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ISIS Press Release 23/01/08
Open Letter to British Food Journal Editor
& Editorial Board
Wormy Corn Paper Must be Retracted
We,
the undersigned, are writing to request the Editor and the Editorial Board
of the British
Food Journal (BFJ)
to retract the published article “Agronomic and consumer considerations for
Bt and conventional sweet corn” [1] and to withdraw its “Award for Excellence
for Most Outstanding Paper in 2004”. This paper, purporting to show that consumers
prefer to buy genetically modified (GM) Bt sweet corn over conventional sweet
corn, is highly misleading, if not a “flagrant fraud”, as it is based on manipulations
of the shoppers’ preference, not reported in the paper. When
evidence of the manipulations emerged, one of the authors, an employee of
the Canadian Government, attempted to suppress the evidence, even resorting
to threatening legal action in the UK and Ireland. We summarize the sequence
of events for your benefit.
The BFJ published the paper in 2003 [1], and
subsequently gave it the “Award for Excellence for the Most Outstanding
Paper in 2004”. The authors claimed
to have shown that consumers, when given a choice between GM (Bt) and non-GM
sweet corn, preferred to buy the GM-corn by a factor of 3 to 2. But it turned
out that the paper was seriously flawed [2] (see Biotech Canada SLAPP
Scandal, SiS 36).
Toronto Star
journalist Stuart Laidlaw reported on the ‘experiment’ in his book,
Secret Ingredients: The Brave New World of Industrial Farming,
(McClelland & Stewart, 2003). The book included a photograph of a sign above
the regular sweet corn saying: “Would You Eat Wormy Sweet Corn?” while the
corresponding sign over the GM-corn said: “Here’s What Went into Producing
Quality Sweet Corn.” The contrast between “Wormy” and “Quality” was highlighted
on the sign by the number of times the regular corn had been sprayed with
insecticides and fungicide. This and other blatant attempts to bias the consumers’
choice [3] were not reported in the BFJ paper.
A leading researcher into scientific ethics, Dr. Richard Jennings
at Cambridge University in the
UK, told the New Scientist [4] that if that is the case, “It
is grounds for the journal to retract the article.”
Prof.
Joe Cummins, Professor Emeritus of Plant Genetics at University of Western
Ontario, wrote a letter to the Editor of the BFJ on 30 May 2006,
requesting that the paper and the Award for Excellence both be withdrawn as
“ the experiment and its controls do not appear to have been reported either
fully or honestly.”
The Editor, Dr. Chris Griffith, Head of the Food Research and Consultancy
Unit at the University of Wales, Cardiff, failed to retract the paper,
sidestepping the objection with a statement in an “Editor’s note” [5] that:
“A common misconception is that science and research are about facts.” Prof.
Cummins’ letter was also published in the same “Editor’s note”, followed by
a lengthy reply from the senior author, Dr. Doug Powell, Associate Professor
of Diagnostic Medicine/Pathobiology at Kansas State University, Manhattan,
in which he tried to justify the research. He admitted that the “wormy corn”
sign had been present on 30 August 2000 (the day the sales experiment started),
and said it was “changed” (not removed) a week later. But he
simply dismissed the charge that this amounted to influencing consumer preference.
The paper’s second author, Shane Morris, replied
on his website GMOIreland [6], claiming he “never saw any such misleading
“signs””, despite the photographic evidence obtained by Laidlaw. Instead he
produced his own photographs [7], which he said confirm there were no such
misleading signs during the data collection period.
Morris is a biotech lobbyist who routinely attacks critics of GM crops
on his website, and is also a paid agent of the Canadian Government, a Senior
Consumer Analyst at the Consumer Analysis Section of Agriculture and Agri-Food
Canada. And while holding that position, Morris resorted to
threats of legal action, a notorious measure commonly referred to as SLAPP
– Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation [2] - forcing a temporary
shutdown of the GM Watch website (which first drew attention to Laidlaw’s
report).
Meanwhile, new evidence has emerged confirming that the “wormy corn”
sign was indeed present during a substantial part of, if not the entire data
collection period, 30 August - 6
October 2000. Tim Lambert, computer scientist at the University of New South
Wales in Australia, noticed a small placard with writing placed over the regular
corn in Morris’s photographs, but the resolution was too low to read. By blowing
up the photographs and aligning the placard with the original photograph of
the wormy sign, Lambert found a match in the writing [8]; thereby providing
proof that the telltale sign, which Morris claimed never to have seen, was
present in Morris’s own photographs.
Dr. Jennings has since spoken to Private Eye [9], calling
the BFJ paper “a flagrant fraud”, and charging the authors with
“a sin of omission by failing to divulge information which quite clearly should
have been disclosed.” But as Private Eye commented [10], “if
the researchers had disclosed the wormy corn labels, would any respected scientific
journal have published it?”
