GMWatch News Review archive

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WEEKLY WATCH number 273
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from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:

The big news this week is the launch of our new website if you haven't already done so, please do visit it and tell us what you think: www.gmwatch.org

The UK government's overseas development agency DFID is still determinedly pouring taxpayers' money down the black hole of GM crops (FEEDING THE WORLD) while carefully ignoring the authoritative IAASTD report, which favours the tried and tested "agroecological" routes to food security.

And pesticides have been much in the news, with campaigners in the first and third worlds alike campaigning hard for justice (CORPORATE CRIMES: PESTICIDES).

Claire <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
www.gmwatch.org

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CONTENTS
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WE'RE BACK!
CORPORATE TAKEOVER OF SCIENCE
THE AMERICAS
AFRICA
FEEDING THE WORLD
CLIMATE CHANGE
CORPORATE CRIMES: PESTICIDES

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WE'RE BACK!
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+ GMWATCH LAUNCHES NEW MYTH-BUSTING WEBSITE
GMWatch has just launched its new website: www.gmwatch.org, which replaces the one forced offline by 14 months of cyber attacks.
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/11313-gmwatch-launches-new-my th-busting-website
OR http://tiny.cc/Gvptp

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CORPORATE TAKEOVER OF SCIENCE
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+ SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN CONDEMNS RESTRICTIONS ON GM RESEARCH
Scientists must ask corporations for permission before publishing independent research on GM crops. That restriction must end, says an editorial in Scientific American. The article says research on GM seeds is still published, but only studies that the seed companies have approved ever see the light of a peer-reviewed journal. In a number of cases, experiments that had the implicit go-ahead from the seed company were later blocked from publication because the results were not flattering.

The article says, "Unfortunately, it is impossible to verify that genetically modified crops perform as advertised. That is because agritech companies have given themselves veto power over the work of independent researchers."

The editorial concludes, "[We] believe food safety and environmental protection depend on making plant products available to regular scientific scrutiny. Agricultural technology companies should therefore immediately remove the restriction on research from their end-user agreements. Going forward, the EPA should also require, as a condition of approving the sale of new seeds, that independent researchers have unfettered access to all products currently on the market."
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/11311-scientific-american-con demns-restrictions-on-gm-research
OR http://tiny.cc/HPDie

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THE AMERICAS
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+ CANADA ABANDONS FIGHT WITH EUROPE OVER GM
The announcement that Canada has agreed to end its World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute with Europe over GM foods was greeted as a step forward by the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network. The Network says the agreement between Canada and Europe could lead to a much needed, comprehensive overhaul of Canada's policies on GM food including implementing the precautionary principle, ratifying the Biosafety Protocol, and establishing mandatory GM food labeling.

Canada and Europe have signed a final bilateral settlement which now leaves the US and Argentina alone in their WTO dispute with Europe over GM food. Canada's actions indicate a clear crack in the pro-GM front for the first time.

"It seems Canada saw no future in further pursuing the WTO dispute with Europe and has instead agreed to hold bi-annual meetings with the European Commission to discuss GM issues," said Lucy Sharratt of the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network. "Its about time our government began looking towards Europe as a model for reforming Canada's dangerously inadequate regulations of GM crops and foods."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=11309:canada -capitulates-and-abandons-fight-with-europe-at-the-wto
OR http://tiny.cc/W66Gb

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AFRICA
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+ ORGANIC FARMING COULD BE ANSWER TO FOOD INSECURITY
Commercial farmers sometimes fail at organic farming because they switch over too quickly, ditching all chemicals, which is as traumatic for the soil as "a drug addict going cold turkey".

This is how Cornelius Oosthuizen, the head of the South African Biofarm Institute's management team, explains why there are relatively few organic farming success stories in South Africa. The South African Biofarm Institute promotes sustainable and profitable biological and organic farming.

"Failure occurs when a farmer who has been using chemicals on a farm for a long time suddenly switches to 100 percent organic farming. If you have 1,000 hectares of land, you cannot start monoculture organic farming on all the land. One first has to farm biologically.

"If you suddenly take away all the chemicals from land that has been chemically farmed, it experiences trauma. It is like a drug addict that goes cold turkey."

The soil has to be primed - the micro and macro minerals have to be brought into balance; the ecological system has to be reinstated (there has to be robust insect and worm activity in the soil); and soil erosion has to be countered in various ways. With biological farming, non-harmful chemicals are used while organic farming does not permit the use of any kind of chemicals.

