GMWatch News Review archive

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THE WEEKLY WATCH number 29
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from Andy Rees, the WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all

Welcome to WW29 bringing you all the latest news in brief on the GM issue in a week so packed full of lies and fairytales you'd think the GM lobby might just tire of them!

Please circulate widely!

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

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WEEKLY WATCH  number 29 - CONTENTS
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TOPIC OF THE WEEK - The UK GM public 'debate'
SETBACKS TO THE GM INDUSTRY
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK
REPORT OF THE WEEK 1 - Independent Science Panel - full summary
REPORT OF THE WEEK 2 - 'Free trade': America's friend, the South's enemy
REPORT OF THE WEEK 3 - The truth about Bt cotton in India
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
FACTS OF THE WEEK
FAIRYTALES FROM THE GM LOBBY
CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK
SUBSCRIPTIONS

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TOPIC OF THE WEEK - The UK GM public 'debate' - not looking good for Blair
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THE BRITISH PUBLIC DON'T WANT GMOS:
Only 13% of the public support GM crops - with only 3% strongly supporting them.

THE BRITISH FARMERS DON'T WANT GMOS:
The majority of Britain's farmers are opposed to GM crops being grown in the UK, according to a poll carried out by Farmers' Weekly (FW) to coincide with the launch of the UK's national debate.  Of the 150 farmers who took part, 53% said they did not support GM crops, while just 36% said they were in favour, 10% said they didn't know.  A FW survey of farmers a year ago showed a similar picture - 60% of respondents said they felt public concern about GM crops was justified.  And the biotech lobby would have us think the farmers are the beneficiaries of GM crops.

THE SUPERMARKETS DON'T WANT GMOS:
Supermarkets have told Tony Blair they will refuse to stock GM foods, even if he manages to persuade a sceptical public to accept GM produce.  The British Retail Consortium, which represents 90% of high-street shops, has sent an unequivocal warning to the Government that GM food is not commercially viable in the UK.  Their united stance threatens the Prime Minister with the embarrassing scenario where GM crops are commercialised, yet no major outlets will sell them. http://www.observer.co.uk/politics/story/0,6903,972904,00.html

YET BLAIR INSISTS ON FORCING THE PRO-GM, PRO-BIG BUSINESS, PRO-US LINE ON BRITAIN.. FARMERS & CAMPAIGNERS HAVE VOWED TO DESTROY GM CROPS IF GROWN:
From the national public debate meeting in Taunton, Keith Hatch, a regional member of Friends of the Earth, said: "At the end of the conference we were asked if we wanted to see GM plants grown in the UK.  Nobody put their hands up." With every sector of the public against GM crops - and Blair determined to carry out his mission regardless - determined farmers and campaigners have vowed to destroy any GM crops grown in the South West, as a last bid to stop GM crops.

THERE'S SOMETHING FISHY ABOUT THIS 'DEBATE' says George Monbiot:
There's something fishy about the government's "great GM debate."  Perhaps it's the contrast between the ambition of its stated aims and the feebleness of their execution. Though the environment secretary, Margaret Beckett, claims she wants "to ensure all voices are heard", she has set aside an advertising budget of precisely zero. Public discussions will take place in just six towns.

Like Monsanto, the British government has already invested in genetic engineering. In 1999, it allocated £13m (or 26 times what it is spending on the great debate) "to improve the profile of the biotech industry", by promoting "the financial and environmental benefits of biotechnology". This, and its appointment of major biotech investors to head several research committees and a government department, ensured that it lost the confidence of the public. So, like Monsanto, it now seeks to revive that confidence, by claiming - rather too late - that it is open to persuasion. Again, the decision to introduce the crops to Britain appears to have been made long before the debate began. Last year, an unnamed minister told the Financial Times that the debate was simply a "PR offensive". "They're calling it a consultation," he said, "but don't be in any doubt, the decision is already taken." And in March, Margaret Beckett began the licensing process for 18 applications to grow or import commercial quantities of GM crops in Britain. Her action pre-empts the debate and pre-empts the field trials designed to determine whether or not the crops are safe to grow here. http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,974036,00.html

