Fried Gene Tomatoes

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It was an inspired choice for Calgene's bioengineers. There is a huge gulf between the taste of fresh, garden-grown tomatoes and the tasteless, pulpy, tomato-like objects sold out of season in most U.S. supermarkets. Tomatoes don't travel well; to transport them cross-country, producers pick them while they are still green. To make matters worse, tomato middlemen often store the green tomatoes for weeks in refrigerator trucks, holding out for the best price. Then, just before they are sold, the tomatoes are gassed with ethylene to make them red. Even so, U.S. consumers buy $4 billion worth of tomatoes each year, and they may gladly pay a premium for one that is not picked prematurely. Calgene says its tomato can stay on the vine and ripen longer than ordinary varieties and stay fresh several days longer once it's on the grocery shelf.

But the new tomato is also a fat target for critics of biotechnology, who believe that the controls over genetic engineering should be especially tight for anything that people ingest. Calgene submitted the Flavr Savr for FDA approval and plans to post brochures in grocery stores explaining how the tomatoes were produced through genetic engineering, even though the law doesn't require either of those actions. Nonetheless, the company finds itself the target of "tomato-squashing" protests organized by the Pure Food Campaign, a Washington-based group headed by longtime biotech opponent Jeremy ) Rifkin. "The middle class is moving in the direction of organic, healthy, sustainable foods," says Rifkin. "The last thing they want to hear about is gene-spliced tomatoes." Rifkin and other critics fault the FDA for not requiring producers to notify the government before they bring bioengineered foods to market.

He concedes, however, that the Flavr Savr may be safe. It could even be safer than conventionally bred tomatoes, says Carl Winter, director of the independent, university-funded FoodSafe Program at the University of California at Davis. According to Winter, "modern genetic engineering techniques have less risk of undesirable traits than conventional breeding." Hybrid potatoes, for example, are tested for elevated levels of alkaloids, which in high enough concentrations can be toxic.

Consumers will probably be more worried about a different set of issues, like how Flavr Savr will taste and whether it will be worth the high prices (up to $2.50 per lb.) that Calgene is expected to charge. Alice Waters, chef and owner of Berkeley's famous Chez Panisse restaurant, and by her own description a "big, big tomato lover," sampled a Flavr Savr and decided it "tasted like a seasonally ripe commercial tomato. Not bad," she says, but not good enough for the diners at Chez Panisse.

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CREDIT: [TMFONT 1 d #666666 d {Source: Union of Concerned Scientists, AgBiotech Stock Letter, Monsanto}]CAPTION: WHAT'S IN THE WORKS