The Rice Man Cometh... California Rejects GE Rice

In early April, the California Rice Commission voted to allow Ventria Biosciences the right to grow a small stand of genetically engineered "pharm" rice in California's Central Valley. But by mid April, the California Department of Food and Agriculture had overruled the Rice Commission's decision, saying it was out of step with federal law.

This reversal was a victory for an unusual coalition of opponents, which included environmental groups like Californians for GE-Free Agriculture and The Campaign to Label Genetically Modified Food, along with industrial rice producers and food industry trade groups who feared contamination of California's $500 million dollar industry. "[If] regulations are not in place to ensure the safety of the food supply," said Stephanie Childs, spokeswoman for Grocery Manufacturers of America, which represents the nation's name-brand foods, "it would only take one accident to destroy an entire industry sector" (reported in SeedQuest, online magazine).

The "pharm" rice in question was engineered for pharmaceutical needs, namely, by placing the DNA of two hormones, lactoferrin, from human breast milk, and lysozyme, from human tears, into rice DNA. These hormones then grow in the rice's storage proteins and are 30-400 times more viable in a rice vehicle than in previously tested forms. Ventria will use the synthetic hormones to design a new generation of baby formulae, which they've been testing since 1997, according to The Sacramento Bee.

Since the initial approval came so late in the season, there was doubt whether Ventria would even be able to plant this year. But now that the California Department of Food and Agriculture has issued its ban, Ventria says that the company will seek federal approval to grow their rice and try again next year.

That task, meanwhile, only got more difficult. In late March, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, citing rapid leaps in biotechnology, said it had plans to tighten regulations on pharmaceutical compounds, like lactoferrin and lysosome, grown in food.