Monday, April 12, 1999 Published at 23:13 GMT 00:13 UK
Leading geneticist urges GM caution
Steve Jones is concerned about GM crops
By Environment Correspondent Alex Kirby
A leading UK scientist says he thinks genes from genetically-modified (GM) crops will inevitably escape into other plants.
He is Steve Jones, professor of genetics at University College, London.
And in an interview with BBC News Online, he explains his concerns over GM crops today.
"People may be worried that GM food is not safe to eat. I think that's unlikely. But if it were true, we could easily find out.
"It's straightforward science. But evolution is not like that."
Professor Jones says it is impossible to predict what evolution will do, and draws a parallel between GM foods and antibiotics.
"But you would have been right. Evolution picked up a gene and changed it, and now the bacteria are resistant to penicillin.
"We are doing more or less the same with genetically manipulated plants. Those genes are going to get out into other plants. Everybody knows that.
"And we have no idea what is going to happen."
Health risks dismissed
The prospect haunts Professor Jones. What would happen, for instance, if a gene that conferred resistance against insects escaped?
"Now this probably will not happen. But it certainly might. With GM plants, we are doing something new. We are moving genes around to where they've never been before.
"And we don't seem to be considering the possibility that evolution may take advantage of those genes, as it has done previously, in ways that we don't like."
More rigour needed
He does not think the field trials planned to test the safety of GM crops are "really rigorous enough".
"Too much attention is being paid to a non-problem - are GM foods poisonous? They almost certainly ain't.
"But we have to be sure what we are doing before we go ahead, and I think we're going ahead far too soon."
BBC Two's Leviathan will be shown at 1930 BST (1830 GMT) on Wednesday, 14 April.