18 April 2003
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THE WEEKLY WATCH NUMBER 23
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from Andy Rees, the WEEKLY WATCH editor
Dear all
Welcome to WW23 bringing you all the latest news in brief on the GM issue. We're having some archive problems at the moment so we've provided urls to original sources where possible. Hope you enjoy it. Have a relaxing Easter.
Andy This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
www.ngin.org.uk
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CONTENTS
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SETBACKS TO THE GM INDUSTRY
OTHER HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK
TOPIC OF THE WEEK 1: GM cotton in India - new reports
TOPIC OF THE WEEK 2 - The war on Iraq, GM food dumping, bioweapons
ARTICLE OF THE WEEK 1 - WMD - one rule for them, another for US
ARTICLE OF THE WEEK 2 - The other superpower: a world in resistance
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
FACTS OF THE WEEK
CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK: GM-free Britain
SUBSCRIPTIONS
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SETBACKS TO THE GM INDUSTRY
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GM FIELD TRIALS IN EUROPE FALL 80%:
A new European Commission survey reveals that the number of field trials with GM plants has fallen by about 80% since 1998 in the European Community.
http://www.foodproductiondaily.com/news/news.asp?id=2650
BLAIR ADVISER ATTACKS LABOUR PUBLIC DEBATE 'FIX':
A key scientific adviser to Tony Blair has launched the most damaging attack yet on the Prime Minister's attempts to persuade the public to accept GM crops. Sir Tom Blundell, a Labour supporter appointed by Blair to chair the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution in 1998, and professor of biochemistry at Cambridge University, has effectively accused ministers of a fix. In a three-page letter, Blundell condemns ministerial efforts to have an independent scientific review of GM technology as 'artificial'. Furthermore, the completion of the farm trials - designed to discover whether GM crops affect the environment - has been delayed to the point where potentially controversial findings cannot now be discussed in the debate. http://www.observer.co.uk/politics/story/0,6903,935944,00.html
KRAFT CEO WANTS TOUGHER RULES ON PHARMA CROPS:
Kraft's CEO, Betsy Holden, is calling for stricter rules for biopharmaceutical crops. The usually regulation-averse Holden told an agricultural forum that such crops pose a threat to the food supply. Kraft spokesman, Michael Mudd, said if the federal government refuses to outlaw pharmaceutical crops or to ban their planting in farm states, Kraft "wants there to be every regulation possible so co-mingling will not happen." http://www.suntimes.com/output/business/cst-fin-biopharm04.html
MONSANTO INVESTORS FACE CATASTROPHIC RISK
A report by Innovest Strategic Value Advisors that looks at Monsanto's corporate strategy of expanding its GM crop business, and the risks it poses to shareholders. "While only some of Monsanto's current financial difficulties are related to the rejection of GE food, the company faces an even greater problem of basing its corporate strategy on selling more GE seeds, in light of growing public concerns and market rejection," Greenpeace said in a statement. "The risk of heavy financial losses due to genetic pollution or technology failure coupled with sustained market rejection of GE foods makes Monsanto a poor investment," the report said. Referring to the example of the StarLink corn contamination scandal in 2000, in which the company Aventis lost $1 billion, Innovest estimated Monsanto's potential financial fallout from a "StarLink scenario" to be $3.83 liability per share. It also gave Monsanto the lowest possible environmental and strategic management rating. Monsanto lost not only $1.7 billion in 2002, but also its Chief Executive, who has still not been replaced. Contamination of food products by Monsanto's GE pharma crops could bankrupt the firm. The company's stock is probably overvalued despite recent price declines. GE products constitute one of the most widely rejected product groups ever, and are facing restrictions from major food importers such as China, Japan, Korea and the European Union. Even in the US, upwards of 90% of consumers now demand GE food be labeled and many would reject GE food if given the choice. In shport, Monsanto appears to be digging its own grave with its GE strategy. The Innovest report can be downloaded from http://www.greenpeace.org/monsantoinvestor