WHAT A DISAPPOINTMENT! SAYS NATURE
In an editorial on the debate the journal Nature comments, "most of the public don't know they are invited, for reasons that aren't hard to discern. Over the past three years, the Netherlands (population 16 million) and New Zealand (population 4 million) have conducted similar programmes to assess opinion on genetically modified crops, each investing some four times the sum allotted in Britain (population 60 million). This penny-pinching has restricted advertising, and turnouts at the first debates have been limited... negative media coverage may leave the British people to assume that the government has already made up its mind on transgenic agriculture, and simply isn't interested in their views."

HUNDREDS ARE DENIED ACCESS TO GM MEETINGS:
Hundreds of people across the West country were denied access to the national 'debate' in Taunton, because the venue could only accommodate 100 people.  Helen Richards, of Penwith Organic Gardeners and Growers, said, "The publicity was absolutely appalling. There were only two A4 sheets on the main and back doors which indicated there was a meeting. Nothing else apart from that. People travelled miles to attend this meeting and it was really difficult to find the venue."

THE GLASGOW DEBATE:
The debate was full at 150!  Good mix of participants, by age, sex, knowledge of GM and background.  A straw-poll at the end showed:
- GM crops should be grown in UK:  4 (inc GM trial farmer + wife)
- Unsure:  3
- GM crops should not be grown in UK: 143.
further details of  all regional debates available on GM Nation? website:
www.gmnation.org.uk

THE OBSERVER DEBATE:
For a scorching anti-GM article, that will persuade even the most cynical or apathetic friend, relative, or workmate, read leading chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's views on GM.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/gmdebate/Story/0,2763,973028,00.html
This is part of Observer Food Monthly's contribution to the 'GM debate.'
http://www.observer.co.uk/foodmonthly

THE SCOTSMAN DEBATE - THE USUAL LIES FROM TREWAVAS:
2 opinions on GM crop commercialisation from The Scotsman - one from Anthony Jackson and one from Tony Trewavas.  TT's piece was full of rabid marketing hype rather than objective science and agronomy.   Particularly unfortunate is the claim that Indian farmers have "seen yields nearly double" when most have faced severe losses.  (See REPORT OF THE WEEK 3) TT similarly claims that US farmers growing insect resistant (ie Bt) GM crops have seen incomes increase by GBP150 an acre. In fact, even the US Dept of agriculture in an official report on the subject concluded: - Bt insecticide GM corn has had a **negative** economic impact on farms. - GM crops do not increase yield potential and may reduce yields. The report concluded: "Perhaps the biggest issue raised by these results is how to explain the rapid adoption of GE crops when farm financial impacts appear to be mixed or even negative." ('The Adoption of Bioengineered Crops' US Department of Agriculture Report, May 2002)
http://ngin.tripod.com/230802a.htm
The answer is of course farmers being fooled by spin and hypebole from corporate-friendly propagandists like Trewavas.
For more on TT, see: http://ngin.tripod.com/trewavas.htm

AND FROM THE NUFFIELD COUNCIL:
To coincide with the GM debate, the Nuffield Council on Bio-ethics has produced a pro-GM report.  When they produced their last on this topic in 1999, George Monbiot described it as "perhaps the most asinine report on biotechnology ever written. The stain it leaves on the Nuffield Council's excellent reputation will last for years."  Commenting on the new report, Matthew Lockwood of ActionAid, said: "The UK public should not be duped into accepting GM in the name of developing countries.  GM does not provide a magic bullet solution to world hunger. What poor people really need is access to land, water, better roads to get their crops to market, education and credit schemes."
http://members.tripod.com/~ngin/nuffield.htm

MORE REALISTIC OBSERVATIONS FROM THE NIAB:
'we do have to accept the fact that once GM oil seed rape is  commercialised it will be everywhere and that is inevitable... I think realistically it's going to be very difficult for GM oil seed rape to coexist with non-GM on the same farm' - Dr Jeremy Sweet, of NIAB, at the GM Science debate held at Aberystwyth.
His full statement is on pages 16 -26 at
http://www.gmsciencedebate.org.uk/meetings/pdf/170303-transcript.pdf.

