bit different from Blair and Haskins
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BBC Monitoring Europe - Political August 23, 2001, Thursday
SOURCE: Europe No 1 radio, Paris, in French 0620 gmt 23 Aug
The following is an  excerpt from an interview broadcast by French Europe 1 radio on 23 August:
Presenter: Elisabeth Martichoux
Guest: Agriculture Minister Jean Glavany.

Martichoux: GMOs, Genetically Modified Organisms , Jean Glavany, are directly part of your ministerial responsibility. Farmers' leader Jose Bove's Farmers' Confederation union pulled some up yesterday in the Gard department in south of France . They were experimental crops, not for sale, it needs to be said, which were torn up, but it is true that there is a risk, even with these experimental crops.

Glavany: Personally, I wanted to tell you that you need a lot of time to deal with this subject, because, personally, I think that one has to show care, great care, even distrust and great distrust regarding GMOs. First of all, because we have seen the damage that excesses in productivity can produce in agriculture. You then face certain crisis because some of these multinational seed companies have very expansionist, even, I mean, imperialist, aims. They want to control the world's food, and so I think that great care has to be taken and it is this government, and no other, which has had this moratorium in place for several years.

Martichoux: That you have maintained.

Glavany: That we are maintaining, and there is no question of it being lifted, on new GMO authorisations, but France is a law-based state. It is a democracy and a republic based on law and no one can take it upon themselves to destroy something that they don't like. And I say to the Farmers' Confederation activists, whom I respect and like, that they are not dispensers of justice in charge of laying down the law in France. Andpersonally, I want to say, that as much as I am distrustful of and careful about GMOs, I think that a window has to be left open for research...

Martichoux: Can't this research be done in confined areas?

Glavany: These are matters we are working on, because - it is a good question - effectively, if more care has to be taken with the tests, well, it seems like the least of things to me that tests, for example, that researchers who carry out research on the dangers of GMOs should be able to carry out their research calmly, in peace. At the same time, I am in favour of taking supplementary precautions regarding open field tests, and we are working on it.

Martichoux: Thanks Jean-Glavany.

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NGIN's greatest accolades:

"NGIN and all its members... should be ashamed of themselves." Julian Morris, Institute of Economic Affairs, UK, August 2001

"Personally, I distrust everything that comes from NGIN" Alex Avery, Hudson Institute, USA, January 2001

"Go get psychiatric help. The last thing the world needs now is more Nazis." Dr Malcolm Livingstone, CSIRO biotechnologist, Australia, November 2000

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