Press Release http://www.greenpeaceusa.org/media/press_releases/2003/04162003text.htm
SUIT FILED AGAINST GM GRASS:
The International Center for Technology Assessment has filed a lawsuit against the US Department of Agriculture to halt the commercialization of GM lawn grasses. The lawsuit demands that the USDA list the GM products as noxious weeds - that is varieties of creeping bentgrass and Kentucky bluegrass that are able to resist the herbicide Roundup or glyphosate. The plaintiffs in the lawsuit contend that these grasses invade parks, wildernesses and other natural areas creating a control problem for managers. http://www.lawnandlandscape.com/news/news.asp?ID=1324
BIOTECHNOLOGY: ITALIANS SAY NO TO GMOS:
Italians are firmly opposed to GM foods: "Italians are against genetically-modified foods and condemn them as trivial, risky and morally problematic." http://www.agi.it/english/news.pl?doc=200304151554-0168-RT1-CRO-0-NF11&page=0&id=agionline-eng.oggitalia
SYNGENTA ABANDONS GM WHEAT IN GERMANY, WILL RELOCATE IN UK & FRANCE:
Syngenta has abandoned plans to start Germany's first trials of GM wheat after the site was sabotaged last week by Greenpeace. Peter Hefner, a spokesman for Syngenta in Germany, said trials would be moved to other countries such as France and the UK. http://www.forbes.com/home_europe/newswire/2003/04/14/rtr938607.html
PLENTY (GM) PAPAYA PROBLEMS IN HAWAII
"...while the two commercially available genetically modified varieties, 'SunUp' and 'Rainbow,' have helped control the virus, farmers have found themselves fighting a new plague, papaya blackspot fungus, to which the genetically altered varieties appear more susceptible than the most common 'natural' papaya. And a new study has raised questions about whether the altered genes in the new papayas could be allergenic to humans.... So far, two papaya growers have discovered that plants they thought were organic were actually transgenic..... To make sure the GM strain is eradicated, Caverly said, the farm would be cutting down all its producing papaya trees, destroying thousands of seedlings, and starting anew with non-GMO seed obtained from the University of HawaiÅ’i, and planting them in a different field." Hawaii Island Journal - http://hawaiiislandjournal.com/- April 1, 2003
BIG CANADIAN GRAIN COALITION OPPOSES GM WHEAT:
The federal grain variety registration process must be changed, to test economic and market factors, before GM wheat is approved, a powerful coalition of grain producers, millers, marketers and farm groups told Ottawa last week. "We could be faced with a situation where Roundup Ready wheat is approved for unconfined release and variety registration in the spring of 2004... The urgency of this issue cannot be overstated." - Canadian Wheat Board Chairman. http://www.producer.com/articles/20030410/news/20030410news01a.html
JAPANESE OPPOSITION TO CLONED MEAT:
Tokyo-based group 'NO! GMO Campaign' urged the health ministry to ban the retailing of meat and milk from cloned cows cloned. The request comes in response to a recent report from a health ministry study group which said meat and milk products from cloned cows are safe for human consumption. No other country allows the consumption of meat or milk from cows cloned from the cells of adult animals due to the high rate of defects in the clones.
THAIS TO LABEL GM FOODS
The Thai Food and Drug Administration is to enforce the labelling of 22 products containing genetically modified organisms from May 11.
http://www.mcot.org/query.php?nid=21737
ECOLOGISTS IN URALS DEMAND RESTRICTIONS ON GMOS
Ecologists in the Urals have made an appeal to Chief Russian Sanitary Doctor Gennady Onischenko that greater restrictions be imposed to limit the amount of genetically modified food available in shops. In their letter to Mr Onischenko the ecologists insisted that genetically modified food is a serious threat to the health of the population and the instability of the national economy does not justify making such food available. http://www.rosbaltnews.com/2003/04/18/62255.html
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OTHER HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK
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US forces UPOV to abandon critique of Terminator
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After two days of intense diplomatic wrangling in Geneva, US patent officials succeeded in turning the expert advice of the intergovernmental secretariat, UPOV, to Abandon its critique of Terminator.