HOW TO GET INVOLVED IN THE 'DEBATE':
ideas and more here:
http://www.fiveyearfreeze.org/indexb.htm
You can submit your views via
http://www.gmpublicdebate.org.uk/dz_08/index.asp
People are also being encouraged to hold their own local meetings. If you want to organize a meeting the Five Year Freeze can help supply you  with leaflets, and support, please call 0207 837 0642.  If you are able to attend a meeting and are willing to take materials along with you please call us on 0207 837 0642.
More information available at
http://www.gmpublicdebate.org.uk/
A GM science review where the more technically interested can submit views (you don't have to be a scientist)
http://www.gmsciencedebate.org.uk/
Looks at the overall costs and benefits associated with the growing of GM crops, including their effect on conventional and organic farming interests.
http://www.strategy.gov.uk/2002/GM/summ.shtml

A SOBERING LAST THOUGHT FROM EUROPE:
According to Steve McGiffen (Environmental Adviser of the United Left Group of the European Parliament - and GM opponent), the UK GM Public 'Debate' is all a bit weird, since the laws governing GMOs will be made in Brussels and Strasbourg, not Westminster. Sad but true. The national debate is therefore pure theatre, designed to distract people from the facts of the matter. Put another way, it matters not a jot if the minister has or has not already made up his mind. His views will have influence, but will not determine the laws which British biotech firms and farmers will have to follow, nor the level of protection available to consumers or the environment.  The fact is that next month the European Parliament will approve the regulation of cultivation and marketing of GMOs. This will then in turn be approved by the Council of Ministers, though there may be some haggling over details. By the end of the year, the legislative framework will be in place, and Britain will have no choice (unless the government is prepared to defy the law) but to licence the cultivation of GMOs and permit their marketing.
See also REPORT OF THE WEEK 1 - First conference of the Independent Science
Panel

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SETBACKS TO THE GM INDUSTRY
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SUDDENLY THE CANADIANS ARE WONDERING IF GM CROPS RUIN SOIL:
Canada is investing nearly $600,000 to learn whether GM crops are ruining farm soils.   Which is bizarre as they have already been approved and grown for years on thousands of Canadian farms.  As Ottawa researcher Ken Rubin's put it to the government: "You put the cart before the horse. You didn't have a proper approval system ...  And now you're coming back and examining issues which you should have done (earlier)."  The big question is whether GM crops are passing on their genes to the natural underground microbes, that make soil productive by breaking down dead plants and helping live plants absorb vital nutrients - and what result this would have.  Bacteria, viruses and other microbes are adept at picking up genes from humans, animals, other bacteria.

TRANSGENIC CONTAMINATION OF CERTIFIED SEED STOCKS:
Canola (oilseed rape) is the second most valuable crop in Canada.  The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) requires a distance of 200 metres between certified seeds and any other Brassica.  In contrast, producers of hybrid canola seed have required a separation of 2 kilometers from a Brassica crop, in recognition that pollen may travel a kilometer or more. CFIA separation distances are evidently inadequate for insuring the purity of certified seeds.  Canadian studies of certified canola seed stocks showed that 95% of 27 certified seed lots were contaminated with herbicide tolerance transgenes; with 52% of the seed lots exceeding the 0.25% maximum contamination standard set for certified seed. Some lots were tolerant to both glyphosate and glufosinate.  This extensive contamination is staggering. The Canadian canola crop covers over 5 million hectares; about 60% are transgenic varieties. By now, it seems unlikely that GM-free canola can be produced in western Canada.
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/TCCST.php

EUROPEAN GMO-FREE BIOGREGION SUGGESTED :
Today, the presidents of organic farmers associations from Slovenia: Union of Slovenian Organic Farmers`s Associations (USOFA); Austria: Bio-Ernte Austria from Carinthia and Styria; Italy: APROBIO from Friuli-Venezia Giulia and AVEPROBI from Veneto signed a declaration to create a bioregion dedicated to the growing of organic food. The bioregion should comprise the whole of Slovenia, the Austrian provinces of Carinthia and Styria and the Italian provinces of Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Veneto. Agriculture Ministers from Slovenia, Carinthia and Friuli-Venezia Giulia were present at the ceremony and expressed their support to this initiative.

