1.ASA warns GM ban retaliation
2.ASA lobbying in EU
3.Profile of ASA
NOTE: Extracts only.
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1.ASA warns GM ban retaliation
By Alex McNally
http://www.foodnavigator.com/news/ng.asp?n=82837
28/01/2008 - The American Soybean Association has warned there could be 'massive retaliation' on Europe if the bloc does not speed up a system for approving GM crops.
At the moment, industry has been loosing millions because producers who use GM crops are restricted in exporting them to the European Union, because of an EU moratorium on the use of GM crops.
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2.ASA Supports USG on WTO Ruling against the EU on Biotechnology
January 24 2008”¦ Saint Louis, Missouri”¦ The http://www.soygrowers.com/newsroom/releases/2008_releases/r012408.htm
...To gain support among industry stakeholders, ASA has also been conducting advocacy missions to the EU to educate and motivate key livestock, feed industry, EU and Member State officials about the soy [GM] events now being developed.
'Some EU officials and Member States are finally beginning to speak out publicly against the EU's ill-functioning biotech approval system,' Dodson said. 'ASA's Biotech Working Group is serving an important function because we are finding stakeholders and officials that are very unaware of the issue and its possible consequences for the European feed and livestock industries. They have expressed appreciation for the briefings and asked for the continued support of U.S. soybean growers.'
ASA is the policy advocate and collective voice of its 22,000 producer-members on domestic and international issues of importance to all U.S. soybean farmers.
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3.American Soybean Association (ASA)
http://www.lobbywatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=10&page=A
The American Soybean Association (ASA) claims to be 'a non-profit, farmer-controlled organisation working to strengthen soybeans as a viable crop' but it enjoys a remarkably close relationship with Monsanto and other biotech corporations.
In fiscal year 2000 it received $2.1 million of its $26.7 million budget from Monsanto, Pioneer Hi-Bred International, BASF, Stein Seed Co. and others, says controller Brian Vaught. (Source: CropChoice)
In 2001, the Association spent $280,000 to work with the Council for Biotechnology Information and the National Corn Growers to achieve 'a unified message about the benefits of transgenic crops.' (Source: CropChoice)
That message has been brought to Europe where ASA Technical Director, Kimball Nill, warns, 'Various pressure groups and some media are hoodwinking the public by making unsubstantiated assertions about US farmers adoption of biotechnology. Their random statements are ludicrous, untrue and deliberately misleading'.
Some US farmers feel ASA and similar groups 'are helping agribusiness to enhance its power and profitability at the expense of the very people they’re supposed to represent farmers.' (Source: CropChoice)