http://www.etcgroup.org/article.asp?newsid=393
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European Parliament gives go ahead for GM contamination of seed
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Organic and conventional farmers face "considerable economic damage" - or even loss of organic certification - after the European Parliament rejected proposals to limit GM contamination of seeds to the minimum level possible. Amendments, proposed by Tory MEP and seed farmer Robert Sturdy, loosening the restriction to "as low a level as practical" were adopted, meaning seeds sold as 'non-GM' could be contaminated with GM material beyond the levels of being labelled GM-free. South-East England's Green MEP Caroline Lucas said: "[This] is a disaster for conventional and organic farmers. The farmers will lose - and so will consumers who have resoundingly demonstrated their aversion to GM produce at every opportunity."
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Nestle lies to protesters in Thailand
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After Nestle said in a press release that it "welcomes" protestors to its factory at Navanakorn, in Thailand, its executives refused to come out to meet them! After waiting for an hour outside closed factory gates, the protestors led by Greenpeace had to dump 10,000 postcards of complaints through the gates. Greenpeace was protesting, on behalf of 10,000 consumers throughout Thailand, against Nestle's promotion of GMOs in Thailand, when it was banned in its own country from selling them.
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Independent Science Panel for GM launched
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You are cordially invited to an important conference - GM Crops: Do We Need Them? Are They Safe? Hear the real evidence from the newly constituted Independent Science Panel for GM - David Bellamy, Stanley Ewen, Mae-Wan Ho, Malcolm Hooper, Vyvyan Howard, Brian John, Arpad Pusztai, and others. Date: May 10, 2003. Time: 13:30h to 18:30h. Venue: Franklin-Wilkins Building, Auditorium B5, King's College,Waterloo, London. Admission Free. To guarantee a place, please reply to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.giving name and organisation (if applicable) to obtain an electronic ticket.
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Watch out for the World Agricultural Forum
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Established in 1997, the World Agricultural Forum describes itself as "a non-profit organization”¡” the only neutral, inclusive, forum that allows for the comprehensive discussion and examination of current and developing domestic and global agricultural policy". Its next World Congress takes place at the lavish Hyatt Regency Hotel from 18-20 May in St Louis - hometown to Monsanto. But, in reality, Aziz Choudry points out, WAF is advised by the likes of Dr Florence Wambugu's of Harvest Biotech Foundation International, who claims that biotechnology will feed the world's poor. Wambugu sits on Dupont's Biotechnology advisory panel, was post-doctoral fellowship at Monsanto's Life Sciences Research Center in St. Louis, and wrote the book, "Modifying Africa: How Biotechnology Can Benefit the Poor and Hungry: A Case Study from Kenya." With a USAID scholarship, she worked with Monsanto to develop Kenya's first genetically modified sweet potato. http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2003-04/18choudry.cfm
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DuPont and Monsanto sign licensing agreement
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DuPont, and subsidiary Pioneer Hi-Bred International, and Monsanto announced they have agreed to a worldwide licensing agreement to Monsanto's recently approved YieldGard Rootworm insect-protected corn technology.