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HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK
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Organic chickens accidentally fed GM-contaminated feed
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A farmer was forced to dump more than 1,200 organic chickens after they were accidentally fed on feed contaminated with GM soya beans.  It is the first time that organic food has been stopped from going on sale in Britain because of GM contamination - alarming environmentalists and food safety groups.  The affected batch was discovered in north Devon late last year. The scare is likely to set back government attempts to persuade a sceptical British public to accept GM foods.
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/environment/story.jsp?story=413445
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US pressures Sudan as it too bans GM food imports
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Once again we see the US forcing a GM gun to the heads of the hungry, just as they did in southern Africa, even though non-GM food was available.
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Monsanto to begin GM corn trials in India soon
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After the debacle of its GM cotton, Monsanto is soon to begin GM corn trials in India. Monsanto has imported two kg of transgenic maize into the country and will begin pollen flow studies very soon - in this khariff season.  The Review Committee on Genetic Manipulation has authorised the studies, the first step in a long and complicated regulatory process which may run to several years.
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The GM potato hoax runs and runs
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The Indian government raised the global biotechnology stakes this week by saying it intended to feed "nutritionally enhanced" GM potatoes to poor children as early as next year. Leading Indian food analyst Devinder Sharma dismissed the GM potato as "another magic bullet from the trashcan of biotechnology industry". He argued that protein could be better provided by the pulses used traditionally in India. "What this country needs is pulses. They contain 20%-26% proteins... this potato has 2.5% protein. Please tell me which one is better."  Greenpeace campaigners dismissed the protato as an advert for biotechnology.  "Years were spent in a lab trying to lever protein into potatoes, while cheap, protein-rich pulses grow abundantly all over India.  It makes you wonder what problem the scientists were trying to solve."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/india/story/0,12559,975657,00.html
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GMOs have never been regulated properly because it was designed that way
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When GMOs were first introduced into agriculture, farmers and consumer groups questioned the lack of basic protections. Since then, farmers have not been able to protect themselves from this genetic trespass. Instead of holding GMO manufacturers liable, the courts are upholding the patent rights of seed companies and making the farmers pay. Taxpayers are subsidizing the costs of GMO food recalls. While national polls show that well over 90% of US consumers want GMO food labeled, government regulators still refuse to consider it.
By almost any measure, regulatory oversight of agricultural biotechnology is failing to protect the public interest. The reason is, it was designed that way. Long before there were any products ready for market, the GMO manufacturers were in Washington, taking pre-emptive action to ensure that the regulatory climate would favor their interests. The industry wanted to leave just enough regulation in place to give the public a sense of assurance, while leaving the manufacturers free of any real restraint. Basically, it was decided that there would be no new laws passed governing biotechnology.
As a result, federal agencies are still struggling to evaluate and approve a plethora of new and potentially dangerous products, using laws designed to deal with chemicals and pathogens, not genetics. And they continue to be constrained by concepts developed with the best science available in the 1960s. The reporting system is essentially voluntary and industry is trusted to inform the government of any problems that arise. It's sort of a "don't tell, don't ask" arrangement. If industry does not tell government what it knows or suspects about its GMOs, the government does not ask. Once crops are released, there is no monitoring or follow-up. Agencies are free to ignore significant findings from independent sources, including reports about the nutritional deficits in food made from GMO crops, how genes wander when GMO crops cross with other plants, about recombinant viruses on the loose, and the growing problems of resistance and tolerance, to name just a few. As a result, evidence of emerging human health and ecological problems are routinely disregarded.
http://www.cropchoice.com

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REPORT OF THE WEEK 1 - First conference of the Independent Science Panel
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The first conference of the Independent Science Panel, convened to promote science for the public good, independent of commercial and government interests, was held at Kings College, London on 10 May 2003.

