GMWatch News Review archive

GMWATCH MONTHLY REVIEW No. 105

From Claire Robinson, Monthly Review editor
Website: http//www.gmwatch.org
Profiles: http://bit.ly/12UAI2
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GMWatch
Facebook: http://bit.ly/c6OnaX

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CONTENTS  
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LATEST NEWS:
GM WHEAT LOBBYWATCH
OTHER LOBBYWATCH NEWS
RESISTANCE
CORPORATE TAKEOVER
GM FAILURES
WORLD HUNGER
LABELLING
CONTAMINATION
CORPORATE CRIMES

REST OF THE MONTH'S NEW IN BRIEF

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LATEST NEWS
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GM WHEAT LOBBYWATCH
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+ STATEMENT BY THE GM WHEAT PROTESTERS
More than 400 growers, bakers and families from across England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, France and Belgium marched at Rothamsted against the return of open air GM field testing.
http://taketheflourback.org/

+ PROTEST OVER GM WHEAT STUDY
Worth watching this Channel 4 News report on the Rothamsted protest for the debate it includes between Theo Simon of Take the Flour Back and Prof. Graham Jellis.
http://www.channel4.com/news/protest-over-gm-wheat-study
GM debate between Take the Flour Back and Rothamsted Research

+ GM LOBBY STILL TRYING TO FORCE-FEED US GMOs
Rothamsted's GM wheat trial is "reckless" and GM has "dismally failed to live up to the expectations of its cheerleaders", says food writer Joanna Blythman in an excellent article in the Daily Mail.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13954
Some photos from the protest with the article
http://bit.ly/JKej7e

+ ROTHAMSTED "VANDAL" CAUSES DAMAGE AT GM WHEAT TRIAL
Ahead of the protest, Devon farmer and anti-GM activist Hector Christie was said to have caused "significant damage" at the Rothamsted Research institute but failed to disrupt the GM aphid-resistant wheat trial. He was arrested by Hertfordshire police and charged with criminal damage.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13933
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13957
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13947

+ DO WE NEED THE GM WHEAT TRIAL?
The disconnect between the UK's farmers and scientists has never been better illustrated than Rothamsted's decision to conduct a GM wheat trial, writes Pete Riley in an article for Farmers Weekly. This lack of communication means that decisions about how to spend limited public money are made by people with a narrow mindset, more preoccupied with the technology than its application or need. The UK scientific establishment's promotion of "sustainable intensification" (GM + chemical farming) seems to have been accepted with the same political naivety that gave us unregulated banking. Alongside Riley's article, Farmers Weekly published an opposing view from Julian Little of the industry lobby group, the Agricultural Biotechnology Council.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13942

+ INSIDE STORY OF THE GM WHEAT TRIAL PR CAMPAIGN
The PR campaign in support of the GM wheat trial was treated uncritically by much of the media, as explained in an article by GMWatch's Jonathan Matthews. Jonathan shows why it's worth taking a glimpse below the surface of the 'Don't Destroy Research' campaign and its claims to the moral high ground.
http://gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13957
More on this story: http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13957
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13937
http://gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13945
More on Tracey Brown cosying up to Big Tobacco: http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13930

+ NFU PRESIDENT FORCED TO DEFEND "NAZI" ACCUSATIONS
NFU president Peter Kendall was forced to defend his ill-advised comments comparing a man arrested for interfering with the GM wheat trial with "Nazi book burners" who destroyed texts that did not conform with Nazi ideology in 1930s Germany. Kendall qualified his remarks following an interview on BBC radio and a Twitter storm in which he was accused of "overstepping the line" and "headline grabbing."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13947

