1.Hawaiian King Joins U.S. Presidential Candidates in Rejecting GMOs
2.Ireland: Sargent calls on Councillors to make regions GM-free
3.Ireland: Senators oppose GM farming
EXTRACT: 'Hawaii can not blindly accept this technology without question. The burden of solid proof is upon the makers of this technology, not us.' - His Majesty Akahi Nui
'We are making progress on the... Government commitment to establish a GM-free zone for the whole island of Ireland. I am working with my cabinet colleagues at national and European level to implement this commitment...' - Irish Minister of State for Food and Horticulture
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1.Hawaiian King Joins U.S. Presidential Candidates in Rejecting GMOs
TheCampaign.org, 14 November 2007 http://www.gmfreeireland.org/news/index.php
Maui, Hawaii ”š The Kingdom of Hawaii hosted a GMO Awareness Event in the first week of November at Baldwin Beach Park in Maui, Hawaii. The conference hosted Hawaii State Senator Mike Gabbard, who is drafting a bill to require the labeling of genetically engineered foods in Hawaii, and Lorrin Pang, MD, a World Health Organization consultant, selected for three years as one of America's Best (top 3%) Doctors. Also speaking at the conference was Dr. Sabry Shehata, University of Hawaii Professor of Agricultural Economics, and Anne Dietrich, Executive Director of The Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Foods. Jerry Konanui, a Hawaiian farmer who grows taro, the staple food crop of the Hawaiian people, also spoke.
This conference was unique. As well as presentations on the scientifically validated dangers of genetically modified organisms (GMO's) in our food supply, the Royal Family was consulted. His Majesty Akahi Nui, whose official title is, Lineal Descent Sovereign Heir of the Hawaiian Islands & Trustee of the Kingdom of Hawaii Nation Ministry Trust, proclaimed that genetic engineering is a violation of the ancient Hawaiian laws of living in harmony with nature.
His Majesty stated: 'We don't want the purity of our Hawaiian lands polluted with GMO's - there's nothing natural about GMO's. We are supported by many countries which refuse to accept this technology. We feel safety is the best policy for Hawaii. Genetic engineering unnaturally alters the structure of a plant's expression, without knowing the outcome for our beautiful Hawaiian Islands, its diversity of people, plants and animals. Our ecosystem is sacred. Genetic engineering unleashes changes in organisms and ecosystems that cannot be recalled. Hawaii can not blindly accept this technology without question. The burden of solid proof is upon the makers of this technology, not us.'
Taking a similar stand are candidates for the 2008 U.S. Presidency, including Senator Clinton, Senator Obama, Senator Edwards, Senator Dodd, and Governor Richardson. Each candidate has stated that, if elected, they would require mandatory labeling of GM foods in our supermarkets. Over 60% of processed food in U.S. grocery stores is now genetically modified, and food safety is becoming a defining issue of the election. In over 40 countries, genetically engineered foods are either banned or are required to be labeled. These countries include all of the European Union, plus China, Brazil, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland, Mexico, Israel, Japan, Hong Kong, the Philippines, the Republic of Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand.
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2.Ireland: Sargent calls on Councillors to make regions GM-free
Food Minister urges party colleagues to table motions on GMO-free councils
Green Party press release, 11 November 2007 http://www.gmfreeireland.org/news/index.php
At a meeting of Green Party councillors in Tipperary this weekend, the Minister of State for Food and Horticulture Trevor Sargent TD urged his party colleagues to declare their local authorities GMO-free zones.
Minister Sargent said: 'We are making progress on the Green Party's Programme for Government commitment to establish a GM-free zone for the whole island of Ireland. I am working with my cabinet colleagues at national and European level to implement this commitment, but there is plenty of complementary work to be done at a local level. Some local authorities ”š including in Clare, Meath, Cork and Bray ”š are ahead of the curve, and have already voted to declare their regions GM-free. Nearly 200 regions and over 4500 municipalities in Europe have declared themselves GMO-free, expressing a commitment to not plant genetically modified organisms in their territories.
'I am encouraging all of my colleagues on county, city, town and district councils to pursue this initiative, table a motion, and respond to the vast public opinion that does not want genetically modified organisms either grown or sold in their areas.'
