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GMW:_Blair's_Not-So-Funny_Farm/ANOTHER_COUNTY_COUNCIL_GOES_GM_FREE

" GM_WATCH "

Sun, 22 Feb 2004 09:54:27 GMT

 

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1.The Not-So-Funny Farm

2.ANOTHER COUNTY COUNCIL GOES GM FREE

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1.The Not-So-Funny Farm

The Sunday Herald (Scotland), 22 February 2004

http://www.sundayherald.com/40084

 

Labour is going to give us GM crops whether we want them or not … what does that

say about British democracy?

By Ian Bell

 

WHEN the jury is still out, you can’t have a verdict. You can have opinions,

even faith, but until those who have studied the evidence reach a firm

conclusion your views are not worth a great deal. Being a new Labour minister,

even a prime minister, does not grant you supernatural powers of prophecy and

insight denied to the rest of us.

 

That’s the nub of the argument where genetically modified crops are concerned.

The government knows only too well that a large majority of people don’t want

their food modified. It knows, too, that if the public’s questions were properly

addressed and properly answered, opposition would probably melt away. Show

beyond doubt that the stuff is safe, in this age of mad cow disease and Sars,

and we might just swallow it. Instead, according to papers leaked last week, the

Blair administration intends to allow the first crop of GM maize in the name of

British science regardless of what the public thinks. A government that claims

to be in the middle of a " Big Conversation " with voters has decided to turn off

its hearing aid. Typically, it presents this as a staunch refusal to " take the

easy way out " . Most of us know, however, that the hard way, unthinkable to the

Blairites, would be to continue to resist the demands of the United States and

its agri-business.

 

That lobby tends to present GM as the latest gee-whiz way to save the world.

Plant the new seeds, they say, and hunger will be banished among the wretched of

the Earth. It sounds like a splendid aspiration. But why, then, are the GM

companies so fanatically keen on forcing their way into the European market?

Starvation isn’t exactly an issue on this side of the Atlantic. If anything, we

are glutted with foods of every variety. Obesity is our problem, not hunger.

 

Last year, in any case, the government held what it called a national GM debate.

(Were you consulted? Me neither). This produced a disappointing, not to say

dismal, result for GM’s proponents. More than 80% of those polled didn’t want

modified foodstuffs and only 2% said they would knowingly let such substances

pass their lips. Other surveys have suggested that opposition is perhaps less

deeply rooted, but none have established anything like a majority for tampering

with food. Still the government, knowing nothing for sure, maintains that it

knows better.

 

In fact, the science it has commissioned is scarcely compelling. A five-year

trial by the advisory committee on releases to the environment ended in January

with a report concluding that GM maize is preferable to maize saturated with

herbicides (right answer, wrong question), but establishing that both GM

oil-seed rape and GM sugar beet were harmful to the environment. This confirmed

previous findings, including those of the government’s own chief scientist, Sir

David King. Still the government presses on.

 

It does not know – because no-one knows – how to prevent GM crops from

contaminating ordinary crops, particularly organic crops. It cannot say –

because no-one can say – what economic benefit there is to be had from GM,

though its own Cabinet Office has struggled to identify any benefit whatsoever.

It cannot even begin to predict – because it chooses not to predict – whether

the imposition of GM will provoke civil disobedience, or worse, from

environmentalists and others. It is walking into a minefield, not a maize field,

and appears not to grasp the fact.

 

The government’s real motives are, as usual, not hard to fathom. You can just

about summarise them in a sentence: what America wants, America must have. The

US, with Canada and Argentina at its heels, has gone to the World Trade

Organisation with a suit maintaining that the European Union’s moratorium on GM

– no permission to plant until its safety is proven – is illegal. The Americans

choose to believe that listening to the concerns of the EU’s citizens is just an

excuse for protectionism. Thus the obedient Blairites, with no other shred of

justification, are doing America’s work. At the risk of sounding melodramatic,

our government is taking the side of a foreign power against its own people.