+ JOURNALISTS "UNQUESTIONING AND SUPINE" OVER GM WHEAT
Lawrence Woodward, former director of Elm Farm Organic Research Center, says that journalists "seem to have been hypnotised into a state where they have been incapable of asking any penetrating questions and ignoring the inconsistencies in the Rothamsted statements". After being "appalled" by coverage of the GM wheat trial in the Guardian, Woodward wrote, "There have been a couple of versions of what the trial is about; discrepancies between early statements about the interest and engagement from industry and later ones saying that it has no industry focus at all; a lack of clarity about the characteristics and provenance of the genes and the trial protocols; and a string of different stories about why Spring Wheat - a crop where aphids are a relatively minor problem - was used, all of which raise questions. Running these inconsistencies to ground may be beyond the time or capacity of today's media, but highlighting that Rothamsted hasn't had its story straight and investigat
 ing why
not must surely be within the capability of at least one journalist, even if they are unlikely to be employed by The Guardian."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13958

+ SCIENTIST'S RESPONSE TO THE ROTHAMSTED GM WHEAT TRIAL
A critique of the Rothamsted trial from an anonymous scientist says, "The public is not so stupid or gullible as you think. In fact, many of us are fellow scientists and do not accept that your narrow, corporate-dependent approach will 'save the world', produce nutritious crops to end starvation and malnutrition, or lead to a more ecological way of farming. Quite the opposite."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13958

+ GM WHEAT NOT NEEDED
Organic farmers do not have problems with aphids or a disease that they carry, called Barley Yellow Dwarf Virus (BYDV), in cereal crops, says an article from an excellent new web resource, http://www.gmeducation.org/. A combination of rotations, the avoidance of soluble nitrogen fertiliser, later sowing dates, an active soil microbial population, hedgerows and floristically diverse field margins that encourage aphid predators provide a successful control strategy.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13946
Organic aphid control with lemon juice: http://www.fennelandfern.co.uk/blog/2012/06/08/how-to-control-aphids-organically/

+ BACKGROUND ON ROTHAMSTED RESEARCH
http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Rothamsted_Research
Profile of the director of Rothamsted, Maurice Moloney, who has a long history of GM industry interests.  
http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Maurice_Moloney
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13896

+ GM FARMER ATTACKS GM WHEAT TRIAL
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13917

+ GM WHEAT OUTCROSSES SIX TIMES MORE THAN NON-GM
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13898

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OTHER LOBBYWATCH NEWS
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+ GEEK-OCRACY OR DEMOCRACY?
Mark Henderson, head of communications of the Wellcome Trust, a medical charity based in London, has written a book called 'The Geek Manifesto: Why Science Matters'. The book argues, through a range of cases - including GM crops - that scientists need to stand up and be counted, and that evidence-based policy is losing out in favour of emotional, ideological or plain ill-informed debate. The scientists - the geeks - need to fight back and, if possible, take over, making inroads into politics to ensure that ill-informed policies are banished in favour of science-led enlightenment.

But Ian Scoones, co-director of the ESRC STEPS Centre and professorial fellow at the Institute of Development Studies, disagrees, arguing, "The job of scientists is to provide the data, in collaboration with other knowledge holders and experts including the public, and let a more open, democratic process be the judge and make the decisions. This is not a dark age of unreason, but a mature democratic approach to science and policymaking." Scoones says Henderson lays out "a linear, technocratic vision - where science leads politics. This is a potentially highly dangerous view. A democratic political process, surely, should have a more accountable relationship with scientific expertise."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13956

+ EX-MONSANTO EMPLOYEE REJECTED FOR EFSA
In a remarkable victory for democracy, EU member states have rejected ex-Monsanto employee and food industry lobbyist Mella Frewen from the management board of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). Frewen had been nominated by the European Commission after a stormy year of debate about conflicts of interest at EFSA. Corporate Europe Observatory revealed last year that no less than four members of the EFSA management board had links to industry. CEO and other groups argued that there is no justification to have industry lobbyists on the board of EFSA, which is supposed to be an independent agency.
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13975

