FOCUS ON ASIA
http://www.gmwatch.org/asia.asp

Very clear article on what's happening in Thailand.
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Thai government admits GM contamination over papaya crops
BANGKOK (AFP), Sep 14, 2004
http://www.terradaily.com/2004/040914112130.5i3g3rqf.html

Agence France-Presse: Thailand admitted Tuesday that genetically modified papaya at a state-run experimental centre had contaminated surrounding fruit farms, in a blow to the government's agriculture policy.

Agriculture Minister Somsak Thepsuthin said a papaya sample from a farm in the northeast was found to be contaminated. His admission followed months of complaints by environmentalists about the dangers of GM testing.

Greenpeace had said loose controls at the state-run farm in Khon Kaen province were responsible for potentially one of the worst cases of genetic contamination of a major food crop in Asia.

Somsak said crops at the affected non-GM papaya farm would be destroyed and a protective ring established to try to control the contamination, according to a ministry statement.

He said the department had discovered the contaminated sample after testing fruit from less than a 10th of the 2,600 farmers in the province who had bought seeds from the state-run centre.

"We will set up a committee to find out how it spread to farmers," the agriculture minister said. He added legal action would be taken against those responsible.

Thai law forbids the public sale of GM seeds and requires products containing more than five percent of a genetically modified ingredient to be labelled.

Greenpeace in July accused the Thai government of illegally selling GM papaya seeds after the environmental group raided the state-owned farm and conducted its own tests.

It said they showed a non-GM farmer's field 60 kilometres (38 miles) from the state-run centre had been contaminated.

Dr. Jiragorn Gajaseni, executive director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, said the government farm had to be shut immediately.

He said there was no proof GM foods were safe for the environment or human health and called for more transparency over testing and crucial evidence of contamination.

"It's become very clear... the chances of contamination are very high. It must be closed," he told AFP.

Concerns over papaya contamination have prompted European importers to cancel orders of Thai fruit cocktails, according to reports.

Thailand grew 300,000 tonnes of papaya in 2002 with about one percent, worth one million dollars, exported.

The government previously backed the expansion of GM food testing and said there were adequate safeguards to prevent contamination.

But it was forced to back down from a planned move to relax three-year old regulations banning open field trials in the face of fierce opposition.

It announced a new study two weeks ago to decide if trials should be delayed or even abandoned but activists claimed it was a delaying tactic to allow an information campaign to get a sceptical public onside.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has been accused of bowing to pressure from US corporate GM giants like Monsanto to reverse the trial ban, a charge he has fiercely denied.

The United States is the world's biggest GM producer but has struggled to persuade other nations to accept the products.

However in Asia, the Philippines and China already have huge plantations producing GM crops such as corn and cotton.