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3.Ireland: Senators oppose GM farming
Seanad Debate on Food Safety, 8 November 2007 http://www.gmfreeireland.org/news/index.php
Extracts only. The full transcript is available at http://debates.oireachtas.ie/DDebate.aspx?F=SEN20071108.xml&Node=H4&Page=5
Senator David Norris:
...This leads me to the question of genetically modified foods. I would like the Minister of State to take this very seriously, as the Minister of State, Deputy Trevor Sargent, does. I draw the attention of the Minister of State to a very interesting book, entitled Genetic Roulette, by Jeffrey M. Smith. The information contained in it is very worrying. It is compiled by scientists and it demonstrates clearly that in terms of genetically modified crops, frequently the pollen from those crops can adversely affect the health of people living in the area. We have noticed, even in this country, an increase in allergies. This situation will only be made worse if we do not retain our status as a GM free country. I note the Minister of State, Deputy Sargent, is committed to this position and I applaud him for it.
It is important we would remain committed to this position even if there were not scientific worries. From a marketing and labelling point of view, it would very advantageous for us to be able to indicate that our food products were free of this material. However, it is a position that is very difficult to maintain. Tesco, for example, has a GM free policy but this has been vitiated because their own brand American long grain rice was recently contaminated with Bayer CropScience's genetically modified American long-grain GM rice variety LL601. It was discovered in two packs of Tesco dried American long grain rice. This is illegal in the EU and the USA, yet it managed to get into the shops in Ireland. That is how penetrative it is.
Monsanto is behind most of this. Monsanto claims, through Mr. Robert Shapiro, the [former] chief executive officer, to be interested in all kinds of ideals of feeding the world and so on. In the introduction to the book Genetic Roulette it is recounted that somebody who was idealistically motivated by the speeches, words and writings of Mr. Shapiro took a job there and was told by senior management that what Robert Shapiro says is one thing but what they do is something else. They are there to make money. He is the front man who tells a story. They do not even understand what he is saying. That is what we are dealing with. A scientific committee which was established in the United Kingdom made certain quite worrying findings. Subsequently it was disbanded. It is time we looked at the question of genetically modified food, the idea of patenting life forms and the questions raised about whether there can be pollution of neighbouring areas from genetically modified crops. There have been court cases about that where neighbouring farmers found their crops were contaminated but were then sued by Monsanto. The judgment of the Canadian court was that regardless of whether the farmer was responsible, and it was found he had not stolen the material, he was responsible. He owed money to Monsanto precisely because it had patented the life form and was entitled to a return on it, regardless of whether he had taken it from elsewhere or planted it. It was due to the fact that it crept in
Acting Chairman (Senator O'Toole)
Your time is up, Senator.
Senator David Norris
This is an extraordinary takeover of our food resources and the Government would be right to resist it.
Senator Deirdre de Burca:
I welcome the Minister of State to the House and the opportunity to speak about the Government policy on food safety and health promotion.
The point has been made already that the food sector is an important sector in the Irish economy. It is estimated that it directly employs approximately 300,000 people and that in 2006, the sectors of food retailing and tourism, respectively, contributed €12 billion and €5.9 billion to the economy, almost €20 billion between them. It is clearly a very important sector and our national policy on food safety is central to protecting the reputation of our food sector and improving the image of Irish food exports abroad.
I am delighted that my Green Party colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Sargent, is now the Minister of State with responsibility for food and horticulture at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. He has a major interest in the issue of food and food safety and the promotion of Irish food internationally as a quality product.
I look forward to many of the initiatives my colleague will support and promote during his term of office. In the programme for Government, some of the goals that have been agreed will make a positive contribution towards general food safety and food promotion here, one of them being the agreement to convert a minimum of 5% of national acreage to organic farmland by 2012. That will be no small feat because currently less than 1% of our farmland nationally is dedicated to organic farming and as we are aware, organic produce offers significant health benefits to consumers because it is produced without the use of chemical herbicides, pesticides and fertilisers.
I recently attended, with the Minister of State, Deputy Sargent, a meeting of the Irish Organic Trust in the Brook Lodge Hotel in my constituency of Wicklow, which has put itself on the map as the leading Irish hotel with the only fully certified organic restaurant. Some frustration was expressed by those involved in organic farming about the difficulties they are experiencing in trying to access organic produce. The chief executive of Flahavan's spoke at the AGM and told us he has to import 90% of organic oatlets for the organic porridge he sells because it is impossible to source organic oats here. We must provide many incentives to encourage conventional farmers to be part of the move to dedicating a greater percentage of our national acreage to organic farming. The more organic produce we can produce here, the more it will enhance the reputation of the food we are producing because there is a growing consumer demand for organic produce which Ireland would be foolish not to exploit. We have a strong green image and given the growing public concerns about genetically modified foods, which other speakers mentioned also, it is important that Ireland would capitalise on its clean, green image and the opportunity to develop this island as a GM-free island. I was delighted to see that objective in the current programme for Government and the decisions recently made in Brussels by the Government reflected that change in emphasis.