EXCERPTS from full summary:
"American promoters of GM foods claim that Americans have been eating GM for a long time and there are no problems. But there is
* no baseline data
* no exposure data
* no human feeding trials
so it's an uncontrolled experiment! If GM foods are causing changes to common conditions (allergy, cancer, auto-immune disease) there is no way we could know.

"The lag time for cancers to develop can be 20 years, so if there were a risk from GM foods we would not know for about another 15 years.  - VYVYAN HOWARD, Medical toxi-pathologist at Liverpool University

For a copy of the full summary mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

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REPORT OF THE WEEK 2 - Free trade: America's friend, the South's enemy
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Contrasting perspectives on free trade - the US demands it but doesn't do it and never did which is where its wealth came from (item 2). And to the extent it does... it brings suffering in its wake.

THE US DEMANDS WHAT IT DOESN'T GIVE:
While Bush charged that the refusal of the EU to certify new US GM crops had perpetuated famine in Africa, one of the main causes of hunger and poverty in Africa lies much closer to home - US subsidies for our own farmers. Cotton is a prime example.  In areas of West Africa, cotton is the main cash crop, and provides employment to more than 2 million people, sustenance to several times more. But with world cotton prices down 10 % from last year's 30-year low (a two-thirds drop in cotton prices since 1995), people can barely survive. Schooling and even minimal health care have become unaffordable luxuries.  As a result, many families are leaving for Europe's large cities, while fundamentalist Islamic clerics are finding more and more listeners.

It costs 82 cents to produce a pound of cotton in Mississippi versus only 23 cents a pound in Mali. So why are the Americans expanding their acreage while the Malians fight to survive? Subsidies.   $3.4 billion to America's 25,000 cotton farmers, last year.  This year, with Bush's increase in subsidies, some of these farm families can expect to receive nearly $1 million in subsidies. Thus, the US government is subsidizing American farmers to produce more and more cotton that will further depress world prices and further impoverish families in West Africa - precisely what the president accused the Europeans of doing.

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed in an effort to stimulate Mexican economic growth and thereby stem illegal immigration. But exports for one of Mexico's main crops, sugar, are severely restricted by US quotas to only 7,258 metric tons of raw sugar a year. Thus, while American consumers pay four times the world price for their sugar, Mexican sugar farmers, like West African cotton growers, face penury and hunger.

Brazil has democratized, liberalized, deregulated, and adopted prudent economic and monetary policies in accord with Washington's demands. At the same time, however, US agricultural subsidies and quotas on imports of citrus fruits restrict trade in about two-thirds of the products Brazil might be able to sell in the US market.

Europeans marvel at the chutzpah that allows the US to file WTO complaints while failing to implement WTO rulings against objectionable American practices.  For example, the US has long had a program allowing special tax treatment on profits from certain kinds of exports. In response to EU complaints, the WTO has twice found this treatment in violation of WTO rules and directed the US to alter the practice. Yet, to date, the practice has not been changed.  The Americans want, and have, it all their own way.

Under NAFTA, Mexican truckers were supposed to be able to drive freely anywhere in the US. But after 10 years, they still are prevented from doing so. The NAFTA dispute settlement panel has found the US in breach of its obligations under the treaty and has urged it to come into compliance. Instead, fears (whether rational or not) in border states of unsafe or inadequately inspected Mexican vehicles have caused US authorities to drag their feet.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A26765-2003Jun6.html

THE US NEVER DID FREE TRADE, THAT'S WHY IT'S SO WEALTHY:
The founding myth of the dominant nations is that they achieved their industrial and technological superiority through free trade. Nations which are poor today are told that if they want to follow our path to riches, they must open their economies to foreign competition. They are being conned. Almost every rich nation has industrialised with the help of one of two mechanisms now prohibited by the global trade rules. The first is "infant industry protection": defending new industries from foreign competition until they are big enough to compete on equal terms. The second is the theft of intellectual property. History suggests that technological development may be impossible without one or both.

