WEEKLY WATCH number 111

February 11, 2005

WEEKLY WATCH 111

" GM WATCH " <info

Thu, 10 Feb 2005 19:40:34 GMT

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WEEKLY WATCH number 111

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from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor

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Dear all:

Tony Hall, the U.S. ambassador to the FAO, has renewed his call for

African leaders who refuse the U.S.'s GM-contaminated food aid to be

tried

for " crimes against humanity " . It appears to be part of a viral

marketing strategy aimed at painting the U.S. and biotech as the

saviours of

Africa and those that raise concerns as genocidal villains. And

lobbyists like CS Prakash and Willie DeGreef have been joining in the

chorus.

(LOBBYWATCH)

The most important piece of news this week is the TERMINATOR ACTION

ALERT - our first item below. leaked documents reveal how the Canadian

government has been secretly planning to unleash the hated Terminator

sterile-seed technology upon the world. They must be stopped and time is

running short. Please act IMMEDIATELY to prevent this catastrophe - a

series of simple actions are outlined.

Claire claire

www.gmwatch.org / www.lobbywatch.org

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CONTENTS

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TERMINATOR ACTION ALERT

TOP TEN GM READS

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The current edition of The Ecologist (Vol. 35, No.1, Feb 2005) lists GM

Watch's " top reads " on GM.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4888

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LOBBYWATCH

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+ NEW U.S. CALL FOR AFRICAN LEADERS TO BE TRIED FOR " CRIMES AGAINST

HUMANITY "

Tony Hall, the US ambassador to the United Nations Food and Agriculture

Organization, has repeated his call for African leaders who refuse the

US's GM-contaminated food aid to be tried for " crimes against

humanity " .

When Hall originally called in 2002 for these leaders to be tried,

organisations from over 30 different countries around the world responded

with a powerful open letter calling for an apology for a " reckless

comment " which " reeks of hypocrisy and bad political judgment and has no

legal basis in international law " . Hall's comment, the letter said,

" serves only to further damage the reputation of the US government

already

suffering for its unilateral, aggressive and abusive foreign policy. "

But, however ludicrous and inflammatory Hall's comments may have been,

it has played its part in a viral marketing strategy aimed at painting

the US and biotech as the saviours of Africa and those that raise

concerns as villains. This can be seen from an article for

FrontPageMagazine.com in which the refusal of GM food aid in Africa is

listed by an

American commentator, in a piece marking the 60th anniversary of the

liberation of Auschwitz, as an example of a modern crime against humanity.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4889

+ BIOTECH REJECTION AN " OUTRAGE " AND " TRAGEDY " IN DEVELOPING WORLD

Willie DeGreef, described as " a biotechnology consultant from Belgium " ,

has told a US Grains Council meeting in California that it is an

outrage and tragedy when third world policy makers reject " genetically

enhanced foods " and " state that they'd rather have their children

starve than

to eat " .

DeGreef is quoted as saying, " How did we get that far; who was

responsible for whispering (those) messages to those policy makers, " who

rejected GM food aid. " That is something that I would rather sooner or

later

want to find out, because you're talking about literally crimes against

humanity. "

This is fantastically misleading. In the case of Zambia, the country

that is most often quoted in relation to the rejection of GM food aid,

president Levy Mwanawasa only reaffirmed his rejection of US GM maize on

the advice of his own experts.

This was a transparent process in which pro-GM scientists had ample

opportunity to more than whisper their messages. A delegation of Zambian

scientists and economists, headed by Dr Wilson Mwenya of the National

Science and Technology Council, completed a fact-finding tour of

laboratories and regulatory offices in South Africa, Europe and the

US, before

reporting back to the president. The report concluded that studies on

the safety of GM foods are inconclusive, and the US maize should be

rejected as a precautionary measure. And there is absolutely no evidence

that anybody died as a consequence of the president's decision.

Willie DeGreef somehow fails to mention that he used to punt GM foods

for Syngenta.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4883

+ ROCKEFELLER PRESIDENT IS NEW MAN AT DFID

A campaign to push more public money into GMOs has received a major

boost with the appointment of a leading GM proponent to help oversee the

international aid programmes of Britain's Department for International

Development (DFID).

The campaign has been underway for some time on both sides of the

Atlantic. Only last week, for instance, the Rockefeller-funded Center for

Science in the Public Interest called for extra public investment into

GMOs.