Other European countries have clearly placed restrictions on GM organisms and produce ranging from Austria, which has a strong ban, to other countries, in particular regions in France, Italy and so on, which have strong organic markets and restrictions on the growing and cultivation of GM produce. It is important to point out, however, that there are difficulties because of WTO rules which are placing great pressure on the European Union to open its markets fully to GM produce, often coming from very large producers such as the United States, Australia, Canada and so on. We must have an enlightened policy at EU level. I hope that the fact that many individual member states already have these restrictions in place, and Ireland will join them in having a very proactive policy on becoming a GM free island, will be reflected in the kinds of decisions that are made within the Council of Ministers in the coming years.
Another issue close to this one is the issue of GM feed and the current dependence of Irish farmers on imported GM feed. Unfortunately, Irish consumers are not aware that in terms of much of the meat they are eating, the animals have been fed GM feed because it is the most affordable feed available to the majority of farmers. Those who have expressed an interest and sought to source non-GM feed find it prohibitively expensive. There is an onus on the Government, given the commitment we have made in the programme for Government, to work towards making Ireland GM-free. We must help farmers and the farming sector to access affordable GM-free feed to ensure that Irish consumers can be confident that the meat they are eating is genuinely GM-free.
That leads on to the issue of labelling. Currently, food must be labelled as GM if it contains above 0.9% of GM ingredients. An EU wide survey of food products was carried out in 2006 - it was carried out here by the State Laboratory. Unfortunately, low levels of GM rice that had been illegally imported from the US were found in five out of the 19 food products it examined. That obliged food retailers like Tesco and Marks & Spencer to withdraw those products from their shelves. The correct labelling of food is essential to a healthy food sector and is something consumers are increasingly demanding. It is important that if there are GM ingredients in the food we are eating, they should be clearly labelled as such. There should be proper implementation of the requirement that any foods containing over 0.9% of GM ingredients would be so labelled...
Senator Phil Prendergast
...The Minister of State noted the increased complexity of food safety in the area of genetically modified organisms. I also acknowledge Senator de Burca's contribution on this issue. The Minister of State noted:
'Although Ireland has traditionally adopted a precautionary but positive approach, the Irish public appears to be divided on this issue. Government policy in this area is currently being re-evaluated to ensure that as far as possible the views of supporters and opponents of the use of GMOs are taken into account.'
When will this re-evaluation be completed? Who is contributing to the debate? In what forum is information on GMO foods being collated?
It was interesting to learn that when animals fed GMO foods are sold on, there is no obligation to label the resulting food products as GM modified. It is a serious error to allow members of the public to be denied the full facts...
Senator Jerry Buttimer
It was Socrates who said that we should eat to live and not live to eat.
Comment from GM-free Ireland
The Canadian Court case which Senator Norris refers to is Monsanto vs. Percy Schmeiser. Monsanto wanted the profits from his entire crop, a 'technology charge' (patent royalty), plus a million dollars in court costs. The court ruled that although Mr. Schmeiser did not owe Monsanto a penny, his contaminated seeds and crops had now become the property of Monsanto under applicable patent law.
Percy Schmeiser and his wife Louise won the prestigious 2007 Right Livelihood Award (the alternative Nobel Prize) for giving the world a wake-up call about the dangers to farmers and biodiversity everywhere from the growing dominance and market aggression of companies engaged in the genetic engineering of crops. The Jury honoured the Schmeisers 'for their courage in defending biodiversity and farmers' rights, and challenging the environmental and moral perversity of current interpretations of patent laws'.
For details see:
Percy Schmeiser's warning to Irish farmers: http://www.gmfreeireland.org/conference/trans/P.Schmeiser.pdf.
Monsanto's onerous farmer contract: http://www.gmfreeireland.org/conference/trans/exhibits/A.php
Monsanto extortion letter sent to contaminated farmers: http://www.gmfreeireland.org/conference/trans/exhibits/D.php