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RESISTANCE
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+ RAJASTHAN BANS GM MUSTARD TRIAL
The Rajasthan Government has withdrawn its "no objection certificate" (NOC) given for conducting a GM mustard field trial.
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13980

+ RICHMOND, CANADA BANS GM CROPS
The Councillors of Richmond, British Columbia, Canada have voted unanimously to ban further GM crops from Richmond soil. Industry lobby group CropLife is lobbying against the ban.
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13951
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13953

+ ZAC GOLDSMITH UNDERLINES HIS OPPOSITION TO GM
The intense focus on climate change in the last decade has encouraged politicians and green groups to drop key green issues like biodiversity and food and avoid reform of the economic system, said the Conservative MP and former editor of The Ecologist, Zac Goldsmith.

In a video interview with John Vidal of The Guardian, Goldsmith said, "Climate change went too far. A lot of stuff slipped off the agenda. The environment became about carbon and not the environment that you can feel and touch and see. Food, biodiversity, air quality all got knocked off. When we talked about forests we talked about them as sticks of carbon.

"If you are just looking only at climate change you do not really have to address the economic system in the same way. By focusing so much on carbon it allowed us to take our eye off the ball."

Zac, who, while editing the Ecologist, came under attack from Monsanto, underlined his long-standing opposition to GM food: "GM was never about feeding the world or environmental problems, but about control of the entire food system by a handful of very powerful companies. The war continues."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13961

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CORPORATE TAKEOVER
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+ BIOTECH PROPOSAL WOULD BYPASS COURTS
A provision in a US bill would allow farmers to grow GM crops while court battles are under way to decide if the plants are safe, said Andrew Kimbrell, of the Center for Food Safety, which frequently sues the government over its approval of GM crops. Kimbrell called the idea an unprecedented muzzle on federal judges. The provision, buried in a funding bill for the Agriculture Department, obliges USDA to approve cultivation of a GM crop while USDA completes "any required analyses or consultations" to decide if the crop is safe to plant. "We can't find a single legislative precedent to this," said Kimbrell, who added that the provision would prevent judges from issuing injunctions against cultivation while courts decide if a crop poses a risk.
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13981

+ INDIA'S GENE BANKS OFFERED TO CORPORATIONS
A director of the Indian Council For Agricultural Research, Dr S K Datta, has offered India's gene banks for sale to multinational corporations, ostensibly in exchange for their expertise in developing high-yielding, climate-tolerant seeds - conveniently forgetting that farmers have evolved such traits over millennia.

GMWatch has long held that gene banks are NOT the answer to losses in biodiversity. Always prone to being sold off to corporations, gene banks have also been the focus of controversy over lack of access to seed stocks for the farmers who contributed the seeds, the often poor conditions in which seeds are kept, and lack of certainty about whether stored seeds will be viable when they are retrieved from storage for planting. The true "gene banks" are the farmers worldwide who conserve and replant locally adapted seeds.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13940

+ NEW ALLIANCE IGNORES AFRICAN FARMERS
At the G8 meeting, US president Obama announced the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition - a $3 billion corporate investment initiative to end hunger in Africa. But the Alliance apparently failed to consult with those who will be most affected by its programs: African farmers. Here's what they told their leaders about having the global monopolies and the G8 decide their futures: "We must build our food policy on our own resources as is done in the other regions of the world. The G8 and the G20 can in no way be considered appropriate fora for decisions of this nature." In case there was any doubt about which corporate projects African farmers see as compromising their food sovereignty, they identified them by name: AGRA (Bill Gates' Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa), the World Economic Forum where 'Grow Africa' was launched, and USAID's approval of the 'New Alliance for Food Security'.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13955
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13927
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13924

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GM FAILURES
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+ GM CROPS TOXIC AND UNSAFE
In Andhra Pradesh, India, during the 2011 season, the majority of the acres planted with Bt cotton suffered from crop failure, writes the director of the Deccan Development Society, P.V. Satheesh. After 10 years of Bt cotton cultivation, yields are less than the pre-Bt days and soil is increasingly toxic. During the seven years of study of Bt cotton in Warangal, non-pesticide management (NPM) methods of cotton cultivation showed 20% to 50% less costs on pesticides compared to Bt cotton, proving the "low pesticide use" argument blatantly false.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13934

