deficiency most children living in poor countries presently suffer from.
Still, as Greenpeace puts it, “Fact is, we don't need this "silver bullet" rice, because: (1) we have a solution – it's called overcoming poverty and accessing a more diverse diet; and (2) like so many silver bullets it's going to cause more trouble and potential harm than existing solutions.”
Just for the record, we also had a look at said report, and all we got from all the science-talk going on there was that, “Children (n = 68; age 6–8 y) were randomly assigned to consume GR or spinach,” and that “β-Carotene in Golden Rice is as good as β-carotene in oil at providing vitamin A to children.”
This roughly translates into the fact that Greenpeace can be argued to be very much entitled to make the aforementioned claims. Especially seeing how, ever since the idea to make this new type of rice first popped into the minds of researchers, environmentalists have been constantly going against it on the grounds that it could seriously affect public health.
“The battle to keep GE [genetically engineered] rice out of China has been a long, seven year struggle, and clearly it's not over yet,” Greenpeace concludes its discussion on this topic.