GMWatch News Review archive

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WEEKLY WATCH number 228
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from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:

GM continues to spread chaos across the globe. The downside of Bt cotton is now hitting Pakistan as well as India (ASIA). A mainstream news report quotes a researcher as citing a link between the distressing Morgellon's disease and GM (DISEASE LINKED TO GM). And there's more on the mysterious death of a woman with a non-life-threatening disease after she was given an experimental gene therapy drug (GENE THERAPY).

Please read the latest on the journal Nature Biotechnology's shameful deception of scientist Irina Ermakova, and take action to make your views known to the editor and his colleagues (NATURE BIOTECHNOLOGY SCANDAL).

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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EUROPE
AUSTRALASIA
ASIA
MIDDLE EAST
"GM SET TO RETURN TO UK"
AFRICA
NATURE BIOTECHNOLOGY SCANDAL
DISEASE LINKED TO GM?
GENE THERAPY
NEW BOOK

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EUROPE
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+ FRANCE MULLING FREEZE ON GM CROPS
France is reportedly planning a freeze on commercial genetically modified crops, which cover less than one percent of farmland in Europe's top agricultural producer. According to the French newspaper Le Monde, the government is preparing to announce a halt to sales of GM seeds at a national conference on the environment taking place next month, involving farmers, business and advocacy groups. Quoting Environment Minister Jean-Louis Borloo, Le Monde said the government wanted a freeze while working on a new law on GM crops, after ruling that it is impossible to stop GM contamination. "Everyone is in agreement on the GM issue: it is not possible to control their spread. So we will not take the risk," said the Environment Minister. Monsieur Le Grand, a senator for la Manche who is helping the Government determine its thinking, told Le Monde, "There must not be pollination of organic fields by GMOs." Coexistence, he said, will be determined according to the principle that "the choice of
some should not impact the choice of others".
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8300

+ ROMANIA: GM CROPS UNEARTHED
Greenpeace has launched a major attack against the production and marketing of GM crops in Romania. It discovered illegal plantations of GM soya and corn over 110 hectares in Braila, 200 km east of capital Bucharest. Both soya and corn seeds used in Braila were produced by Monsanto. Cultivation of GM soya is illegal in the EU, and from this year, in Romania as well.

67 percent of Romanians say they would not voluntarily consume genetically modified foods. Moreover, according to the Association for Consumer Protection, 98 percent of Romanians demand food containing GMOs be clearly labelled, but this isn't happening. During a press conference, Gheorghe Albu, secretary of state for agriculture, declared that his ministry might agree to a complete ban on GMOs in Romania "if the ministry of environment, as the authority in charge, also agrees to such a ban."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8297

+ GM CONTAMINATION IN GERMANY
German authorities have found genetically modified rapeseed (canola) in conventional crops. Consignments from the company Deutsche Saatgutveredlung were found to contain Bayer's seeds tolerant to the herbicide glufosinate. About 1500 hectares have already been planted with the GM crops. The origin of the contamination is unclear. Jan Pehrke from the Coalition against Bayer Dangers comments: "Neither seed merchants nor farmers are responsible for this mess. Bayer must take responsibility for the organisms it created and must pay for the damage."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8288

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AUSTRALASIA
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+ NEW ZEALAND AUTHORITY FACES COURT BATTLE OVER GM
A hearing date for a legal challenge against The Environmental Risk Management Authority - ERMA's approval of field trials of GM brassica has been set for March 31st 2008. GE Free NZ first announced its decision to file court papers against the regulatory body last year, after ERMA allowed Crop and Food Research to field-test a brassica crop, the mustard family genus that includes cabbages and turnips. GE Free NZ say the possible outcome of the trial had not been examined in enough detail, and so could possibly damage New Zealand's economy, as well as the public and animal health.
"GE Free NZ has decided that flawed decision making cannot go unscrutinised," said Claire Bleakley, GE Free NZ spokesperson.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8299