+ GM NOT SOLVING DROUGHT PROBLEM
A new report by the Union of Concerned Scientists explains why attempts to genetically engineer drought tolerance into crops have failed:
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13960

+ GM DROUGHT-TOLERANT CORN NOT MUCH USE IN A DROUGHT
Monsanto's new drought tolerant corn, DroughtGard, reduces crop losses only modestly during moderate droughts, and will not reduce the crop's water requirements, according to the new report by the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS). The report found that traditional breeding and improved farming practices have done more to increase drought tolerance, and that further improvements in genetic engineering are unlikely to solve the drought problem in coming years.
http://organicconnectmag.com/wp/report-monsantos-droughtgard-corn-not-much-use-in-a-drought/

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WORLD HUNGER
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+ AS GRAIN PILES UP, INDIA'S POOR STILL GO HUNGRY
While India's poor go hungry, excess grain stocks are rotting in storage, according to a report in the New York Times. Spurred by agricultural innovation and generous farm subsidies, India now grows so much food that it has a bigger grain stockpile than any country except China, and exports some of it. Yet one-fifth of its people are malnourished because of corruption, mismanagement and waste in the programs that are supposed to distribute food to the poor.

"The reason we are facing this problem is our refusal to distribute the grain that we buy from farmers to the people who need it," said Biraj Patniak, a lawyer who advises India's Supreme Court on food issues. "The only place that this grain deserves to be is in the stomachs of the people who are hungry."

In a separate article written a year ago, anthropologist Glenn Davis Stone said of the biotechnology companies' 'solution' to the hunger problem, "Just exactly how are their technologies going to feed hungry Indians when over 30 million tons of excess grain can't?" According to the New York Times, the excess now stands at over 70 million tons, and Devinder Sharma tells us the true figure is now over 80 million tons.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13964

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LABELLING
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+ MEET THE CORPORATE FRONT GROUPS FIGHTING GM LABELLING
Who's behind the anti-GM labelling advertising blitz soon to hit the California airwaves? A former mouthpiece for tobacco and big oil, a corporate-interest PR flack, and the regional director of a Monsanto-funded tort reform group, among others. Californian voters, read this and immunise yourselves - and remember, there's no evidence that food prices have increased anywhere that GM foods are labelled.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13959

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CONTAMINATION
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+ INDIA DENIES GM CONTAMINATION OF BASMATI RICE
The Indian government has denied allegations by the European Commission of GM contamination of basmati rice imported from India. The Indian government, in its reply to the director general of the Health and Consumers division (DGHC) of the European Commission, said no GM food crops are being grown in India and so there is no question of contamination. However, the issue of GM contamination of basmati rice was raised at a meeting of the Convention on Biological Diversity in India on May 29. At the meeting Aruna Rodrigues, lead petitioner in a public interest litigation seeking moratorium on GM testing in the country, questioned the silence of the commerce ministry on the issue. She said that considering the way field trials are regulated and monitored in India, GM contamination could not be denied. In April this year, Richard Werran, managing director of food certification firm Cert ID Europe, said unauthorised GMOs had been turning up in consignments of basmati rice from India and Pakistan.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13963

+ ILLEGAL GM RAPESEED SPREADS IN SWITZERLAND
GM rapeseed has been found to be spreading along railway tracks and in a port in Switzerland. Volunteers from Greenpeace collected the samples and sent them to local authorities. Growing GMOs outside labs is illegal in Switzerland.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13962

