from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:
This week in Greece - a country where every single one of its 54 prefectures has declared itself a GM-free zone, the government is reported to have banned 16 more types of GM corn from being imported, bringing the total to 47. Greece made the move despite the EU Commission's approval of GMOs in the face of opposition from a majority of EU member states. (EUROPE)
And in yet another warning to rice exporting nations, the Greek government is also reported to have blocked the import of 88 tons of Chinese rice due to GM contamination (EUROPE). In China, as in the US, allowing GM rice trials has opened the door to widespread GM contamination and lost exports.
The UK's Science Media Centre has been up to its old tricks again, this time priming journalists with claims that only GM and intensive farming can save the world from food shortages. The SMC's latest shenanigans came at the same time that LobbyWatch published a powerful complaint from an investigative journalist about the SMC and its director, Fiona Fox. (LOBBYWATCH)
It's ironic that one of the major claims to come out of this week's SMC media briefing is that with the new competition between crops grown for biofuels and crops grown for food, we have to use GM to get more food out of the same land. Apart from the lie that GM increases yield, the push for biofuels has of course been keenly encouraged by the GM industry. Create a problem, then offer the "solution" -- a brilliant business strategy, particularly when it's pushed for you by obliging third parties. (LOBBYWATCH)
Talking of which, don't miss our report about the scientists at Broom's Barn research centre in the UK, who've come up with a cunning plan to show that the research that some years ago proved that GM sugar beet was bad for the environment, now proves that, er, it's good for the environment! Broom's Barn scientists have a long history of collusion with industry. (EUROPE)
We also have some great QUOTES OF THE WEEK from former GM scientists who are telling it like it is.
Claire This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
www.gmwatch.org / www.lobbywatch.org
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CONTENTS
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QUOTES OF THE WEEK
ASIA
AUSTRALASIA
THE AMERICAS
AFRICA
EUROPE
LOBBYWATCH
BP-BERKELEY DEAL
NEW FILMS ON GM
CAMPAIGNS OF THE WEEK
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QUOTES OF THE WEEK
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+ SCIENCE FOR SALE AT UC BERKELEY
A UC Davis professor speaking about the impact on academic colleagues of the lucrative "consulting" contracts, patent royalties etc. that accompanied the last biotech "revolution" in the universities: "It's like the invasion of the body snatchers. You take one look in their eyes and realize they are gone."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7770
See also BP-BERKELEY DEAL below.
+ GM SCIENTISTS PUSH GM TO SAVE CAREERS, SAYS BIOTECHNOLOGIST
From an article on the application by New Zealand's public research institute Crop and Food Research to field-test GM brassicas, quoting biotechnologist Dr Elvira Dommisse, who herself worked on the early stages of Crop and Food's GM experiments (EXCERPT):
Some scientists were not keen on GE work but were afraid to talk out about it for fear of losing funding on which jobs depended.
[Dr Dommisse said:] "New Zealand has invested quite heavily in it. As a scientist, once you narrow down into GE your skills are very much in that area, you can't just say, 'I don't like this area any more, I'll zip over to plant breeding instead'.
"You have to try to push it - 'we have got this GE stuff, what are we going to do with it now? We have to keep getting our salaries for the next 10 years, get funding that will keep this project going'.
"If you can get a 10-year bloc of funding, you are home and hosed."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7760
+ INTERVIEW WITH FORMER GM SCIENTIST ON GM POTATO TRIALS
From an interview with Ken Hayes, who's previously researched and developed GM plants, on the forthcoming GM potato trials in the UK:
"... because of this random insertion of the gene, there's always going to be an element of uncertainty as to how that gene will react to being expressed in the new plant and that could lead to things like allergic reactions to toxicity when we consume the plants. And then also how that gene would then interact if it was to cross-fertilise with another plant ...
Interestingly, when I was preparing for this interview, I was having a quick look in some science journals for articles about risks with GM, and it turned out there were so many more articles written about opinion pieces and comments on GM without any experimental basis to them, and it just seems that there's a real lack of experimental data into the risks of GM in our food.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7762
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ASIA
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+ BIO COMMENDS U.S. TRADE REP FOR U.S.-KOREA TRADE AGREEMENT
GM industry body BIO has issued a statement commending the US Trade Representative for brokering a free trade deal with South Korea. This is bound to be a further embarrassment to the S. Korean government, which had denied reports that the US had forced concessions out of it on GMOs in return for a favorable deal on Korean textiles. But the government's own internal documents make clear that it did compromise on safety to get the US deal, which is why BIO's so delighted.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7763
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7743
+ GM FOODS MUST BE LABELLED: MALAYSIA TO U.S.