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DuPont 'withheld' risk of toxic chemical
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Gene giant DuPont, the US second-largest chemical company, has been accused of withholding from the government an internal study, in 1981, linking a toxic chemical in Teflon to birth defects in some children. http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/20464/story.htm
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Ann Veneman - the Calgene connection
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Ann Veneman, the US Agriculture Secretary, has an interesting past. Between her tenure at the US Department of Agriculture (under George Bush Sr.) and being named head of California's Department of Food and Agriculture in 1995, Ann Veneman served on the board of directors for Calgene. In 1994, Calgene became the first company to bring GM food, the Flavr Savr tomato, to supermarket shelves. Calgene was bought out by Monsanto, the nation's leading biotech company, in 1997. http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/index/00042069.htm
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Canadian biotech industry seeks legislation to permit patenting of life
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Canada's biotech industry says its prospects have been hard hit by the Supreme Court decision against patenting the Harvard mouse. Industry spokesmen said the ruling has had a chilling effect on foreign investment and called on Ottawa to introduce legislation to permit patenting higher life forms. But ethicists and environmentalists said the court had it right. "There is huge pressure at the moment from the industry on government to basically reverse the decision of the Supreme Court legislatively," said Mr Beresford, a consultant to the Canadian Council of Churches.
http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20030415.gtbioapr15/GTStory
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5% boost or 43% slump for NZ farmers from GM
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The release of genetically engineered crops, animals and other organisms could offer New Zealand farmers a 5 percent boost in earnings over the next decade - or slash their earnings by 43 percent, according to a cabinet paper released this week. http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,2410687a3600,00.html
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Announcing an Important New Book - Living with the Fluid Genome
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The biotech empire is fast collapsing because it has got the science wrong. Read this riveting inside-story of the fluid genome from a scientist who has been warning that genetic engineering is both dangerous and futile for over a decade. http://www.i-sis.org.uk
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TOPIC OF THE WEEK 1: GM cotton in India
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WILL GM COTTON GO NORTH?
The Indian government's Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) is likely to soon take a decision on whether to approve the cultivation of Monsanto's Gm (Bt) cotton seeds for the coming kharif (summer) season in the northern regions of the country. GEAC may face hurdles, given the terrible performance of the Bt cotton crop in the southern states last season. It was unable to approve the GM mustard seeds, developed by ProAgro last year. But Monsanto is doing its best to suppress news of the the multiple failures in order to increase its market penetration in India. http://ngin.tripod.com/140403a.htm
INDIAN BT COTTON FARMERS SUFFERED HUGE FINANCIAL LOSSES:
Farmers who cultivated Bt cotton have suffered huge losses, according to a Greenpeace study of three districts of Karnataka. The input costs for Bt cotton were much higher than non-Bt cotton hybrids. As many as 77% of farmers interviewed reported that bollworm affected Bt cotton plants (against which they were supposed to be resistant). Pesticide and fertilizer costs went up. Farmers reported a rise in labour costs, as the cotton bolls were smaller in size and packing took longer. Bt seed cost 4xs non-Bt seed. The yield of Bt cotton and non-Bt cotton hybrids was more or less the same; however, in Raichur District, non-Bt cotton hybrids fared better. The market value for Bt cotton was lower than non-Bt cotton hybrids, due to low quality. All in all, an impressive failure. Mr Ananthapadmanabhan said the Congress-led Opposition in Andhra Pradesh had secured compensation for farmers who had suffered crop loss. But the State Government in Karnataka had yet to acknowledge the truth of Bt cotton failure. The Union and State governments were protecting the US multinational, Monsanto, and its Indian partner, Mahyco, which introduced Bt cotton in the country, he charged. http://hinduonnet.com/stories/2003041703430400.htm
BOLLWORM ESPECIALLY BAD ON BT COTTON IN PUNJAB:
Concurring with Greenpeace's study, in Punjab, the Daula village sarpanch Mr Darshan Singh was quoted as saying, "...We had to spray chemicals four to five times on Bt Cotton. The crops were attacked by various pests, especially the American Bollworm. The Bt Cotton yield was lower than that of the local varieties, which are more profitable."
