– Or is the Agricultural Biotechnology Council pulling the wool over our eyes?

An article in the Telegraph claims that "Millennials 'have no qualms about GM crops' unlike older generation".

The article features a survey by the GM industry body the Agricultural Biotechnology Council (ABC). The survey found that 50% of respondents favour "GM and gene editing" – still far fewer than the 81% of millennials who supported driverless tractors, the 67% who supported the use of innovations such as unmanned aerial vehicles to shore up crop security and improve yields, the 65% of young people who supported the use of drones in livestock farming to count sheep and the 63% who agreed with the use of drones in arable farming to assess, monitor and spray crops.

Peter Melchett, policy director of the Soil Association, UK, commented, "There is no information in any of the articles about this poll on the actual question asked about GM, but the ABC says people were asked about 'the latest techniques to help make crops more nutritious, pest and disease resistant', which does not sound neutral by a long way, and would not be allowed by any reputable polling company."

The GMO lobby has a long history of asking leading questions in surveys to get a predetermined outcome. For example, a much-touted consumer survey conducted in the 1990s for the industry lobby group, the International Food Information Council (IFIC), contained the following questions:

* "How likely would you be to buy a variety of produce, like tomatoes or potatoes, if it had been modified by biotechnology to taste better or fresher?"

* "How likely would you be to buy a variety of produce . . . if it had been modified by biotechnology to be protected from insect damage and required fewer pesticide applications?"

* "Biotechnology has also been used to enhance plants that yield foods like cooking oils. . . . Would this have a positive effect, a negative effect, or no effect on your purchase decision?"

James Beniger, a communications professor at the University of Southern California and past president of the American Association for Public Opinion Research, reviewed the IFIC survey and said it is so biased with leading questions favouring positive responses that any results are meaningless.

UCLA communications professor Michael Suman agreed, adding that the questions "only talk about the food tasting better, being fresher, protecting food from insect damage, reducing saturated fat and providing benefits. It's like saying 'Here's biotechnology, it does these great things for you, do you like it?'" The results might be different, Suman offers, if it contained questions biased in the other direction such as: "Some people contend that some foods produced from biotechnology cause higher rates of cancer. If that is so, what effect would that have on your buying decision?"