In November 2007, the Rt Hon. Michael Meacher
MP tabled an Early Day Motion in the UK Parliament on Scientific Research
into GM Crops [11], which “regrets the continuing attempts to silence or misrepresent
scientists whose research indicates possible human health problems from GM
crops”, “deplores the continuing efforts of an employee of the Canadian Government
to close down websites in the UK and Republic of Ireland,” and calls for “journal
editors to withdraw papers they have published which subsequently turn out
to be grossly misleading or even fraudulent.” This has been signed by 26 MPs
from different political parties.
Professor Cummins wrote to the BFJ Editor again on
26 November 2007, drawing attention to the new evidence,
and asking that “accusations as serious as mendacity, falsification and fraud”
not be swept aside or barred from discussion. He wrote again on 6 December
and 20 December 2007, but Dr. Griffith has failed to reply.
This disgraceful incident has brought science and the BFJ
into disrepute, and we urge the Editorial Board to do what it can to redeem
itself by retracting both the paper and its award, thus sending a clear signal
to the scientific community and the public that you are not compromising the
traditional, accepted standards of good science or of truthful journalism.
References
- Powell DA, Blaine K, Morris S and Wilson J. Agronomic
and consumer considerations for Bt and conventional sweet-corn. British
Food Journal 2003, 105 (10), 700-713.
- Cummins J. Biotech Canada SLAPP scandal. Science in Society 36,
6-7, 2007.
- “The GM propaganda lab”, GM
Watch, http://www.gmwatch.org/p1temp.asp?pid=72&page=1
- “Controversy over claims in
favour of GM corn”, The New Scientist, 27 May 2007, http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg19025533.300&feedId=gm-food_rss20
- Griffith C. Editor's note, British
Food Journal 2006, 108(8).
- “More Spin, FAKE information
and Lies!!!” Shane Morris, GMOIreland, 20 March
2006, http://gmoireland.blogspot.com/2006_03_20_archive.html
- “Poor old Johnny”, Shane Morris,
GMOIreland, 21 March 2006, http://gmoireland.blogspot.com/2006_03_21_archive.html
- “Would you eat wormy sweet corn?”,
Tim Lambert, 7 September 2007, Deltoid, http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2007/09/would_you_eat_wormy_sweet_corn.php
- “Corn fakes”, Private Eye No.
1194, 28 September – 11 October 2007.
- Fraude, 27
September 2007, http://bioseguridad.blogspot.com/2007/09/fraude.html
- Early Day Motion, EDM 425, Scientific Research into GM Crops,
28 November, http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=34547&SESSION=891
Signed:
Prof. Joe Cummins (jcummins@uwo.ca,
tel: 1-519 681 5477)
Emeritus Professor, University of Western Ontario, Canada
Dr. Mae-Wan Ho (m.w.ho@I-sis.org.uk,
tel: 44-(0)20-7272-5636)
Roster of Experts, Cartagena Protocol for Biosafety, and Director, Institute
of Science in Society, www.i-sis.org.uk,
UK
Prof. Peter Saunders (peter.saunders@kcl.ac.uk,
tel: (0)20-7272-5636)
Emeritus Professor of Applied Mathematics, King’s College, London
University, UK
Dr. Richard C Jennings
Lectures on Ethics in Science, University of Cambridge, UK
Prof. Andy Stirling
Director of Science, SPRU - Science and Technology Policy
Research, University of Sussex,
Brighton, UK
Prof. Brian Wynne
Associate Director, ESRC Centre for Economic and Social Aspects of Genomics,
CESAGen, Lancaster University, UK
Prof. Erik Millstone
SPRU - Science and Technology Policy Research, University of Sussex,
Brighton, UK
Dr. Terje Traavik
Scientific Director, GenØk-Center for Biosafety
Professor of Gene Ecology, School of Medicine, University of Tromso,
Norway
Rt. Hon. Michael Meacher
Member of Parliament, UK
Alan Simpson
Member of Parliament, UK
Prof. Gilles-Eric Séralini
Molecular biologist, University of Caen France, and president of the Scientific
Council for Independent Research on Genetic Engineering (CRIIGEN), www.criigen.org, France
Dr. David Schubert
Professor, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla,
Ca, USA
Dr. Michael Antoniou
Reader in Molecular Genetics, King's College London, UK
Dr. Rod MacRae
Food policy consultant and Assistant Professor, Faculty of Environmental
Studies, York University, Toronto, Canada
Dr. Carlo Leifert
Res Dev Professor of Ecological Agriculture, University of Newcastle, UK
Dr. David Miller
Professor of Sociology, Department of Geography and Sociology, University
of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland
Dr. James Wilsdon
Head of Science and Innovation, Demos, London
Dr. Stuart A. Newman
Department of Cell Biology and Anatomy, New York Medical College, Valhalla, NY, USA
Prof. Iain Boal
University of California, Berkeley, Ca, USA
Dr. John Fagan
Chief Scientific Officer and molecular biologist, Genetic ID, USA, Germany,
Japan
Dr. Philip L Bereano
Professor Emeritus, Department of Technical Communication, University
of Washington, Seattle, USA
Dr. Pietro Perrino
Research Manager, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche,
at the Institute of Plant Genetics (ex Germplasm Institute), Bari, Italy
Prof. Masaharu Kawata
Yokkaichi University,
Mie-Prefecture, Japan
Dr. Tom Wakeford
Director of Public Engagement, University of Newcastle, and
SABL Visiting Fellow at the International Institute for Environment and Development
(IIED), UK
Dr. Werner Kraus Jr.