 

Well, if Iraq demonstrated nothing else it showed that such is a tenet, these

days, of what passes for British foreign policy. It also illustrates a wilful

misunderstanding, in some quarters, of what the anti-globalisation campaign is

about. We can argue about capitalism and free trade – put me down as a

practising heretic – but when commercial interests are elevated above the will

of a country’s people the real debate is about democracy.

 

Those leaked papers allegedly state explicitly that the government has a clear

understanding of the depth of opposition to GM. As a member of the EU’s inner

council, that government also knows that the wishes of an entire continent are

at issue. It prefers, nevertheless, to let the GM genie out of a bottle to which

it can never be returned.

 

That, I suspect, is what troubles ordinary people most. We are talking about a

process that is irreversible. The biotech industry, we can be certain, will not

lift a finger to prevent the contamination of organic crops: contamination is in

its interests. Last week, indeed, Paul Rylott, head of biosciences at

BayerCropScience, told The Guardian that his industry had no intention whatever

of funding compensation for organic farmers, as the government apparently

proposes.

 

Compensation was unnecessary, said Rylott, and “silly” because simple

precautions, such as keeping GM crops at a set distance from ordinary crops, was

all the protection organics require. You can sense the way the wind is blowing,

and it is carrying modified seeds.

 

I am not, I hope, guilty of Luddism, or whatever the environmental equivalent to

machine-smashing might be. Genetic research has a vast potential for good; the

possibilities flowing from the human genome project are endless.

 

But what sort of lunatic proposes altering a fundamental resource – and they

don’t come much more fundamental than food – in an irreversible way without a

cast-iron certainty that they know precisely what they are doing? In the matter

of GM food we can all agree that opinion is divided, but that ought to be

enough, of itself, to instil maximum caution. They will tell you that no-one

should have a veto on scientific progress. That, it appears, is one of the

government’s central arguments. It says that a ban on GM would be “irrational”

given its science policy and its commitment to “the UK science base”. This

sounds impressive until you remind yourself how the same government would react

to any attempt at human cloning in Britain.

 

That government also imposes restrictions, though not enough of them, on

experiments with animals. Science is tightly regulated in this country, yet,

when American big business comes calling, restraint disappears.

 

Which, in the long run, is more important: supporting a nascent, home-grown (as

it were) organics industry, or co-operating with foreign multi-nationals whose

products might well put an end to organic food? Is it better for a government to

listen to its people, or ease the way of the US in its battle with the EU, our

treaty partners? In this affair the only jury that should count is being denied

a vote, and not for the first time.

 

At bottom, all of this illustrates why the struggle to control globalisation

matters. The international argument over GM has its roots in a free trade regime

that allows a dominant economy, in this case America, to impose its will on

others simply because the unimpeded flow of goods and services is held to be

sacred. That same regime has forced privatisation, theft at public expense, on

most of the planet and it has a nasty habit of promoting wars, trade wars and

shooting wars.

 

Anyone who tells you, for example, that the US has absolutely no commercial

interests in Iraq is a liar or a fool. Anyone who suggests, equally, that the

government’s determination to introduce GM stems from a devotion to science

should take the matter up with a university researcher working for a pittance.

Globalisation is the issue.

 

Next, according to the leaked document, will come a propaganda campaign

promising a land of GM milk and GM honey. The truth will be genetically modified

from its present, simple state – we just don’t know enough – to something far

grander and less honest by tame MPs and scientists employed by the biotech

industry. One thing I guarantee: it won’t be good for your digestion.

---

2. ANOTHER COUNTY COUNCIL GOES GM FREE

 

Oxfordshire is the seventh County Council to become 'GM-Free'; joining over

twenty other local authorities.

 

MEDIA RELEASE

Oxford Friends of the Earth, c/o 13 Princes Street,

Oxford. OX4 1DD.

Tel. 01865 203 015

Email: andrew

Web: www.oxfoe.co.uk

 

Immediate release 17 February 2004

 

OXFORDSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL GOES 'GM-FREE'

 

This afternoon, Tuesday 17 February, The Executive of Oxfordshire County Council

passed a resolution for a package of measures to stop the commercial growing of

GM crops in the County and to ensure the County Council's catering, including

school dinners, will contain no GM ingredients. The resolution was passed

without objection [1]. Oxfordshire is the seventh County Council to become

'GM-Free'; joining over twenty other local authorities.