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ASIA
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+ PAKISTAN: OUTPUT SET TO FALL AS BT COTTON FAILS
Pakistan will face around 25 percent shortfall of cotton yield due to mealy bug and Cotton Leaf Curl Virus (CLCV) attack and reddening of leaf. A senior member of Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA) and President of the PCGA Sanghar cotton belt region, Raja Abdul Sattar, said the recent spell of rains in the Sindh and Punjab cotton growing belts affected the quality and the volume of the crop, especially the Bt variety of cotton.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8294

+ INDIA: COTTON OUTPUT MAY FALL IN PUNJAB
Cotton output in Punjab, the major producing state of north India, is likely to fall due to the incidence of the mealy bug. The Punjab state agriculture director, B. S. Sidhu, said, "The farmers in Punjab opted for Bt cotton cultivation in a big way with the hope of earning better returns. Their hopes are belied with the large-scale incidence of mealy bug."
According to Sidhu, the farmers incurred a loss within the range of Rs 2,500 to Rs 3,000 per hectare.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8294

+ INDIA: PROTEST AGAINST GM BRINJAL TRIALS
Scores of Greenpeace activists held a demonstration to spread awareness about the potential dangers of allowing field trials of GM brinjals (eggplant/aubergine). They blamed the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), along with Monsanto Mahyco, for attempting to force-feed its genetically "unsafe" brinjals in contravention of the Supreme Court's order. India's Supreme Court has ordered a temporary halt on all new GM trials pending the implementation of biosafety systems.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8289

+ INDIA
The Bhartiya Kissan Union (BKU), Indian Coordination Committee of Farmers' Movement, has called for a total ban on the commercial release of all GM crops and foods in India. In an open letter to the Prime Minister thay state, "The plight of Indian farmers who opted for genetically modified seeds as transgenic cotton (Bt. cotton) in the country and its failure, is not hidden from any one... The bias of the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) in favour of biotech industries is evident from the manner in which serious environmental, human and animal health issues are being ignored. Working in tandem with the companies, the GEAC is turning India into a dumping ground for untested and risky GM crops and food."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8289

+ INDIA: PROPOSED GOVT RIDER MAY BECOME A GM CROP KILLER
The government is considering a proposal that says GM crops, apart from passing several other field trials, also have to prove that they are nutritionally superior to their "natural" counterparts before they can be cultivated in any scale and, consequently, sold commercially.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8296

+ INDIA: TERMINATOR TO "CONTROL DANGEROUS WEEDS"
Delivering the special address at the International Conference on Agricultural Biotechnology in Delhi, the director-general of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) Mangla Rai said: "Even the controversial terminator technology can be deployed to control dangerous weeds." The conference was organized by the industry body, FICCI in collaboration with the department of biotechnology, ICAR and co-sponsored by USDA and Monsanto and its Indian partner Mahyco.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8289

+ MORE ON BT COTTON FARMER SUICIDES
In the middle of India, the world's second most populous country, over 4,000 farmers in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra state have committed suicide in the past four years - more than 1,000 in 2006 alone. Even now, the deaths continue, often several a day. READ ON, INCLUDING ANOTHER POWERFUL ARTICLE FROM P SAINATH
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8289

+ "THE DYING FIELDS": PBS FILM ON BT COTTON FARMER SUICIDES
A harrowing PBS feature on the Bt cotton farmer suicides in Vidarbha is at
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/wideangle/shows/vidarbha/index.html#videoplayer

+ BIO-NANOTECHNOLOGY "WILL HELP FOOD SECURITY" - MINISTER
Advances in the area of bio-nanotechnology would go a long way in helping India's food security, minister for food and agriculture Sharad Pawar said. "Bio-nanotechnology takes agriculture from the era of [GM] crops to the brave new world of atomically modified organisms," Pawar said, speaking at the inaugural session of the three-day Fifth Knowledge Millennium Summit on "B2B Bio and Nanotechnology" organised by industry body Assocham.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8296

+ INDIA'S NONM-GM SOYMEAL EXPORTS UP
India has finalised export deals for up to 400,000 tonnes of soymeal at about 40 percent higher prices than a year ago, thanks to a bumper crop forecast and robust demand for Indian soymeal which is not GM.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8296