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=2&theme=&usrsess=1&id=10959
BT COTTON FAILURE ALSO DOCUMENTED BY 'GENE CAMPAIGN'
Gene Campaign has also collected data on India's first Bt cotton harvest. The data collected from 100 farmers, selected from 16 villages in Warangal in Andhra Pradesh and Yavatmal in Maharashtra, were presented in a discussion with NGOs, experts and the media. The data clearly showed that Bt cotton had failed. http://www.agbioindia.org - April 17 2003
MONSANTO'S SHOCK & AWE
Meanwhile, in New Delhi, Monsanto demonstrated its "shock and awe" fire power, when a bus load of 30 Monsanto-hired farmers brought from Andhra Pradesh 'disrupted' a meeting organised by the New Delhi-based NGO Gene Campaign. Gene Campaign was presenting the field study data on the performance of Andhra Pradesh's Bt cotton crop. Former Finance Minister of India, Dr Manmohan Singh, pleaded with the hired farmers to let the data of the Bt cotton harvest be presented. These farmers were accompanied by the head of the Liberty Institute, an arch supporter of Mahyco-Monsanto and a promoter of free trade and economic liberalisation. This episode wasn't unexpected, though. AgBioIndia has always warned against such games in the name of agricultural development and growth. "Multinational companies can go to any extent, even use muscle-power to browbeat the country into acceptance of faulty technologies," AgBioIndia said. http://www.agbioindia.org - April 17 2003
MONSANTO'S SHOCK TROOPS FAKE AGAIN, AND AGAIN, AND...
Monsanto and Liberty have come together with Monsanto-linked AP corporate farmers before for corporate propaganda purposes - notably the 'Fake Parade' at the Earth Summit. http://www.freezerbox.com/archive/article.asp?id=254
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TOPIC OF THE WEEK 2: WAR DRUMS
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NGOS OPPOSE GM FOOD DUMPING IN IRAQ, FAVOUR UN ROLE:
http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=32150
ASIAN NGO SAYS 'NO!' TO UK GOVT AID, AFTER INVASION OF IRAQ:
Focus on the Global South, which works in Asia, became the first NGO to reject future funding from Clare Short's Department for International Development, refusing aid because of the government's invasion of Iraq. Walden Bello, its executive director, is none too happy with Short who called Blair's behaviour 'extraordinarily reckless' then "put her career ahead of principle. This is regrettable," he says. Information taken from 'eco soundings', The Guardian, April 16 2002. For more on Short, see George Monbiot's 'Angel of Death'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/debt/Story/0,2763,677466,00.html
BIOWEAPONS HYPOCRISY FROM BUSH:
After sabotaging a UN inspection system for biological weapons research facilities, the Bush Administration is spending billions in a massive expansion of America's biodefense programme. From Boston to Honolulu, more than three dozen new "hot zones" have been proposed - labs said to be necessary to defend the US from bioterrorists. But the biodefense program itself is the bigger threat to peace, health, and the environment. These labs will store and grow the world's most dangerous organisms and genetically engineered diseases. They will train hundreds, perhaps thousands, in the perverted science of making biological weapons. As public health systems crumble, federal money has still been found to genetically engineer anthrax. When you mix biotech, the military, and billions of dollars you get profound dangers to people, the environment, and peace. The Biodevastation 7 panel will bring together activists resisting the out-of-control expansion of research on bioweapons. A major theme, at Biodevastation 7: A Forum on Environmental Racism, World Agriculture and Biowarfare, May 16 - 18, 2003, St. Louis, Missouri, www.biodev.org, will be "The International Threat to Farms and Farmers." This will highlight the destructive impact of corporate policies, including those of Monsanto, on farms and farmers throughout North America and around the world. http://www.biodev.org
NEED TO MONITOR AND REGULATE SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH:
In an experiment that involved one single genetic change, a team of scientists in the Netherlands successfully created a new type of coronavirus - transforming one that is lethal to cats into one that infects mouse cells, by replacing a single gene from a mouse coronavirus. The result strengthens the idea that the SARS coronavirus might have arisen when an animal and human virus met and swapped genes - a single genetic change could have created the deadly SARS. This raises once again the concern that research, in particular genetic engineering research, could create lethal viruses, deliberately or accidentally. In 2001, Australian scientists reported that they accidentally created a killer version of a mousepox virus that killed all the mice in the experiment. A similar experiment on human viruses might create new lethal viruses with devastating consequences. It is imperative to rigorously monitor and regulate such potentially dangerous research. From The Third World Network, Penang, Malaysia
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ARTICLE OF THE WEEK 1 - WMD: one rule for them, another for US
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Hong Hanh is falling to pieces, so are many more like her. She has been poisoned by the most toxic molecule known to science; it was sprayed during a prolonged military campaign. The contamination persists. No redress has been offered, no compensation. The superpower that spread the toxin has done nothing to combat the medical and environmental catastrophe that is overwhelming her country.