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CORPORATE CRIMES
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+ GM MOSQUITOES FLY THROUGH REGULATORY GAPS
British biotech firm Oxitec released GM mosquitoes in the Cayman Islands and Malaysia in an atmosphere of secrecy, with an absence of public and scientific debate, and in a regulatory vacuum, say critics of the project.
http://gmwatch.eu/latest-listing/1-news-items/13978
TAKE ACTION: GM mosquito petitions
http://www.gmofreeflorida.com/action.html

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REST OF THE MONTH'S NEWS IN BRIEF
For those who do not receive our GMWatch Review
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+ EUROPE SLEEPWALKING INTO GM SOY CATASTROPHE
Following revelations by Danish pig farmers that GM soy feed caused health damage and malformations in their animals, GM-Free Cymru warned, "Europe is sleep-walking into a GM soy catastrophe." The group reminded European health and consumer policy commissioner John Dalli that there is a growing body of evidence of severe problems associated with the import and use of GM soy. The group also warned of the problem of glyphosate residues in feed and straw litter. Spokesman Dr Brian John said the EU had an "extraordinary overdependency" on imported GM soy.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13901

+ EFSA CHAIR MOVES TO FOOD INDUSTRY LOBBY GROUP
In a move that may signal a new willingness to crack down on corporate lobbying in public agencies, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has demanded that Diana Banati resign as chair of its management board because she is rejoining the board of the International Life Sciences Institute Europe (ILSI), an industry-backed lobby group with members including Monsanto and Syngenta.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13910

+ EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT REFUSES TO APPROVE EFSA'S BUDGET OVER CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
The European Parliament voted to adopt a report by Monica Macovei MEP, deciding that the approval of the European Food Safety Authority's 2010 budget will be postponed. Also, a resolution was adopted denouncing the conflicts of interest that have plagued the agency. Nina Holland of Corporate Europe Observatory said: "This vote is a very important signal that conflicts of interests with industry are not acceptable."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13914

+ MORRISONS' GM MUCK-UP
Morrisons' decision to allow its farmers to use GM feed looks spectacularly ill-informed and dumb, when Carrefour labels own-label meat and dairy products as GM animal feed-free, or 'Nourri sans OGM'. If the world's second largest retailer can guarantee customers the field-to-fork GM-free food they demand, then Morrisons can too, writes food writer Joanna Blythman.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13903

+ PUBLIC RESEARCH, PRIVATE GAIN: CORPORATE TAKEOVER OF UNIVERSITIES
Nearly a quarter of funding for agricultural research at land-grant universities comes from private and corporate donations, leading to the sector being overrun by narrow corporate interests, says a report by Food & Water Watch.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13915
Download report:
http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/reports/public-research-private-gain/

+ TRAGIC TOLL OF GM SEEDS IN INDIA
A new documentary film, Bitter Seeds, describes the devastation wreaked on India's farmers by Monsanto's Bt cotton.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13908

+ THE TRUTH ABOUT BT COTTON
GM promoters are in panic about a flurry of revelations about the performance of Bt cotton in India, including a leaked advisory from the government blaming the crop for the high numbers of farmer suicides. Biotech promoters say in response (truthfully) that overall cotton production has gone up in India since the arrival of Bt cotton. But Kavitha Kuruganti, convenor of the Alliance for Sustainable and Holistic Agriculture, says that this is because of factors like an increase in acreage planted to cotton, low pest presence in all crops, and the introduction of irrigation and hybrid seeds (which also carry the Bt trait). In other words, where production has increased, it is not because of GM Bt cottonseed. Where irrigation is not available, Bt cotton crops have given poor yields.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13909

+ MONSANTO'S UNTRUTH ABOUT GM COTTON
A powerful article from renowned development journalist P Sainath reveals the truth behind the PR lie of the 'model farming village' showcasing Monsanto's Bt cotton.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13912

+ PHILIPPINES SUPREME COURT HALT TO GM EGGPLANT/AUBERGINE
The Philippines Supreme Court has moved to stop commercial production of GM Bt eggplant in the country.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13920