 

The resolution passed was to:

 

* Stop the commercial growing of GM crops in

Oxfordshire by seeking exemptions during the EU

approvals process of each crop on a case by case basis where justified. But this

is subject to the agreement of two Councillors each time: one responsible for

Sustainable Development (Anne Purse, Liberal Democrat) and the other the

Executive member for Transport (David Robertson, Conservative);

 

* Formally confirm the requirement that officers

arranging contracts for the supply of foods ensure

that suppliers contract take all reasonable and

practicable steps to ensure that genetically modified

food is not used or provided e.g. school dinners.

 

* Consult farmers and growers who have registered in the Oxfordshire " GM Free

Register " [2] and other

representative agencies as to what other measures

might be feasible to protect the economic well being

of organic and other non-GM farmers and producers

 

Andrew Wood, Food Campaigner for Oxford Friends of the Earth said:

 

" We're delighted that the Council listened to the many people who live and work

in Oxfordshire and asked for a GM-Free Oxfordshire. This really is of benefit to

both wildlife and the agricultural economy of the County. However the Council

Executive is being very cautious in it's commitment to using its EU powers to

stop commercial GM growing in the County. We'll be monitoring them to see they

live up to their promise. "

 

Oxfordshire farmer Charles Bennett, from Sandy Lane Farm, near Thame said:

 

" We can all breathe a sigh of relief now Oxfordshire

is to stop the commercial growing of GM crops. It's

really for everyone's benefit, organic growers and

conventional farmers, as well as consumers, especially those who buy

locally. " [3]

 

The Council had received many, many representations [3] for Oxfordshire to

become a GM-Free County Council like neighbouring Warwickshire and

Gloucestershire, and other authorities around the Country [4]. The Executive

meeting considered a report by the Solicitor to the County of the legal measures

that could be taken to keep Oxfordshire GM-Free. The report was ordered after a

Council meeting in November 2003.

 

ENDS

 

Contact Andrew Wood, Oxford Friends of the Earth 01865 203 015

 

Editors Notes

 

[1] The resolution passed was slightly amended from

that published in the agenda for the Executive

Meeting, see:

 

http://www2.oxfordshire.gov.uk/hlpdownloads/ex170204.htm

 

The resolution for the GM-Free Oxfordshire is item 9

of the 15 item agenda.

 

[2] In November the Council asked the Oxfordshire Food Group to construct a

register of 'Oxfordshire farmers, market gardeners and others with a financial

agricultural interest (including bee keepers) who wish to able to declare

themselves GM-Free'. The Food Group is currently drawing up the register.

 

[3] The Council has received representations from

farmers, farm workers, beekeepers, wildlife

organisations, women's groups and the general public for Oxfordshire to become a

GM-Free County. At its November meeting the Council was presented with over a

hundred letters from Oxfordshire farmers and growers asking for the commercial

growing of GM crops to be prohibited. Oxfordshire farmer Charles Bennett from

Sandy Lane Farm, Tiddington near Thame presented the

letters. He can be contacted on: 07711 606 980

 

[4] See http://www.gmfreebirtain.com for further

details of GM- Free local authorities.

---

" none of this - nor public opinion, protecting the countryside or safeguarding

future health - seems to matter to ministers so much as trying to show that like

some tinpot tyrant, Mr Blair, America's poodle, is always right. " - journalist

Geoffrey Lean

 

" A government that claims to be in the middle of a 'Big Conversation' with

voters has decided to turn off its hearing aid. Typically, it presents this as a

staunch refusal to 'take the easy way out'. Most of us know, however, that the

hard way, unthinkable to the Blairites, would be to continue to resist the

demands of the United States and its agri-business. " - journalist Ian Bell

 

" Why is the Government going ahead? It is not because of the science, it is

because of the Bush administration applying pressure, and because of companies

like Monsanto who want to make a big profit bonanza out of cornering the world

food supply. It is nothing to do with feeding the world. " - Michael Meacher,

former UK environment minister

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