The US defended its markets aggressively during its key development phase. In 1816, the tax on almost all imported manufactures was 35%, rising to 40% in 1820 and, for some goods, 50% in 1832.  Combined with the cost of transporting goods to the US, this gave domestic manufacturers a formidable advantage within their home market.  The US remained the most heavily protected nation on earth until 1913. Throughout this period, it was also the fastest-growing.

The three nations which have developed most spectacularly over the past 60 years - Japan, Taiwan and South Korea - all did so not through free trade but through land reform, the protection and funding of key industries and the active promotion of exports by the state. All these nations imposed strict controls on foreign companies seeking to establish factories.  Their governments invested massively in infrastructure, research and education. In South Korea and Taiwan, the state owned all the major commercial banks, which permitted it to make the major decisions about investment.  In Japan, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry exercised the same control by legal means.  They used tariffs and a number of clever legal ruses to shut out foreign products which threatened the development of their new industries.  They granted major subsidies for exports. They did, in other words, everything that the WTO, the World Bank and the IMF forbid or discourage today.

There are two striking exceptions to this route to development. Neither Switzerland nor the Netherlands used infant industry protection. Instead, they simply stole the technologies of other nations.  During their key development phases (1850-1907 in Switzerland; 1869-1912 in the Netherlands), neither country recognised patents in most economic sectors.

The nations which are poor today are forbidden by the trade rules from following either route to development. New industries are immediately exposed to full competition with established companies overseas, which have capital, experience, intellectual property rights, established marketing networks and economies of scale on their side. "Technology transfer" is encouraged in theory, but forbidden in practice by an ever fiercer patents regime. Unable to develop competitive enterprises of their own, the poor nations are locked into their position as the suppliers of cheap labour and raw materials to the rich world's companies. They are, as a result, forbidden from advancing beyond a certain level of development. While there is no sound argument for permitting rich nations to protect their economies, there is a powerful case for permitting the poor ones to follow the only routes to development which appear to work.
http://www.monbiot.com/dsp_article.cfm?article_id=583

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REPORT OF THE WEEK 3 - The truth about Bt cotton in India
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MORE LIES FROM THE GM LOBBY - THIS TIME PROF CHRIS LAMB:
"Contrary to ActionAid's report (GM crops of no benefit to poor, says Action Aid, May 28), GM technology is delivering results in the developing world... Smallholders in China have seen increased income and in India and South Africa cotton has provided significant yield increases."
-  Prof Chris Lamb, John Innes Centre.  Letter to the Guardian.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,3604,967607,00.html

COMPARE THIS THIS TO PV SATHEESH'S *UNPUBLISHED* LETTER TO THE GUARDIAN
This has reference to Prof Chris Lamb's letter in today's Guardian.  I wonder where the Professor got his data about the yield increases in India for GM cotton.  For the first time Bt Cotton was permitted for commercial release by the Government of India in 2002.   We are freshly out of a season long study on Bt Cotton's performance in Warangal District in Andhra Pradesh in Southern India.  This is one of the first districts to grow Bt cotton in the country.  The study covered about 20% of all farmers who cultivated Bt Cotton in Warangal District. Conducted by two agricultural scientists [one of them Dr Abdul Qayum was formerly the Joint Director of Agriculture of the Government of Andhra Pradesh] the study clearly brings out the following findings:
Bt farmers got nearly 50% less yield compared to non-Bt farmers.
While 71% of Bt farmers reported losses, only 18% of non - Bt farmers reported losses.
While only 29% of Bt farmers reported profits, 82% of non-Bt farmers had gained profit.
In all non-Bt farmers earned more than 600% profit compared to Bt farmers.
The full study entitled Did Bt cotton save farmers in Warangal will be on our website <www.ddsindia.com> with effect from June 5th, the day on which the report will be formally released.*

Besides our own study the Government of Andhra Pradesh's own assessment said that Bt cotton had performed badly in the state and there was a proposal by the government to ask Mahyco-Monsanto the company which produces Bollgard Bt cotton in India to compensate the farmers for their losses. The statement was made by the Minister for Agriculture, Government of Andhra Pradesh. As most of your readers know the AP government is very pro-biotech and encourages GE in agriculture. But still it had to accept ground reality.