Some organic and sustainable farming projects have shown massive increases in yield.
http://www.ipsnews.net/africa/nota.asp?idnews=47704

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FEEDING THE WORLD
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+ UK TO SPEND GBP100 MILLION ON GM FOR POOR
Britain's Dept for International Development (DFID) is planning to quietly spend up to GBP100m on support for GM crops for the world's poor. A new white paper shows the government is committed to dramatically increasing spending on high-tech agriculture in the next five years, much of which will be on GM crop research. Biofortified crops, containing added vitamins, will receive GBP80m of development money, GBP60m will go on researching drought-resistant maize for Africa and a further GBP24m will be spent on pest resistance. In addition, support for an international network of GM crop research stations, in collaboration with GM companies, will be doubled. A further tranche of UK aid will go to a research initiative backed by the GM crop firm Syngenta, which is developing a strain of rice modified to increase vitamin A.

The white paper avoids the terms "genetically modified". But scientists and development experts are clear that much of the money will be spent on GM.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=11307:uk-to- spend-gbp100m-on-gm-crops
OR http://tiny.cc/wjE0E
GMWatch comment: This news comes hard on the heels of the call by Green Party leader Jeanette Fitzsimons in New Zealand for precious science funding not to be "poured down the black hole of GM crops". Policy makers need to look past their uncritical enthusiasm for GM crops at the real evidence on the best solutions to the complex problems the world faces.

+ DFID "HEADING DOWN A BLIND ALLEY" GM FREEZE
A new report from GM Freeze says that DFID's agriculture research strategy is heading down a blind alley. GM Freeze say DFID is "obsessed with GM crops" as a technical fix to hunger, and challenges ministers to adopt policies to build a strong research capability in agroecological farming in the UK.

This month's DFID White Paper specifically mentioned projects involving GM technology as "best bets" (for drought tolerance and vitamin enhancement) and pledges GBP140 million in support.

The report, Blind Alley, analyses how DFID has allocated agricultural research and development funding since 2000.

It finds a lack of transparency in how research institutions in receipt of UK grants spend the money. Many institutions, which are part of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), are given core funding to spend as they wish, without the need to account for how it is spent or to demonstrate tangible results from the research which actually improve the lives of poor farmers.

The CGIAR network of research institutes has benefited hugely from DFID funding since 2000. Many of its members are actively engaged in GM research. Earlier this year, Hilary Benn told a Select Committee that GBP11.3m were allocated to GM crop-related research in the UK by the the public funding body for the biological sciences, the BBSRC.

The new report also points to DFID's failure to make any changes to their agricultural R&D programs in response to the key findings of the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) published in 2008. This week's DFID White Paper fails to mention the report. The IAASTD report recommended that agroecological research should get greater priority, in particular to deal with the impacts of climate change and to enhance the production of food, fuel and fibre while still providing ecosystems services (eg, clean water) and protecting natural resources and biodiversity.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=11315:dfid-h eading-down-a-blind-alley
OR http://tiny.cc/BU7mc

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CLIMATE CHANGE
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+ NO TO DUBIOUS BIOTECHNO-FIXES FOR CLIMATE CHANGE
Several groups including Greenpeace, ETC Group and Biofuelwatch warned that the biotech lobby would mount a major green-washing public relations exercise during the Sixth Annual Conference on Industrial Biotechnology and Bioprocessing that will be held at the Palais de congres (19-22 July 2009).

During the Conference, the biotech industry presented various untested biotechnology innovations as solutions to climate change. “The biotech industry is seeking massive public and private investment for their untested technologies, whose health and environmental impacts have not been fully examined. Rather than be duped by yet another green mirage, governments should invest in real solutions to climate change and get serious about reducing CO2 emissions and commit to solutions that we know work -- like energy saving," says Eric Darier, Director of Greenpeace in Quebec.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=11308:biotec h-fixes-and-patents-denounced
OR http://tiny.cc/0zWkC

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CORPORATE CRIMES: PESTICIDES
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+ GMOs = PESTICIDES
With research[1] and local reports[2] all pointing to the devastating impact of Roundup on the health of rural communities where Monsanto's GM Roundup Ready crops are extensively grown, it's a useful reminder that the GM corporations are also the world's largest pesticide producrers[3] with a long and terrible legacy of toxic pollution.[4]

It's not for nothing that the vast majority of GM crops planted worldwide (80%+) involve herbicide tolerance. GM crops have contributed substantially to increased pesticide use and that's not something that's going to change - most new GM crop varieties coming through the pipeline are also pesticide-promoting.