Malaysia has insisted in free trade talks with the US that imports of GM food must be labeled. A long-awaited law to make the labelling of GM products mandatory is expected to be passed in the Malaysian parliament this month to come into force by the end of the year. US business lobbies in their submissions to the US Trade Representative, had earlier insisted that mandatory labelling ''should be firmly opposed by the US'' in negotiations for a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Malaysia, which may help explain why the FTA negotiations came to a grinding halt.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7764
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7771
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AUSTRALASIA
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+ SCIENTISTS MAKE NON-GM SALT TOLERANT WHEAT BREAKTHROUGH
Most scientists involved in trying to breed salt-tolerant wheat varieties focus on the ability of the wheat to exclude the salt. But the Molecular Plant Breeding CRC's Dr Yusuf Genc has found that some non-GM wheat varieties take salt up into their roots, but are less affected by it than other varieties. The mechanism, known as "tissue tolerance", could result in dramatic yield increases for salinity-affected growers.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7766
+ GM WHEAT TRIAL MADNESS IN OZ
Victoria's Primary Industries Department wants to grow GM drought-tolerant wheat at two sites totaling nearly 10 acres in the state's west.
GM WATCH comment: Are nearly 10 acres of GM wheat trials what Australian farmers need after the export meltdown that's hit the US rice industry - a direct result of contamination from GM trials, and when even Monsanto has backed off GM wheat because of the massive opposition of the global food industry?
And the real joke is that conventional plant breeding is already starting to deliver the goods on the drought and salinity tolerance that pro-GM lobbyists claim only GM can provide. And traditional breeding's doing it faster and more economically - just without all the misleading hype!
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7772
+ DISEASE INCREASING IN GM COTTON IN OZ
The rising incidence of cotton bunchy top (CBT) disease in Australia is causing concern. In central Queensland, it has been found that CBT is increasing and is most obvious in fields where Roundup Ready cotton had been planted.
The Cotton Catchment Communities (CRC) reports that volunteer cotton can cause problems for resistance management of Bt cotton, reduce seed purity and act as early hosts for insect pest. It also provides a conduit for carry over of harmful plant pathogens into the next season.
In the past, the broad spectrum herbicide glyphosate was commonly used to control volunteer cotton seedlings but this is not effective on Roundup Ready cotton.
GM WATCH comment: This is yet another example of farm management issues supposedly simplified by GM crops becoming ever more complex.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7774
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THE AMERICAS
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+ GM ALFALFA WILL DEVASTATE ORGANIC DAIRY INDUSTRY
America's largest and oldest cooperative of organic farmers is joining the Center for Food Safety in a fight against the sale of Monsanto's GM alfalfa seed. Said Organic Valley CEO George Siemon, "The organic dairy industry is now at approximately $1.4 billion in sales. GM alfalfa drift would severely impact the market for our farmers' products."
The Center for Food Safety recently won a lawsuit filed in northern California finding the USDA illegally approved GM alfalfa without conducting the required Environmental Impact Statement. A judge ordered a preliminary injunction stopping the sale of GM alfalfa seed. Monsanto and Forage Genetics, developers of the seed, are arguing against a permanent injunction, which is now being sought by the Center for Food Safety.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7768
+ TRIBES SEEK LIMIT ON WILD RICE ENGINEERING
Native American tribal officials and supporters of sustainable agriculture are turning to the Legislature in hopes of heading off genetic alterations to one of the Ojibwe culture's most sacred foods - manoomin, or wild rice.
Tribal officials say they can't afford to allow scientists to manipulate the wild rice genome, and they're hoping a Senate bill (SF 2103) introduced last month, will hold such research at bay, at least for now. The measure would require an environmental impact statement before any open-air tests of GM wild rice could be conducted. It would also require the Dept of Natural Resources to identify and assess threats to natural stands of wild rice in the state.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7777
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AFRICA
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+ SOUTH AFRICA: BIOWATCH HEADS BACK TO COURT OVER MONSANTO
NGO Biowatch South Africa is to appeal on Monday against a court order that it pay the legal costs of the South African component of Monsanto.
The costs order, which raised legal eyebrows, was made against Biowatch during its successful application for a high court order compelling the Dept of Agriculture to provide access to information on the basis for its decisions about permitting GM crops in South Africa.
In February 2005, Judge Eric Dunn ordered that Biowatch be granted access to almost all the information it had requested. But instead of applying the general legal principle that costs should follow the outcome of litigation, Dunn ordered Biowatch South Africa to pay the legal costs of Monsanto.
