Measure would ban GMO food
By Keri Brenner, IJ reporter
Marin Independent Journal, 20 Sept 2004
http://www.marinij.com/Stories/0,1413,234~24407~2414348,00.html

Genetically modified crops bans on ballots in several counties

Leaders of Measure B, a Marin ballot measure to ban genetically altered crops, say they are bracing for an intense campaign over the next few weeks until the Nov. 2 elections.

"We're up against some real big money here," said Mark Squire of San Anselmo, of GMOFreeMarin, the measure's proponents. "The core of the issue is that big corporations are trying to direct our food choices and policies."

Squire, owner of Good Earth Natural Foods in Fairfax, said the organization has launched a major education drive on the issue. The campaign, he said, is to expose the truth about the dangers of genetically modified organisms to the nation's crops and food supplies.

A countywide forum is set for tomorrow in San Rafael, and other events - including an authors' talk Saturday at College of Marin and three showings of the film, "The Future of Food," by Deborah Koons-Garcia - are scheduled the next few weeks.

GMOFreeMarin, which has set up an office in San Anselmo, is seeking to raise $150,000 for mailings and other tools in the drive to counteract the anticipated biotech industry efforts.

But Lisa Dry, spokeswoman for the Washington, D.C.-based Biotechnology Industry Organization, a trade group, said her organization is not planning to flood Marin with an expensive promotional campaign as the biotech industry did in Mendocino County earlier this year.

CropLife America, a biotech industry trade group, spent a reported $621,000 in an unsuccessful campaign to defeat a genetically altered crops ban in Mendocino. Despite the influx of cash, some 56.5 percent of voters on March 2 approved the ban, making Mendocino one of the first counties in the nation to have such a law in place.

"As far as the Marin County ballot initiative, we do not plan to be actively engaged on the ground on this issue," Dry said. "We're not going to be funding a campaign such as the industry did in Mendocino."

Dry said the biotech industry instead plans to offer itself as a resource.

"The preference would be," she said, "(for) the local folks who are most engaged, that we will happily provide them with information, education and materials we have prepared that are based on our experience with the technology."

The Marin measure, if approved, would ban the cultivation of genetically altered crops in the unincorporated areas of the county, such as West Marin. The measure does not apply to biotech medical research firms and institutions.

More than 15,000 Marin residents signed petitions earlier this year to place the measure on the ballot - well more than the approximately 9,000 valid signatures needed.

Similar measures are on the Nov. 2 ballot in Butte, Humboldt and San Luis Obispo counties.

At issue, according to Squire, is efforts by firms such as Alleman, Iowa-based Monsanto Corp., makers of the herbicide Roundup, to hold the patents on seeds for various crops so they will have full control over food production.

"Their vision is that they are going to own the seeds," said Squire, of the biotech industry. "Farmers will no longer be independent, and will have to license the use of the seeds for a year from the corporations."

Monsanto and other biotech corporations claim their genetically modified canola, soybean and corn will aid production and reduce pesticide use.

"We believe farmers should have a choice to use the most modern tools of agriculture for their farming practices," Dry said.

But Squire said contamination by GMO crops puts farmers out of business.

Lawyers for Monsanto have sued or sent letters threatening to sue thousands for patent infringement, claiming farmers have stolen varieties of Monsanto's genetically modified crops they have found in their fields.

"The (biotech) industry is bending science for economic interests," Squire said.

One example is Percy Schmeiser, a farmer in Western Canada, who was forced to destroy all of the seed he developed over several decades after Monsanto claimed it found its Roundup-resistant canola plants on his farm. Schmeiser is featured in Koons-Garcia's film, which tells the stories of various large farmers claiming similar experiences.

Squire said GMO-contaminated crops are being turned away from export to Europe or Asia. The contamination, he said, can't be reversed because the seeds remain in circulation indefinitely. Once the crops are tainted, the farmer can lose overseas export opportunities.

"Most of the world is rejecting the GMO crops," he said, "or at least, they're regulating them heavily."

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