In the UK, as the biotech industry has gone into almost total retreat,

the pro-GM lobby group Sense About Science has been seeking to fill the

vacuum via a lengthy campaign in support of " public good plant

breeding " . The aim of this campaign, backed by the John Innes Centre

amongst

others, is to help raise more public and foundation money for the

introduction of plants developed through biotechnology into the

developing

world.

http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=151

Sense About Science works in close coordination with the Royal Society,

the UK's pro-GM national academy of science. The RS has strongly

lobbied for a post of " chief scientist " to be established at DFID to

oversee

the UK government's international aid programmes.

DFID has now appointed Gordon Conway as its chief scientific adviser.

Until recently, Conway was president of the Rockefeller Foundation.

Predictably, the appointment has been warmly welcomed by the Royal

Society.

In 1999, Conway, the author of " The Doubly Green Revolution: Food for

All in the 21st Century " , was able to tell a meeting organised by

Monsanto that " the Rockefeller Foundation has funded over $100 million

dollars of plant biotechnology research and trained over four hundred

scientists from Asia, Africa and Latin America " . Not all of that money

was

spent on promoting GM, but a sizeable amount was, with Golden Rice being

notable among the Foundation's pet projects. And Conway has made clear

his own personal support for the technology.

More: http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4881

+ PRAKASH PUSHING GMOS IN AFRICA

CS Prakash has written a piece for the Nigerian press with the

sub-heading, " Africa needs GMOs to survive the impending continental

famine " .

In his usual shameless manner, Prakash warns that yields of sweet potato

in " African nations are dangerously low - in some cases losing up to 80

per cent of expected yields due to the sweet potato weevil and also the

feathery mottle virus (SPFMV) " . Prakash then goes on to say, " Research

is under way on sweet potatoes that produce their own protection

against SPFMV " .

But the impact of SPFMV has been shown to have been hugely overstated

and not even to be the main viral risk for sweet potatoes. And when

Prakash says the " research is underway " he fails to mention that it's

already been " underway " for over 12 years, that it has wasted millions of

dollars and that it has proved totally useless! Despite which, Prakash

has repeatedly cited the GM sweet potato as an example of a GM success

for Africa!

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4889

http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=131

http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=106

http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=131

+ FUREDI REHAB EFFORT

An article in the Times Higher Education Supplement focuses on the

Godfather of the ferociously pro-GM " LM " network, Frank Furedi.

The article provides Furedi with a platform to bemoan George Monbiot's

December 2003 piece - drawing on research by GM WATCH - revealing how

former members of Furedi's Revolutionary Communist Party have turned up

in lobby groups used to promote GM and other controversial genetic

technologies: Sense About Science, Science Media Centre, Genetic Interest

Group, Progress, Genepool, etc.

Furedi claims to have been " dogged " by the Monbiot article. He tells

the Times Higher that not only were copies sent to his vice-chancellor,

but when he was in Phoenix, Arizona on a lecture tour, people were

" coming up to me with copies of Monbiot's article asking me what I was up

to " .

For Furedi this constitutes persecution akin to the worst excesses of

the last century. " It is so fascistic. It is McCarthyism, " he complains.

" It was characteristic of the Right to talk about masonic conspiracy,

about Jewish plots, but now we are seeing parts of the Left being

obsessed with this kind of stuff. "

In view of the contempt Furedi often expresses for victim culture, it's

interesting to note his equating of the sending of articles to his vice

chancellor, or being asked questions in an Arizona meeting, with

fascistic oppression, McCarthyite persecution and the scapegoating of

Jews.

In his own case, it seems, he's only too happy to invoke the victimhood

he has always railed against.

Furedi's self-pity is also nauseating when one considers the real

vilification and persecution experienced by those who've run up

against the

kinds of forces Furedi and his followers have happily excused and

encouraged - from the Wise Users to ethically challenged corporations and

the Serb and Hutu militias!

Perhaps the most incisive comments in the article are those of the

sociologist Laurie Taylor who wonders why " all these former Trotskyists

agree in detail on what appears to be in essence a right-wing platform

and

how can they call themselves academics if they appear to deny

independent thought? You might have expected them to travel in a

variety of

directions after the collapse of their revolutionary dream in the

Nineties,

but many peddle similar lines. "

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4875

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EUROPE

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+ WALES LEADS EUROPE IN PROTECTING CROPS FROM GM THREAT

Wales has joined with other like-minded European regions in Florence to

discuss measures for protecting conventional and organic agriculture

from the risks of genetic modification. At a meeting of the European

Regions Network (ERM), which was part founded by Wales, suggestions for

strict coexistence measures were put forward to protect European farming

from contamination from GM crops.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4887