Almost 95% of farmers most of whom are medium and small farmers [In India a small farmer is one who owns five acres of rainfed farmland and medium farmer is a ten acre owner] swear that they will never plant Bt cotton again.

Therefore we strongly believe that statements saying that Bt cotton has done well in India and has helped the poor are completely misleading.  I would be curious to know where the learned professor got his facts to support that Bt cotton has done well in India.

PV Satheesh, Deccan Development Society , #101, Kishan Residency, Road No 5 Hyderabad 500016, Andhra Pradesh, India

[*copies of the full study along with a CD containing the 23 minute film called Why are Warangal Farmers Angry with Bt Cotton are available at a cost price of ten euros. For more information, please write to Ms Jayasri, Joint Convenor, AP Coalition in Defence of Diversity on her email: Jayasri <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>.]

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QUOTES OF THE WEEK
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"GM is more a case of alleviating problems for greedy shareholders than for alleviating poverty and hunger" - Prof. Bob Orskov, Head of the International Feed Resource Unit in the Macaulay Institute, Aberdeen, Scotland.

Prof. Miguel Altieri, agroecologist, University of California, Berkeley: "Agroecological farming methods are already reaching about nine million small farmers at **one-tenth** the cost incurred by official international agricultural subventions, and working miracles to increase food production, as well as the physical and social wellbeing of local communities. This must now be up-scaled to bring the benefits to all."

Prof. Joe Cummins, Emeritus Professor of Genetics at the University of Western Ontario in Canada (Telephone 1-519 681 5477; E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ): "Commercialization of GM crops seems to have been based on public relations and not on full and truthful scientific reporting. Science has begun to feel the impact of putting commerce ahead of full disclosure and debate."

Dr. Brian John, geomorphologist and environmental scientist working with GM Free Cymru: "Those of us who have looked into the science of GM crops and foods from a community or consumer perspective have been appalled at the apparent abandonment of the precautionary principle and at the control exerted over the scientific agenda by the biotechnology multinationals."

Dr. Eva Novotny, Scientists for Global Responsibility: "There is no evidence that unlike species have ever crossed during the billions of years that life has existed on earth. If Nature tried this experiment, it must have failed. We must not be so arrogant as to assume that we are more clever than Nature, lest we precipitate an irreversible chain of biological evolution that ends in catastrophe."

"The thing that's dismayed me most is coming face-to-face with scientists who are not concerned about the truth."  - MALCOLM HOOPER, Emeritus Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Sunderland

"the growing consensus among most Southern advocates is that attempts to push GMOs as a condition of food aid (or HIV assistance) should be resisted and any expansion of WTO control prevented... The fight over GMO food is a major part of the battle against US efforts to dictate policy on all aspects of international trade and development. Does the United States have the power to impose trade terms favorable to itself... That is what will be debated in Sacramento and fought out in Cancún and Miami. Get ready: The empire is being renegotiated." - Tom Hayden, Californian state senator

John Watson, co-owner of the Riverford Organic Farm in Totnes and a staunch anti-GM campaigner, said: "If someone decides to spend millions of pounds on developing a super crop like the genetically engineered Chardon maize and then they refuse to produce any information about it, then surely something must be wrong."

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FACTS OF THE WEEK
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36 million Americans lack enough food, mainly because of poverty. The so-called Green Revolution of the  1970s and '80s may have increased food production but did not reduce the  number of starving people if the figures exclude China, which reduced  hunger, primarily through state-sponsored land reforms.

