"The controversies in Thailand over GM research, contamination and food safety have brought the consumer movement closer to the farmer movement. We are all fighting for our food safety, our food security and our food sovereignty. I believe in the power of the people. We the people can shape and choose our future."
------

Speech on GMOs & Food Safety in the context of Thailand society
By Witoon Lianchamroon, Director of BioThai, Thailand
Global Forum of Food Safety Regulators - organised by the WHO and the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), Oct. 12 - 14 2004 at UN - Bangkok
http://www.biothai.org/cgi-bin/content/news/show.pl?0381

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Thank you very much for attending this informal meeting on GMOs & food safety issues. It's an honor for me to discuss these issues with delegates from the FAO-WHO meeting on Food Safety, the general public and the media.

As you know, the GM issue is once again a very hot topic in Thailand. Last month we learned that GM papayas from the experimental field in Khonkaen province have been leaked to the farmer fields.

In my point of view, the leaking of GM plants to farmers' fields is very important for the food safety issue. In Thailand, and most developing countries, small farmers are the majority of our population. They run their farms and consume the product from their own land. The proportion of people that depend on food coming from their farms is different from country to country. In the case of Thailand, 30-40 % of food that farmers consume comes from their own farm. Globally, I think the percentage is 70%.

With this in mind, I would like to share some concerns :

1. I strongly support the idea that GM labeling policies should respect the right of all consumers. Consumers groups in Thailand are trying to secure strict labeling regulations following the EU model. However, we have been facing a lot of pressure from the US government ever since we launched our GM labeling discussions in 2002. I hope the Thai process will succeed in developing its own policy. I also feel the US government should respect the American consumers' voices. According to Dr. Hansen, over 80% of US citizens want GM labeling and more than a half do not want GM products. I
support the right of Europe and the US to develop their own policies, and under no circumstances should GM labeling regulations be interpreted as a barrier to trade.

2. But to respect the right of the majority of consumers -- those who consume mainly food from their own farm or community -- we should pay more attention to the problem of contamination of GM plants in our agriculture systems. The spread of unapproved GM crops like the case of GM papaya in Thailand is very serious for the food safety issue. Unacceptable cases of this are happening again and again, both in Thailand and the rest of the
world. It has become very clear to the Thai people that we cannot allow a small groups of scientists, or even the government, to take decisions alone about running field trials of GM crops. The best way to control contamination is to stop all GM field trials. I have participated in many public debates in Thailand on this issues over the past couple of months. And we have found that if you give people enough information both for and against GM crops, 80% of the people say no to the planting of GM crops and 65% say they are against GM research!

3. When GMOs leak into the environment -- and it doesn't matter if they are approved or unapproved -- no one can control pollination and no one can prevent contamination. This causes problems not only in terms of food safety, but with our whole food system. When the GM papayas first contaminated Thai farmers' fields, we only knew that those GM papayas belonged to Cornell University and Monsanto. Since then, we have learned that because of the patents involved, Thai people would have to pay license fees when we export the papaya to the world market. The fee could represent 10-35% of the price of the export. We were very angry when we further learned that the Thai strain of the virus used in this GM papaya research will be the property of Cornell University. By pushing GM technology and products on us, transnational corporations and industrialized countries are going to control our biodiversity, our agriculture and our food system.

4. I myself believe that the people -- not the corporations -- should decide if we go down the road to GM food systems or not. Our prime minister said in the beginning of September that Thailand has to promote GM crops, that we cannot miss the GM train. However, he was forced to change his mind one week later because his cabinet faced very strong resistance from Thai farmer organizations, consumers groups, the Buddhist community, NGOs and many local businesses.

The controversies in Thailand over GM research, contamination and food safety have brought the consumer movement closer to the farmer movement. We are all fighting for our food safety, our food security and our food sovereignty. I believe in the power of the people. We the people can shape and choose our future.

Thank you.