This is not northern Iraq, where Saddam Hussein gassed 5,000 Kurds in 1988. This is Vietnam today. "[Hong Hanh] is dying," her mother says. "My youngest daughter . has the same symptoms. Their fingers and toes stick together before they drop off. Their hands wear down to stumps. Every day they lose a little more skin. And this is not leprosy. The doctors say it is connected to American chemical weapons we were exposed to during the Vietnam war." The Vietnamese Red Cross has registered an estimated one million people disabled by Agent Orange, suffering from an array of baffling chronic conditions. Another 500,000 have already died. The thread that weaves through all their case histories is defoliants deployed by the US military during the war - the most toxic of which was manufactured by Monsanto. Some of the victims are veterans who were doused in these chemicals during the war, others are farmers who lived off land that was sprayed. The second generation are the sons and daughters of war veterans, or children born to parents who lived on contaminated land. Now there is a third generation, the grandchildren of the war and its victims. This is a chain of events bitterly denied by the US government - their scientists claimed that these defoliants were harmless to humans and short-lived in the environment. New scientific research portrays the US government as one that has illicitly used weapons of mass destruction, stymied all independent efforts to assess the impact of their deployment, failed to acknowledge cold, hard evidence of maiming and slaughter, and pursued a policy of evasion and deception. Teams of international scientists working in Vietnam have now discovered that Agent Orange contains one of the most virulent poisons known to man, a strain of dioxin called TCCD which, 28 years after the fighting ended, remains in the soil, continuing to destroy the lives of those exposed to it. Evidence has also emerged that the US government not only knew that Agent Orange was contaminated, but was fully aware of the killing power of its contaminant dioxin, and yet still continued to use the herbicide in Vietnam for 10 years of the war and in concentrations that exceeded its own guidelines by 25 times. As well as spraying the North Vietnamese, the US doused its own troops stationed in the jungle, rather than lose tactical advantage by having them withdraw. 80g of TCCD, just enough of the super-toxin contained in Agent Orange to fill a child-size talcum powder container, would kill the entire population of New York if dropped into the water supply. The US sprayed 170kg of it over Vietnam.
In 1964, the Pentagon signed contracts worth $57m with eight US chemical companies to produce defoliants, including Agent Orange. By the war's end in 1975, more than 10% of Vietnam had been intensively sprayed with 72 million litres of chemicals, of which 66% was Agent Orange, laced with its super-strain of toxic TCCD. But these figures, vastly underestimate the true scale of the spraying. Former pilots allege that, in addition to the recorded missions, there were 26,000 aborted operations during which 260,000 gallons of herbicide were dumped. Almost immediately after the war finished, US veterans began reporting chronic conditions, skin disorders, asthma, cancers, gastrointestinal diseases. Their babies were born limbless or with Down's syndrome and spina bifida. When rumours began circulating that President Reagan had told scientists not to make "any link" between Agent Orange and the deteriorating health of veterans, the victims lost patience and sued the defoliant manufacturers in an action that was finally settled out of court in 1984 for $180m.