In 1999, the British government allocated £13m (or 26 times what it is spending on the great debate) "to improve the profile of the biotech industry", by promoting "the financial and environmental benefits of biotechnology". http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,974036,00.html

A Pew Research Center survey found that between 70 and 89% of West European consumers are wary of GM foods.
http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/display.article?id=1787

Anamarija Slabe from USOFA added "In Slovenia on average, every day we get new organic farm registered. In 1998 there were 41 organic farms in the country in the year 2002 total number was 1100 and they represented 1.3 % of total agricultural farmland in the country in 2002. Our goal is to have 30 % organic agricultural farmland in 10 years time."

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FAIRTYTALES FROM THE GM LOBBY
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The lies are flowing thick and fast this week as the GM 'debate' gets underway. 

The extremity of the hype and disinformation used to promote GM crops, especially in the South, is well-illustrated by what International Seed Federation secretary general Bernard Le Buanee who was attending the ongoing five-day World Seed Congress in Bangalore, India, asserted, "about 80 per cent of the farmers in the US and 40-45 per cent of farmers in Europe have switched over to Bt cotton and genetic engineering for cash crops."  In reality, aside from some farmers in Spain and trial plots, approaching 0% (not 40-45 per cent!) of farmers in Europe have switched over to genetic engineering.

There are similar claims that the failure of GM cotton in India can be put down to "failure due to climatic changes". So, how come, if the problems were due to "drought and lack of moisture in the soil at the harvesting time", they didn't affect any of the non-GM varieties?
http://www.rediff.com/money/2003/jun/10seed.htm

"The Secretary of the Department of Biotechnology [India] has been quoted as saying that the GM potato contains 40% protein. Utter nonsense! All it contains is 2.5% protein (potato normally have 1.98% protein) and with this increase, the GM scientists are getting ready to take on the fight against malnutrition. They surely live in a blind world!!"
http://www.agbioindia.org

Mark Henderson, the science correspondent of The Timesderides not just the current GM 'public debate' but the very idea of public involvement in such decision making. What crops we grow, what foods we eat, it seems, are matters best left to the experts.  In between such impartial expertise and 'the people' stand, of course, science correspondents like Henderson. Ponder these Henderson headlines:

*GM grass to put club golfers on par with the best
*GM crops could revive endangered wildlife
*GM cotton boon for Indian farmers
*Bananas 'will slip into extinction without GM'
*Stupidity just another disease to cure, says DNA pioneer
*Attack on safety of GM crops was unfounded
*New GM rice could transform the fight against famine
*BBC incited eco-terror on GM drama website
*Protesters 'censor' GM crop benefits
*Imported plants 'far worse than GM crops'
*Modified crops help man and wildlife
*Blair condemns protesters who thwart science
*Indian farmers reap benefit of GM cotton crops

All over southern India GM cotton has been failing, precipitating severe losses for poor farmers, but Henderson gives us a fairytale in which smiling Indians bask in the the boon of GM crops. According to Henderson's reports - gleaned from the experts, without GM we face thwarted science, no bananas, eco-terror and famine; with GM it's great golf, grateful natives, wildlife aplenty and an end to stupidity. This is not just one-sided journalism here but stories that evaporate on a closer inspection of the facts.

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CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK
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HOW TO GET INVOLVED IN THE GREAT 'DEBATE':
ideas and more here:
http://www.fiveyearfreeze.org/indexb.htm
You can submit your views via
http://www.gmpublicdebate.org.uk/dz_08/index.asp
People are also being encouraged to hold their own local meetings. If you want to organize a meeting the Five Year Freeze can help supply you  with leaflets, and support, please call 0207 837 0642.  If you are able to attend a meeting and are willing to take materials along with you please call us on 0207 837 0642.
More information available at
http://www.gmpublicdebate.org.uk/
A GM science review where the more technically interested can submit views (you don't have to be a scientist)
http://www.gmsciencedebate.org.uk/
Looks at the overall costs and benefits associated with the growing of GM crops, including their effect on conventional and organic farming interests.
http://www.strategy.gov.uk/2002/GM/summ.shtml

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