Fwd: Scientists Join Farmers to Call for Enquiry into Publicly Funded Science

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18 Jan 2004 14:32:08 -0000

Scientists Join Farmers to Call for Enquiry into Publicly Funded

Science

press-release

 

The Institute of Science in Society

Science Society Sustainability

http://www.i-sis.org.uk

 

General Enquiries sam

Website/Mailing List press-release

ISIS Director m.w.ho

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Scientists Join Farmers to Call for Enquiry into Publicly Funded Science

 

 

Prominent scientists representing more than a thousand colleagues around the

world are voicing their deep concerns at the lack of social accountability of

publicly funded science, especially in genetically modified (GM) crops.

 

They are particularly incensed at the persistent denial and dismissal by the

government’s scientific advisors of the now extensive scientific evidence on the

hazards of GM crops to health and the environment, and their total disregard for

the precautionary principle.

 

The scientists will be speaking out at a special briefing in the Greater London

Assembly between 2:00 to 4:00pm on Monday, 19 January 2003, where they will join

representatives of independent and family farmers to call for a review of

publicly funded science, and to set priority for non-GM sustainable farming in

Britain.

 

The scientists belong to the London-based Institute of Science in Society,

representing more than 670 scientists from 76 countries, Scientists for Global

Responsibility, with a membership of 600, and the Independent Science Panel

(ISP) on GM, launched 10 May 2003 at a public conference in London attended by

the then environment minister Michael Meacher and 200 other participants.

 

The 24 scientists on the ISP published their report, The Case for a GM-Free

Sustainable World on 15 June 2003. The report is a complete dossier of evidence

on the problems and hazards of GM crops as well as the proven successes of all

forms of non-GM sustainable agriculture. It has been translated into Spanish,

and French, Indonesian and Portuguese translations are on the way.

 

The evidence reviewed in this authoritative report, containing more than 200

references to primary and secondary sources, received ample corroboration from

new data released recently. The US Department of Agriculture confirmed that GM

crops increased pesticide use by 50 million tonnes since 1995. UK’s Farm Scale

Evaluations (FSEs), much criticised for being limited in scope and biased in

methodology, nevertheless confirmed that two of the three GM crops harmed

wildlife. The third, GM maize tolerant to herbicide glufosinate, appeared to do

better only because the conventional maize crop was sprayed with the deadly

herbicide atrazine that Europe has banned a week before the FSEs Report was

released.

 

“Scientific evidence has gone decisively against GM crops,” says Dr. Mae-Wan Ho, of the Institute of Science in Society, “It is incredible that our

government’s scientific advisors are still giving the green light to growing GM

maize.” She will be revealing at the briefing how 12 dairy cows died in a farm

in Hesse, Germany, after being fed GM maize, that different GM feed also harmed

other livestock and lab animals, suggesting there may be something seriously

wrong with GM food and feed in general.

 

An important clue is to be found in the overwhelming instability of GM

varieties. Practically every GM variety analysed by French and Belgian

scientists recently, including the T25 GM maize that the UK government is

authorising for growing in Britain, turned out to be unstable. “These results

are telling us what many of us have been saying for years: the GM process itself

is inherently uncontrollable and unsafe.” Dr. Mae-Wan Ho states.

 

“We all want to benefit from what new technologies have to offer, but history

shows that, all too often, we have failed to heed well-founded warnings and made

very expensive mistakes, and GM could be one of these;” says Professor Peter

Saunders, bio-mathematician, King’s College, London, “Precaution is the key, and

precaution is inseparable from good science.”

 

Dr. Vyvyan Howard, medical toxi-pathologist, Liverpool University, reminds us:

“The £1.6 million given by the UK Government to Dr. Pusztai was to develop

hazard assessment techniques for novel foods. That tells us the regulators

recognized that the methods in use then were not adequate to protect human

health. Not much has changed, and it seems that line of research is no longer

seriously pursued. Consequently, the current risk assessments are still totally

inadequate.”

 

Dr. Arpad Pusztai, formerly of Rowett Institute, Aberdeen, Scotland, agrees:

“Science is able to provide the tools for conducting thorough risk assessments

on GM foods, yet this is not being done adequately. It leads one to ask, ‘Who is

responsible for not ensuring that GM foods are properly assessed, and why?’”

 

Emeritus Professor of Plant Genetics Joe Cummins, from University of Western

Ontario, Canada, says of his country: “The Canadian government pumped millions

of dollars into developing GM crops, especially GM wheat, owned by the

corporations. In return, the corporations agreed to enhance the salaries of

agricultural bureaucrats. The cosy relationship between the corporations and

government has resulted in lax regulation and widespread pollution of non-GM

crops. Worse still, scientists are intimidated into silence; they are afraid to

speak out, let alone do experiments on the risks and hazards of GM.”

 

Many scientists deplore the pervasive commercial and political conflicts of

interests in both research and development and regulation of GM. Dr. Eva

Novotny, astrophysicist, formerly from Cambridge University, and spokesperson

for Scientists for Global Responsibility sums it up: “Vested interests must not

override science, economics and what the public want.”

 

The scientists are keen to work in partnership with farmers in research and

development of sustainable agriculture. John Turner, organic farmer from FARM, a

group set up in 2002 to represent independent and family farmers in the wake of

the foot and mouth epidemic, is very enthusiastic about the possibility of

forming a scientists-farmers coalition. He says: “This will ensure that science

can respond to the present needs of agriculture, and anticipate future

aspirations and needs of farmers and consumers.”

 

Register NOW for GLA Briefing, Winning the GM Science Debate at:

 

http://www.indsp.org/GLAinvite.pdf

 

 

For further details, contact Sam Burcher: sam Tel:

44-(0)-20-7383-3376 or

 

Dr. Mae-Wan Ho: m.w.ho Tel: 44-(0)-20-7272-5636.

 

 

 

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General Enquiries sam

Website/Mailing List press-release

ISIS Director m.w.ho

 

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