As lawyer Andrew Kimbrell, director of the Center for Food Safety, notes, "All those dreams... the blind will see, the lame will walk... has turned out to be science fiction. They are basically chemical companies selling more chemicals."

It's in this context that we need to see the struggles for justice of pesticide victims worldwide. The GM industry has shown it is about extending and intensifying the agrochemical nightmare.
NOTES:
[1]http://americas.irc-online.org/am/6254
[2]http://www.lasojamata.org/
[3]http://www.etcgroup.org/en/materials/publications.html?pub_id=707
[4]http://www.theecologist.co.uk/pages/archive_detail.asp?content_id=753

+ PROBLEMS WITH ROUNDUP
Roundup is manufactured by Monsanto and is based on a chemical called glyphosate, which disrupts many processes in plant cells causing their death. Roundup is taken up by plants and transported to all parts, so it kills the whole plant. Monsanto rely heavily on global sales of Roundup for their profits. To ensure sales continued to rise when their patent on glyphosate ran out in 2000, the company produced glyphosate-tolerant crops (known as Roundup Ready, or RR) by genetically engineering a bacterium gene into crops such as soya and maize. RR crops have been taken up in North and South America (especially RR soya), and as a result Roundup sales have soured, and with them Monsanto's profits. Roundup as sold to farmers, growers and gardeners is a mixture of glyphosate and other chemicals, called adjuvants, that help the product stick to the leaves of plants thus allowing glyphosate to enter cells more easily and kill them. On its own, glyphosate is far less effective as a weed killer.

New Research
A team from CRIIGEN based in France compared the toxicity of various types of Roundup on sale with that of glyphosate alone, the breakdown product of glyphosate and one common adjuvant on three types of human cells (human umbilical, embryonic, and placental cells). The result was dramatic the Roundup formulations caused "total cell death within 24 hours", which was significantly more toxic than glyphosate, its breakdown product and one commonly used adjuvant on their own. This effect was even observed at very low concentration: the researchers diluted Roundup by 100,000 times for the purposes of the experiments. This concentration is much lower than that used for the Roundup sprayed from tractors and corresponds to the residues that might be expected in RR soya after spraying.

Residues in Food
Pesticide residues in foods are supposed to be below an internationally agreed Maximum Residue Level (MRL). When RR soya was introduced in the 1990s, the MRL for glyphosate in soya was raised from 0.1mg/kg to 20mg/kg (ie, raised 200 times) to accommodate the newly developing trade in GM soya. No RR GM crops are approved for commercial cultivation in the EU, so at present this MRL only applies to imported crops.

Roundup is used in the UK to kill off cereals and oilseed rape crops just before they are due to be harvested to make sure the grain and seeds are thoroughly dried out. Residue monitoring results in 2006-08 revealed that 27% of cereals, flour and bread samples contained glyphosate residues, one as high as 3.8mg/kg. Samples of soya-based foods sold in the UK have been taken in small numbers. The results of this monitoring showed that Brazilian manufactured tofu/soya pieces contained glyphosate residues up to 1.1mg/kg. However, there was no indication whether this was produced using GM soya or not. There is no data available for the breakdown products of glyphosate or the common adjuvants.

There is no doubt that consumers can be exposed to low levels of glyphosate via residues in food. The position in animal feed, where the bulk of RR GM crops imported into the UK are used, is not clear because no residue monitoring data is available.

Farmers and Bystanders
The groups of people most at risk of being exposed to Roundup are the farmers who spray it and people who live in areas where the product is heavily used, such as the soya belts in Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil. The spraying of Roundup from aircraft is permitted in Argentina and Paraguay, increasing the risk of spray drifting from field onto neighbouring farms and housing areas. Research into the health of rural people in these areas is very limited at present.

Regulatory Weaknesses
The approval of GM crops and pesticides in the EU involved two regulatory systems. Neither process requires that the toxicity of Roundup as sold to farmers be tested. The GM crop approval system has a limited requirement for toxicity testing based on short term laboratory feeding studies of the GM crop.