Agent Orange has been linked to 28 life-threatening conditions, including bone cancer, skin cancer, brain cancer - in fact, almost every cancer known to man - in addition to chronic skin disorders, birth defects, gastrointestinal diseases and neurological defects. Some believe Agent Orange was used in concentrations 6-25xs the suggested rate and that 4.2m US soldiers could have made transient or significant contact with the herbicides, twice the official estimate of US veterans who may have been contaminated with TCCD.
Madame Binh, minister of foreign affairs for the Provisional Revolutionary South Vietnamese government, who negotiated at the Paris peace talks in 1973, talks about chemical warfare, recalling how, in her home province of Quang Nam, ". So many families now have four or five disabled children, raising them without any hope." The US government, last March, did make its first financial contribution to the debate on the effects of Agent Orange in Vietnam - a miniscule $850,000. However, when the US government sees it as politically expedient, there is cash to be lavished in Vietnam. Over the past 10 years, more than $350m has been spent on chasing ghosts - trying to locate the 2,267 servicemen missing in action in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. So it is that America continues to spend considerably more on the dead than it does on the millions of living and long-suffering - be they back home or in Vietnam. http://www.guardian.co.uk/weekend/story/0,3605,923715,00.html
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ARTICLE OF THE WEEK 2 - The other superpower: a world in resistance
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As the war began, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld promised a "campaign unlike any other in history." What he did not plan or expect, however, was that the peoples of earth -what some are calling "the other superpower" - would launch an opposing campaign. Both are creatures of the Information Age, which underlies the so-called "smart" technology on display in the war as well as the Internet, the peace movement's principal organizing tool. The question everywhere was which superpower to obey - the single nation claiming that title, or the will of the people of the earth. A Gallup poll of people against the war showed that in "neutral" (and normally pro-American) Switzerland the figure was 90%, in Argentina 87%, in Nigeria 86%, in Bosnia (recently the beneficiary of NATO intervention on its behalf) 91%. In all of the countries whose governments supported the war, except Israel's, the public opposed it. The "coalition of the willing" was a coalition of governments alone. Most newspapers outside the US opposed the war. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan expressed his chagrin. The Pope said the war "threatens the destiny of humanity." For once, the majority of the world's governments spoke up unequivocally for the majorities of their peoples.
The consequences far transcend the war in Iraq. Dr Robert Muller, a former assistant secretary general of the UN, caught the mood of the new peace movement when, aged 80, he received an award for his service to the UN. He startled his discouraged audience by saying, "I'm so honored to be here. I'm so honored to be alive at such a miraculous time in history. I'm so moved by what's going on in our world today." For "never before in the history of the world has there been a global, visible, public, viable, open dialogue and conversation about the very legitimacy of war." This was what it looked like, he said, to be "waging peace." It was "a miracle." Shock and awe has found its riposte in courage and wonder. The Other Superpower, Jonathan Schell, The Nation, April 14, 2003.