If the costs order stands, the environmental group could effectively be bankrupted, and similar groups would be wary of going to court in future, even if they believe they have a watertight case.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7775
+ WHO WRITES PROF THOMPSON'S SCRIPT?
Mariam Mayet from the African Centre for Biosafety has discovered that a large chunk of the submission to the South Africa Parliament on the GMO Act Amendment Bill by GM regulator Prof Jennifer Thompson has been taken verbatim, or vice-versa, from the submission made by the South African National Seed Organisation, SANSOR. The Chairperson of the Board of Directors of SANSOR is JM Lindeque of Monsanto.
Thompson was involved in the drafting of the South African Biotechnology Strategy and was Chair of SAGENE, South Africa's orginal regulatory body for GM crops. She is also a member of South Africa's current Advisory Committee, which provides expert technical advice on regulatory decisions involving SANSOR's members.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7773
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EUROPE
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+ GREEKS BAN MORE GM CORN AND BLOCK CHINESE RICE
The Greek government has banned 16 types of GM corn from being imported into the country, bringing the total number of banned corn types to 47. Greece took the move despite an EU decision to accept the corn. Agricultural Ministry officials said the decision was based on scientific evidence showing that the corn could have harmful environmental effects. The ministry also blocked the import of 88 tons of GM-contaminated Chinese rice.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7758
+UK: RESEARCHERS CLAIM NEGATIVE EFFECT OF GM SUGAR BEET CAN BE MITIGATED
Leaving 2 rows of sugar beet in every 100 unsprayed would mitigate any adverse effects of GM herbicide-tolerant sugar beet on food for farmland birds, claim scientists at Broom's Barn in a paper published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society.
The government's trials of GM herbicide tolerant sugar beet showed that the technology could have an adverse impact on food for farmland birds if a "weed-free" management approach was adopted. But the Broom's Barn scientists have now reworked the data.
GM WATCH comment: There's good reason for scepticism about the latest claims out of Broom's Barn - a research centre with a long history of close collaboration with the biotech industry that's even included Monsanto press tours of ongoing research.
In fact, Broom's Barn researchers have been popping up in the farming press baselessly claiming their research shows GM sugar beet is environmentally friendly since as long ago as 1998!!
And what the incentive would be for farmers attracted to a "weed free" technology to bother leaving rows unsprayed, and then to leave the resultant weeds to set seed, is not explained.
We're also told, "According to research team leader Dr John Pidgeon the economic benefits for the farming sector are large." This is consistent with previous Broom's Barn claims of major savings for farmers taking up GM sugar beet. However, again there are good grounds for scepticism.
Farmers from the independent farmers' group - FARM - indentified from their experience of beet-growing that the Broom's Barn paper claiming these economic benefits had exaggerated by *as much as 75%* the costs of a conventional herbicide regime, making the GM herbicide regime appear financially attractive. http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7776
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LOBBYWATCH
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+ SCIENCE MEDIA CENTRE PUSHES PERSONAL OPINIONS AS SCIENCE
Peter Melchett, in a great piece for the Guardian website, points out that the Science Media Centre is behind Prof Bill McKelvey's much-reported hype to the effect that only GM and intensive farming can feed the world and organic farming isn't up to the task. Peter Melchett also points out that the SMC is presenting guesswork and personal opinion as science:
EXCERPT: Professor Bill McKelvey, the director of the Scottish Agricultural College... has discovered that food prices will soar in the future, GM crops are going to be required to provide enough food, industrial turkey farming, as practised by Bernard Matthews, has been criticised unfairly, and that food shortages are possible in the UK in the next 25-50 years. Europe will have to use GM crops.
These would all be fascinating and, to some of us, surprising new scientific findings but this isn't science. This is actually guesswork and personal prejudice being pushed by a pro-GM campaign group, the Science Media Centre. I have absolutely no objection to people campaigning for GM crops, just as I campaign against them. What is both dishonest and dishonourable is scientists and journalists who pretend to be presenting scientific findings when they are simply pushing personal opinions, or worse, opinions shaped by financial and institutional interests which they do not disclose.
The London briefing given by Professor McKelvey was organised by the Science Media Centre, which is run by Fiona Fox. In the past, Fiona Fox was linked to the Living Marxism network. ...
Another Scottish professor, Professor David Miller of Strathclyde University, described the Science Media Centre as being "not as independent as it appears". It pushes views "largely in line with government scientific policy". The Centre receives 70% of its funding from business, and is funded by companies with GM interests like Dupont and Astra Zeneca.