Pesticide approvals require more toxicity tests using a wider range of laboratory animals for longer periods. Crucially, however, individual Roundup products are not tested in this way. Instead, glyphosate and the adjuvants mixed with it to make up Roundup are tested and approved separately, despite the fact that it is known that, "Carrier solvents used in commercial formulations may change toxicological properties." Thus there is a serious gap in the regulatory system, which leaves people and animals exposed to a product which may be far more toxic and dangerous in its commercial form than stated by the manufacturer or regulators on labels.
MORE INFORMATION: GM Freeze's full briefing on this important issue is available at
www.gmfreeze.org/uploads/D8C_seralini_long_doc_final.pdf.
For copies of the research carried out by CRIIGEN contact at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

+ PARAGUAY: STOP INDUSTRY'S PRO-PESTICIDE LAW
Paraguay has turned into the world's 4th biggest soy exporting country. Monsanto's Roundup Ready soy, destined for the agroindustry in Europe and China, currently takes up over 2 million hectares in Paraguay. These monocultures require intensive chemical spraying that impacts the health of rural populations.

Thousands of small farmers and indigenous people have been forced to leave their communities, because the living conditions have deteriorated enormously because of the contamination. They end up in poverty in the cities.

Recently, the Paraguayan Congress has approved a new law that favours the indiscriminate use of agrochemicals. This law was written by the agribusiness lobby and will leave the population without protection. President Lugo has the power to veto this law and send it back for revision to the Congress. Please sign the letter to President Lugo, asking him to veto the law.
English translation of the protest letter here:
http://www.regenwald.org/international/englisch/protestaktion.php?id=423&zusatz= 1
TAKE ACTION - SIGN THE LETTER HERE:
http://www.regenwald.org/international/englisch/protestaktion.php?id=423
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/11314-victims-of-pesticides-f ight-for-justice
OR http://tiny.cc/tXBeq

+ UK: "PESTICIDE NUN" LOSES CASE AFTER LEGAL ANOMALY
In July 2009 pesticide campaigner Georgina Downs (known as the "pesticide nun" because of her closeted lifestyle after her health was damaged by pesticides) has lost her case against the UK government in the Court of Appeal. This followed a victory for Downs over the government at the High Court in November 2008, which The Times reported as "a landmark case that could halt crop spraying":
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5161219.ece

That High Court Judgment was clear, with the Judge, Mr Justice Collins, concluding that Downs had produced "cogent arguments and evidence" that had been "scientifically justified." He also concluded that Downs had produced "solid evidence that residents have suffered harm to their health."

Mr Justice Collins added that he was in "no doubt" that the Government had been acting unlawfully in its policy and approach in relation to the use of pesticides in crop spraying, and that public health, in particular rural residents and communities exposed to pesticides from living near sprayed fields, was not being protected (and this applied to both acute and chronic long term adverse health effects).

The UK government appealed against the judgment, resulting in the Court of Appeal case earlier in July 2009. According to Downs, the judge in the Court of Appeal substituted another, less cogently argued and out of date, case for the evidence she had presented in the High Court case.
Her statement is here: http://www.pesticidescampaign.co.uk/documents/georginaStatement7july09.doc
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/11314-victims-of-pesticides-f ight-for-justice
OR http://tiny.cc/tXBeq

+ VICTIMS OF PESTICIDES ORGANIZE THEMSELVES IN FRANCE
The Movement for the rights and respect for future generations has launched a network for the victims of pesticides. This association, which has campaigned for pesticide-free agriculture for fifteen years, is sought out by "many individuals who find they have no way to defend himself against the sprays as the legislation is virtually nonexistent," says François Veillerette, President of the Movement. Some of those who approach the Movement for help are "penitent" agrochemical farmers who have become ill from sprays.

The Movement for the rights and respect for future generations calls for the banning of pesticides in the city, in parks, gardens and playgrounds, "so as to prevent children whose ball lands on the lawn from touching and swallowing them.” It also calls for the establishment of buffer zones, between homes and spray zones. And "so that the law is respected, it must be accompanied by stringent criminal penalties," says Veillerette. He hopes that the Government seizes the opportunity to bring in a European directive governing the use of pesticides to introduce these provisions.
Original article in French
http://www.lemonde.fr/aujourd-hui/article/2009/07/17/les-victimes-des-pesticides-s-organisent-pour-faire-reconnaitre-leurs-maladies_1219976_3238.html
GMWatch translation into English
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/11314-victims-of-pesticides-fight-for-justice
OR http://tiny.cc/tXBeq