It is a sad comment on the priorities of modern culture when the biggest international coverage two respected plant scientists get is when they counter claims made in the inflammatory best selling book Wheat Belly by William Davis.
University of Saskatchewan researchers Ravi Chibbar, the Canada research chair for crop quality, and wheat breeder Pierre Hucl published research in the peer-reviewed journal Cereal Chemistry showing that the concentration of starches and protein, including gluten, in Canadian wheat is almost unchanged after 150 years of crop breeding.
The wire service Reuters did a story on the research and coverage spread to newspapers, TV, radio and websites around the world.
Read Also
Proactive approach best bet with looming catastrophes
The Pan-Canadian Action Plan on African swine fever has been developed to avoid the worst case scenario — a total loss ofmarket access.
“Our results substantiate that the wheat grown by Canadian farmers today is nutritionally similar to wheat grown in 1860,” said Chibbar.
The research directly contradicts claims made by Davis, who is not a food or plant scientist, but a cardiologist.
His book claims that agricultural scientists have genetically altered wheat so dramatically in the past 50 years that it is “beyond recognition.”
Davis and other authors have sparked an anti-gluten, anti-wheat movement that has actually reduced wheat consumption in North America in the past few years.
Davis claims that eating modern wheat contributes to weight gain and helps trigger diseases such as type 1 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis. He says it contributes to eczema, depression and anxiety and even suggests that wheat consumption might contribute to cancer.
Capitalizing on the popularity of his first book, he has released a series of cookbooks, makes numerous appearances on talk shows and even has a program featured during fund raising drives by PBS.
He is not alone. The celebrity bandwagon plus the whole industry of no-gluten restaurants and food products each in its own way casts suspicion on the healthfulness of wheat.
Now Chibbar and Hucl have shown that the nutritional content of wheat is virtually unchanged over more than a century.
Davis has latched on to the idea that “virtually unchanged” allows that there have been slight changes. He argues they are enough to provoke the supposed health apocalypse of which he warns.
The message of Davis and other anti-wheat charlatans increasingly rings hollow as scientists such as Chibbar and Hucl debunk their hysterical allegations.
But as valuable as Chibbar and Hucl’s paper is in bringing scientific rationality to this anti-wheat fad and as extensively reported as it was, the mania will go on until the next irrational food obsession arises.
Our scientific illiteracy, reliance on infotainment and celebrity endorsements and suspicion of authority all play into food fads and conspiracy theories about big companies creating “Frankenfoods.”
Farmers might at times feel despair, but many have taken to social media to talk about how the application of science advances the productivity and safety of the food they produce, providing an alternative to the misinformation about farming and food production rampant on the web.
And they can make their members of Parliament know how important it is to ensure researchers such as Chibbar and Hucl have the resources they need to continue to understand and improve the crops that feed humanity.