Dept. of Automation and Systems Engineering, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil
Dr. Christophe Boëte
Research Scientist in Evolutionary Parasitology, University
Pierre & Marie Curie, Paris, France
Dr. Alexandra Plows
Research Associate, ESRC Centre for the Economic and Social Aspects of
Genomics, CESAGen, University of Cardiff, UK
Dr. Hector Valenzuela
Professor and Vegetable Crops Extension Specialist, University
of Hawaii at Manoa, USA
Prof. E R Orskov
IFRU, Macaulay Institute, Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen, Scotland
Dr. Arpad Pusztai FRSE
Biotechnology Section Graduate Division at the St Stephan University School
of Ecology, Hungary, and Consultant, GenØk-Center for Biosafety, Norway
Dr. Susan Bardocz
Professor of Nutrition at University Debrecen, Hungary, and Consultant,
GenØk-Center for Biosafety, Norway
Dr. Malcolm Hooper
Emeritus Professor of Medicinal Chemistry, University of Sunderland,
UK
Dr. Paul Nightingale
SPRU - Science and Technology Policy Research, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK
Profa. Dra. Uiara Montedo
Departamento de Engenharia de Produção, Escola Politécnica da Universidade
de São Paulo, Brazil
Dr. Stuart Parkinson
Executive Director, Scientists for Global Responsibility (SGR), UK
Dr. Jonathan R. Latham
Editor, The Bioscience Resource Project, Ithaca, NY, USA
John Verrall MRPS, DBA
Member, Food Ethics Council, Brighton, UK
Dr. Helen Wallace
Director, GeneWatch UK, Buxton, UK
Dr. Brian John
GM-Free Cymru, www.gmfreecymru.org,
Wales
Dr. Michael W. Fox
Veterinarian and syndicated columnist, Minneapolis, Minnesota,
USA
Hira Jhamtani
Vice Chair, Bali
Organic Association, Bali, Indonesia
Dr. Neil Carman
Sierra Club Genetic Engineering Committee, Austin, Texas, USA
Sent
23 January 2007 to British Food Journal Editor and Editorial Board
Members
Professor Chris Griffith
Editor of British Food Journal
Head, Food Research and Consultancy Unit, University of Wales Institute,
Cardiff
Dr Louise Fielding
School of Applied Sciences,University of Wales Institute,Cardiff,
UK
Dr Michael Bourlakis
Senior Lecturer and Director of Postgraduate studies
Dr Roger L. Cook
National Manager (Microbiology) Programme Development Group
Ministry of Agriculture & Forestry Food Assurance Authority
Leo-Paul Dana
Associate Professor in Marketing, Canterbury University
Dr Ruth Fairchild
Senior Lecturer Cardiff School of Health Sciences University of Wales
Institute Cardiff, UK
Susan Gregory
Research Unit in Health, Behaviour and Change, University of Edinburgh.
Medical School
Prof, Christina Fjellstrom
Department of Public Health and Caring Sciences, Uppsala University,
Sweden
Professor dr Lynn Jayne Frewer
Marketing and Consumer Behaviour Group Wageningen,Netherland
Cathryn Hart
Senior Lecturer in Retailing and Operations Management Programme Director
of Retail Management Marketing and Retailing Research
Professor Adam Lindgreen
Marketing and Business Strategy University of Hull
Ingela Marklinder, Ph. D.
Department of Domestic. Sciences, Uppsala University, Sweden
Prof. Alberto Mattiacci
Università degli Studi di Siena
Prof. Bevan Moseley
Consultant Blandford House, 2 Hamilton Road, Reading United Kingdom
Terry Robinson
Reader in Teesside Business School
Samim Saner
General Manager Kalite Sistem Laboratories Group Kalamis M.Nurettin Selcuk
cad.No.28 Istanbul 81030 Turkey
Claire Seaman
Senior Lecturer, School of Business and Enterprise Management Team
Queen Margaret University
Dr Andrew Smith Associate Professor in Marketing
Professor Claudio Vignali
Leslie Silver International Faculty Tourism, Hospitality & Events
School
Professor Verner Wheelock
Verner Wheelock Associates,Broughton Hall Business Park,
Skipton, UK
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