+ BENGAL: AGRI PANEL FOR GM TRIALS BAN
Bengal's state agriculture commission has recommended banning field trials of GM crops in the state after the recent controversy over "illegal" field trials in North 24-Parganas. "The members of the commission were unanimous about the need for banning trials of GM crops in open fields till we are certain about the safety aspects through further research. Trials may be permitted only in case of government farms or those under universities," Mr Nurul Huda, the member from CPI-M said.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8296

+ TEMPORARY VICTORY WON AGAINST GM RICE IN PHILIPPINES
In the Philippines, the Quezon City regional trial court has issued a temporary restraining order preventing the government from approving the application of Bayer Philippines to use GM rice LL62 for food, animal feed and processing. Behind the petition against LL62 is Greenpeace, which filed the suit, together with other concerned citizens, in the belief that the approval of LL62 for "food, feed and processing" is Bayer's way of introducing GM rice through the backdoor.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8280

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MIDDLE EAST
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+ IRAQI FARMERS MIGHT PREFER DEATH TO BREMER'S ORDER 81
"Heard about the thousands of farmer suicides in India? Well, Iraqi farmers may be next thanks to the work of US diplomat Paul Bremer and his Monsanto friends," says an article for AlterNet. The artice notes how Indian farmers are choosing death after finding themselves caught in a loop of crop failure and debt rooted in GM and patented agriculture - the same farming model that Bremer introduced to Iraq during his tenure as administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority, the American body that ruled the "new Iraq" in its chaotic early days.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8293

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"GM SET TO RETURN TO UK"
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+ UK: ANONYMOUS GOVT SOURCE CLAIMS GM IS BACK
A front page article in the UK Guardian quoted an anonymous government source as saying that ministers had given their backing to a renewed campaign by farmers and industry to introduce GM crops to the UK. This was quickly followed by a denial from Defra (the government's department of environment, food and rural affairs) in the Times saying they're not about to support a new push for GM.

Peter Melchett of the Soil Association comments, "how on earth could the Guardian give over its front page to a story based on the musings of one anonymous source, claiming to speak on behalf of ministers but clearly not a minister? Second, how many other commercial products could expect to get a huge plug on the front page of a national newspaper on the basis of one anonymous briefing?" Melchett points out, "The story by the Guardian's science correspondent neatly coincides with the departure of one of the government's longest standing pro-GM campaigners, Prof Howard Dalton, who finishes his job as [Defra's] chief scientist this week."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8283
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8284
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8290

+ EXCELLENT LETTERS TO GUARDIAN ON THREATENED RETURN TO GM:
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8285

+ GM CROPS MUST NOT BE ALLOWED - GREEN PARTY
"I believe that decisions on the future of GM may be the most important made in my lifetime" - Green Party spokesman Derek Wall:
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8291

+ LMers FOR GM - AGAIN!
Predictably, the LM-spawned website Spiked Online carries an article by James Heartfield punting GM and trying to discredit its critics. Heartfield is a long-time member of Frank Furedi's LM cult that eulogises technologies like nuclear power, genetic engineering and human cloning, while ridiculing environmentalism. Although the LMers claim to be ardent supporters of science, they aggressively promote climate change skepticism.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8291

+ MEACHER BLASTS GM YIELD AND CLIMATE CHANGE CLAIMS
Former UK environment minister Michael Meacher comments on the story that GM is set to return to the UK: So the biotech industry is having another try. Having been defeated comprehensively in 2004 after the GM field-scale trials I set up, they have the gall to suggest (like the nuclear industry) that climate change might provide the way back in. Your report says an unnamed "senior government source" claims the tide will turn because, allegedly, GM crops are higher-yield and hardier to help feed the world's increasing population and will help provide biofuels to limit climate change. These claims are bunkum.