***
Peter Melchett also responded to Bill McKelvey's scare-mongering about food shortages on the BBC Radio 4's Today programme with an important point:
... The Government says there hasn't been any yield advantage from GM crops. Bill, what disturbed me about your speculation to the media is you didn't quote recent scientific papers which looked at world agriculture and how we can increase production from world agriculture - two papers, both of which show that by converting all the world's production to organic, this would increase food production."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7767
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7769
+ COMPLAINT ABOUT SCIENCE MEDIA CENTRE AND THE LM GROUP
The writer and investigative journalist Andy Rowell has made a formal complaint to the board of the Science Media Centre (SMC) at the suggestion of one of its board members.
In his carefully referenced submission, Rowell raises concerns about the role of the SMC's director, Fiona Fox, in the light not just of her long-term involvement with the GM-loving climate-sceptical 'LM' group but of the SMC's lack of proactivity in combating climate change denial - something that stands in marked contrast with the SMC's record on a number of other issues, such as GM crops.
Rowell points out that out of about 120 SMC press releases "only about four have been on climate." Rowell notes how this compares "to over 40 on issues to do with genetics and roughly another dozen each on animals in research and GM crops." He also notes how the independence of those whose views the SMC has promoted to journalists is open to serious question. Industry executives, lobbyists and people connected to the LM group are all presented in SMC releases that claim to be giving the views of "the scientific community".
Perhaps the most startling aspects of Rowell's submission are extracts from an internal document of the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP), which was behind LM magazine, authored by the SMC's director. Fox has always downplayed her RCP/LM involvement as short-term and marginal, despite clear evidence that she wrote a large number of articles for LM, including hugely controversial pieces involving genocide denial and support for terrorism. The leaked internal discussion document confirms the extremity of Fiona Fox's involvement in what many regard as a fundamentalist political sect.
Rowell asks how it could have come about that a tiny extremist faction with a magazine that only ever had a small number of contributors, now has so many of its supporters and contributors serving as leading lights in influential science-related groups in the UK. This is particularly the case when - like Fiona Fox - they often have no relevant background in science.
For more, and Andy Rowell's submission to the SMC
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7761
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BP-BERKELEY DEAL
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+ FACULTY SENATE NEARS SHOWDOWN OVER UC-BP PACT
Concerns continue to be raised about the proposed BP-Berkeley biofuels deal and the impact of the increasing reliance on corporate funds, and the secrecy shrouding patent-directed research, on academic freedom, faculty hiring, etc.
On April 5, student activists from StopBP-Berkeley.org forced university officials to release the previously secret appendices to the winning proposal that led BP to pick UC Berkeley as the recipient of a 10-year funding package.
Release of the documents sparked a sharp letter from John M. Simpson of the Santa Monica-based Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights to Chancellor Robert Birgeneau.
Simpson charged that some of the scientists listed as participants were opponents of the deal who "were shocked to discover that their names and resumes were included."
The newly released appendices also included a letter of endorsement from BayBio, an interest group of regional biotechnology firms.
One of the 32 signatories to the BayBio letter was Neal Gutterson, president and CEO of Mendel Technology. Geneticist Chris Somerville, whose controversial hire by UCB Chancellor Robert Birgeneau is one of the reasons critics sought an academic senate meeting this week, chairs the firm's board of directors and is its leading scientist.
Somerville is expected to play a leading role in the BP-Berkeley alliance, as is another UC Berkeley academic, Jay Keasling, a founder of Amyris Biotechnology-the firm that hired BP's American fuels operations president John G. Melo while the university was bidding for the half-billion-dollar grant.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7770
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NEW FILMS ON GM
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+ FILMS CONFRONT GM CROPS
A new film, "Unnatural Selection", focuses on the GMO food industry. It includes interviews with Terje Traavik, of the Norwegian Institute of Gene Ecology; Andrew Kimbrell, of the Center for Food Safety; several farmers in Canada; and Vandana Shiva, an activist from Navdanya, New Delhi, India.
[Copies can be purchased as part of the GMO Trilogy, see http://www.responsibletechnology.org/Public/TheGMOTrilogy/index.cfm]
A second film, made by Dalit women in India, is called "A disaster in search of success: Bt cotton in global south". The women, who took to film-making under the tutelage of the NGO, the Deccan Development Society, won the national award for best educational video film in a nationwide contest.
[more info: http://www.ddsindia.com/www/Btcottonfilm.htm]
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7765
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CAMPAIGNS OF THE WEEK
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+ GM SPUDS IN THE UK - GET ACTIVE!
Oppose BASF's plans to trial GM potatoes in the UK http://www.mutatoes.org/take-action.php
+ TAKE ACTION ON THE LOSS OF HONEYBEES!
Asking for the science to be done.
http://www.sierraclub.org/biotech/whatsnew/whatsnew_2007-04-07.asp