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030414&s=schell
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QUOTES OF THE WEEK
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Norman Baker, Liberal Democrat environment spokesman, said: "The decision has been taken to accept [the commercialisation of] GM following tremendous pressure from the Americans. The Government is just going through the motions [with the Public Debate]." http://ngin.tripod.com/130403a.htm
"The farm scale results will represent the most comprehensive study of the environmental impact of GM crops. As an industry, we are willing to accept Lord May's challenge to 'take note of any negative results' and support his challenge to all in the debate to be equally willing to accept all aspects of these results." - Dr Paul Rylott, Acting chairman, Agricultural Biotechnology Council; Letters to The Guardian, Monday April 14, 2003 http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,3604,936221,00.html
"The trials are an exercise in self-justification by an industry and government backed into a corner by a justifiably angry citizenry which doesn't like being patronised by a government - or even former government scientists - who persist in acting as advocates for GM crops." - Charlie Kronick, Greenpeace; Letters to The Guardian, Monday April 14, 2003. http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,3604,936221,00.html
"Sir Robert May has missed the point concerning public opposition to GM crops (Moment of truth for GM crops, April 10). . whatever the farm scale trials reveal about the environmental impact of the weed killers used with GM crops (and the trials don't evaluate the GM crops themselves), they won't enable us to make a sound decision about whether GM crops are a "good" or a "bad" thing. Science alone can't answer the questions that GM crops raise: what do we want from agriculture and how can we best get it?" - Charlie Kronick, Greenpeace. Letters to The Guardian, Monday April 14, 2003. http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,3604,936221,00.html
"Both [biopharmed crops and GM animals] share the same issue - the risk of co-mingling with the food supply, the same problem that led to the recall a couple of years ago of our Taco Bell products that were adulterated with StarLink corn.". - Kraft's CEO Betsy Holden Holden in a speech to the Outlook Forum in Arlington, Va. Holden also said a trace amount of an allergen "could be extremely deadly," according to the Congress Daily report. Holden also pointed to "close calls" in which the Agriculture Department found traces of biopharmaceutical corn in a crop of Nebraska soybeans and in a new corn crop in Iowa. "Right now, public acceptance of biotechnology in America is relatively high," Holden said. "But how many more times can we test the public's trust before we begin to lose it?" http://www.suntimes.com/output/business/cst-fin-biopharm04.html
"OK, we know that cross-pollination will occur but we've got thirty years of experience to say we know how far pollen will travel." - Dr Paul Rylott, Seed Manager, Aventis, 12 October 2000 http://ngin.tripod.com/pants2.htm
"It soon became clear to me that genetic engineering was not being led by good science, for which I have a deep respect, but by scientific cowboys funded by multinationals who cared more for market share than the health and wellbeing of our children and of our environment. As Dr Judy Carman, an independent scientist who works for the Public Health Association of Australia said, 'We are all being used as human guinea pigs in a mass, uncontrolled experiment.'" - Alannah Currie on GM Foods, in Waitrose Food Magazine
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FACTS OF THE WEEK
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In 2002, 91% of GM acreage world-wide was planted with Monsanto seeds. The company also makes the world's largest selling herbicide, Roundup/Glyphosate.
"India's "Green Revolution" fell on its face, with degraded soils, drying aquifers and vanishing biodiversity. More than 20% of the soil of Punjab and Haryana, the cradle of the Green Revolution, is beyond repair, where it will be a Herculean task to grow even a blade of grass again! The process fattened the farm lobby while the less-than-one-acre poor farmer was left out in the cold. No Green Revolution ever happened on his tiny patch of land." - K. P. Prabhakaran Nair, [Biotech] No panacea for farm sector's ills, The Hindu Business Line, India, 15/04/2003
http://hoovnews.hoovers.com/fp.asp?layout=displaynews&doc_id=NR20030415670.2_3c21007ae246b16d
THIS IS AN EXCELLENT ARTICLE!
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CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK
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*E-mail your Local Authority for a GM-Free Britain*
http://www.foe.co.uk/campaigns/real_food/press_for_change/email_la/index.shtml
*AskBeckett to make Britain GM-free!*
http://www.foe.co.uk/campaigns/real_food/press_for_change/email_beckett/index.html
*ASK YOUR LOCAL ELECTION CANDIDATES WHERE THEY STAND*
"It really is now or never if we are going to stop the introduction of GM crops in [the UK]. And it is now or never for candidates in the local elections. They have a chance to show they support the GM-free Britain campaign by pledging to push their own council to go GM-free, as a growing number of councils have already done. The more local councils declare themselves GM-free the stronger the signal to the Government that people don't want GM crops grown in their areas, threatening their local food, organic farming and the environment." - Friends of the Earth GM Campaigner Clare Oxborrow *FREE GM STICKERS* http://www.foe.co.uk/campaigns/real_food/press_for_change/order_stickers/index.html
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