The most authoritative study on crop yields - by Charles Benbrook, an independent US scientist - found that over a five-year period yields actually fell and pesticide use increased to deal with superweeds.... The claim that GM will assist production of biofuels is equally mischievous. If it did this (which is unlikely), it would actually diminish the world's food supply, given the competition for land.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8292

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AFRICA
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+ IMPORTANT NEW REPORT ON "AFRICAN" GM MAIZE
Professor Jennifer Thompson, the ardent South African lobbyist for GM crops, and scientists at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, in collaboration with colleagues from seed company, PANNAR Pty Ltd, have reported on the development of a GM maize variety resistant to maize streak virus that they say could contribute to a substantial improvement in African maize yields. Mariam Mayet of the African Centre for Biosafety looks at the issues raised in a new Briefing Paper.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8301

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NATURE BIOTECHNOLOGY SCANDAL
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+ JOURNAL FACILITATES ATTACK ON SCIENTIST
Dr Brian John of GM-free Cymru has described in detail how the journal Nature Biotechnology "set up an honest scientist through a conspiracy of lies and deception" over her work showing that GM soy had negative effects on rats.

The journal appears to have helped a "kangaroo court" of four scientists with no experience in animal feeding trials to rip apart Irina Ermakova's study without giving her a chance to defend it. In the process, the journal's editor allegedly deceived Ermakova over the nature and authorship of the article on her studies.
Read the story at http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8287

+ TAKE ACTION
Please protest to Andrew Marshall about his behaviour and that of his journal, and inform his bosses what you think of his conduct. The relevant e-mail addresses are:
Andrew Marshall, Editor, Nature This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it._
Richard Charkin, Chief Executive, MacMillan Ltd_c/o This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it._
Annette Thomas, Managing Director of Nature Publications, London_c/o This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it._
Philip Campbell, Editor-in-Chief, Nature Publications, London_c/o This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. _and This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
See Prof Joe Cummins' powerful letter to Marshall, in which he accuses Marshall of plagiarizing Ermakova's article, at http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8295

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DISEASE LINKED TO GM?
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+ IS X-FILES ILLNESS A REALITY?
Report from the London Evening Standard:
The symptoms sound like something from The X Files - sufferers complain of a crawling sensation all over the body, egg-like lumps under the skin and, even more bizarrely, cuts which produce tiny red and blue fibres.

Many doctors, however, are highly sceptical - dismissing the symptoms as imaginary and patients as delusional.

But a growing number of experts believe the symptoms are genuine, and the US government's Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is investigating the condition - Morgellons disease - as reported in the New Scientist....

.. at the State University of New York, Vitaly Citovsky, professor of biochemistry and cell biology, found that the lesions of Morgellons patients test positively for the presence of agrobacterium, a bacterium used in the commercial production of genetically modified food - but not normally found in skin sores.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8286
More: http://www.biotech-info.net/tumor_causing.html
http://www.sunysb.edu/biochem/citovsky/index.html

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GENE THERAPY
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+ DEATH OF WOMAN RAISES QUESTIONS OVER GENE THERAPY
A few hours before she died this summer at the age of 36, Jolee Mohr lay in a Chicago hospital so swollen by internal bleeding and her failing kidneys that her husband decided against bringing their 5-year-old daughter to say goodbye. The girl wouldn't have recognized her mother.

Jolee Mohr got sick the day after her right knee was injected with trillions of GM viruses in a voluntary experiment to find out if gene therapy might be a safe way to ease the pain of rheumatoid arthritis. She was dead three weeks later.

There have been more than 800 gene therapy studies involving 5,000 US patients since the NIH approved the nation's first human gene transfer study in 1989. Yet there are no approved therapies despite 17 years of research, and the only major success - a cure for the rare inherited immune disorder known as "bubble boy disease" - came with a high cost: leukemia linked in 2003 to the virus that delivered the treatment.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8282

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NEW BOOK
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A new book on biosafety has been published, called Biosafety first: Holistic Approaches to Risk and Uncertainty in Genetic Engineering and Genetically Modified Organisms, by Terje Traavik and Lim Li Ching (eds.). It is a unique work as its approach to biosafety is holistic, encompassing not only scientific, but also socio-economic, cultural, policy and regulatory spheres.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=8281