+ MONSANTO IN BIG TROUBLE IN BRAZIL
The courts of the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul have suspended the collection of royalties on GM soy seeds by Monsanto. The ruling also provides for the reimbursement of license fees paid (royalties) since the harvest of 2003/2004, as the business practices of Monsanto violate the rules of the Brazilian Cultivars Act.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13906

+ GM CORN AND SICK HONEYBEES
What's the connection between the disappearance of bees and GM corn? In the early 1990s most corn was grown with few or no pesticides. But in the mid-1990s this unravelled - or was deliberately unravelled by Monsanto and Bayer. Now most corn is grown from seeds treated with neonicotinoid insecticides or genetically engineered to express insecticides before being sprayed with Roundup herbicide and a new class of fungicides that farmers didn't know they "needed" before the mid-2000s. Neonicotinoid pesticides are are strongly implicated in bee die-offs. Farmers have little choice but to buy GM seed, as non-GM varieties have been removed from the market by companies that have monopolistic control.
http://www.gmwatch.eu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13921

+ NEW GM CROPS COULD MAKE SUPERWEEDS EVEN STRONGER - SCIENTISTS
Multi-herbicide-tolerant GM crops could fuel the evolution of the worst superweeds yet, according to scientists. These weeds may go further than merely being able to survive one or two or three specific weedkillers. The intense chemical pressure could cause them to evolve resistance to entire classes of chemicals.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13899

+ GM CROPS' RESULTS RAISE CONCERN
Biotechnology's promise to feed the world did not anticipate superweeds, the disappearance of monarch butterflies, and a new GM biofuels corn that could turn edible corn to mush, says an article for the San Francisco Chronicle that calls America's adoption of GM crops "an experiment" that "is producing questionable results".

Midwest fruit and vegetable growers this month petitioned the Department of Agriculture to block approval of the 2,4-D-tolerant corn, militaristically named Enlist and made by Dow AgroSciences. Similar crops, including a soybean engineered by Monsanto to tolerate dicamba, a similar herbicide, wait in the regulatory pipeline.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13895

+ DARK SIDE TO BETA-CAROTENE - IMPLICATIONS FOR GOLDEN RICE: NEW STUDY
A new study shows that beta-carotene (a precursor to Vitamin A that's been engineered into golden rice) is processed into a number of compounds, not just Vitamin A.  Some of these compounds actually block the action of Vitamin A. The scientists who did this study say it may have implications for golden rice.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13905
For our backgrounder on golden rice see:
http://gmwatch.org/gm-myths/11130

+ CALIFORNIA PUBLIC TO VOTE ON GM LABELS
A California initiative to require labelling of GM foods appeared headed for the ballot in November after organizers said they had gathered nearly 1 million signatures in favour of the measure.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13900

+ CONNECTICUT'S GM LABELLING BILL EVISCERATED
Connecticut's Genetically Engineered Foods bill may still be alive, but it is no longer a bill requiring the labelling of GM foods. The labelling provision was removed. Rep. Richard Roy of Milford, co-chair of the Environment Committee and the original sponsor of the bill, said, "The labelling provision was eliminated from the bill due to fears that it opened the state up to a lawsuit."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13904

+ DESIGNED TO FAIL: WHY REGULATORY AGENCIES DON'T WORK
William Sanjour retired from the US Environmental Protection Agency in 2001 after 30 years, most of it spent in regulations. He's written an incisive article for Independent Science News on why regulatory agencies don't work, why that suits the corporations just fine, and what can be done to fix the system.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13894
Sanjour says, "When I was writing regulations, I was told on more than one occasion to make sure I put in enough loopholes." For how the European Food Safety watchdog EFSA and other EU regulatory agencies use the notorious "Klimisch loophole" to insulate industry and its risky products from the inconvenient findings of independent science, see the report here:
http://earthopensource.org/index.php/reports/49-conflicts-on-the-menu