+ EUROPEAN GM-FREE REGIONS NETWORK SET UP IN FLORENCE

Allowing regional governments to take a clear stance against GMOs is

the goal of " OGM-free " , a European regional governments network set up in

Florence by the regional government of Tuscany. Nineteen regional

governments have already signed a document named " Europe's Regional

Governments and Local Authorities Charter " , which aims at safeguarding

genuine

and high-quality products, increasing the autonomy of farmers.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4887

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THE AMERICAS

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+ ASSAULT ON LOCAL DEMOCRACY IN IOWA AND BEYOND

The last 12 months have been the most inspiring yet as far as local

activism on GM in the US is concerned. In Vermont 79 towns passed

resolutions against GMOs, while the state government passed a

groundbreaking

seed-labelling bill. In California, voters in Mendocino county passed the

first law in the US to ban GM releases into the environment. Other

counties have followed suit.

A backlash against local communities taking action was inevitable and

here's an item that might set many good folks in Iowa and beyond up in

arms as it is a direct assault on local democracy, and specifically

local ordinances controlling GM seeds.

" HF 202 " is being pushed (or should it be 'sneaked in'?) by Rep Sandy

Greiner who, we're told, has previously been an advocate for special

interests. The proposed bill is for " An Act relating to the regulation of

agricultural seed, by providing for preemption of local legislation " .

The ACT would stop " a local governmental entity, including a county,

special district, township, or city, from adopting or enforcing

legislation which relates to the production, use, advertising, sale,

distribution, storage, transportation, formulation, packaging, labeling,

certification, or registration of agricultural seed. The local

legislation is

void and unenforceable. "

Iowa is not the only front for " pre-emption " : it seems a broader effort

is under way to nullify the voter initiatives that began in Mendocino

County last year and spread to Marin, San Luis Obispo, Butte, Humboldt

and, most recently, Sonoma counties.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4886

+ HAWAII: GOVT FORCED TO REVEAL PHARMCROP TEST SITES

In a first step toward public disclosure of test sites of

biopharmaceutical crops, the US Department of Agriculture was forced

by court order

on February 4 to reveal the locations of these sites in Hawaii.

Following the ruling, representatives of the USDA handed over to

Earthjustice

attorneys information on the precise locations of open-air field tests

of biopharmaceutical crops genetically engineered to produce industrial

chemicals and drugs. This marks the first time the federal government

has been forced to disclose the location of field tests of GM crops

since it began systematically hiding these locations from the public.

" Allowing food crops to be engineered to produce chemicals or drugs is

bad enough, " said Peter Jenkins of the Center for Food Safety, one of

the groups fighting the case, " but hiding the location of the test

fields from an at-risk public is indefensible. Yet we find our own

government fighting on the side of the biotech industry to keep the

public in

the dark about drug-laced food crops. "

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4884

+ PHARMCROPS AND BIOTERROR

In a letter to Nature Biotechnology, US EPA toxicologist Suzanne

Wuerthele criticizes an article which recommended the production,

through GM,

of pathogen-resistant crops and animals as counterattacks to bioterror

agents that might be used against the US.

Wuerthele says, " It might be productive for the biotech industry to

first consider how genetically modified crops themselves could contribute

to terrorist attacks. Just a few bushels of 'pharmcorn' producing a

swine vaccine could, if strategically planted by terrorists, contaminate

virtually the entire US corn supply and close international markets to

us for years. "

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4873

+ ARKANSAS RICE GROWERS REJECT " PHARMA RICE "

The Arkansas Rice Growers Association has voted to approve legislative

efforts to ban the production of pharmaceutical or industrial rice in

Arkansas. Because of the imminent threat that " pharma " rice will be

planted in the Missouri Bootheel this spring, the potential for domestic

and export market disruption from even a small acreage of rice containing

human genes is serious, according to Greg Yielding, executive director

of ARGA.

The vote came in response to Ventria Bioscience's leaving California

and relocating to Missouri, where they hope to plant their GM

drug-producing rice this year.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4873

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ASIA

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+ FOOD, HEALTH AND BRIBES

For decades Monsanto has been claiming that their GM crops are tested

and safe. But in Indonesia, Monsanto employees used bribery to try to

buy the company out of the need for an environmental impact statement.

The questions now go beyond Indonesia. If Monsanto finds it necessary to

bribe at least 140 officials and family members for half a decade in a

country that only makes less then 1% of its overall revenue ... what

can we expect in other places where there's more at stake? All human

safety data for Monsanto's GM crops - if indeed any exists - are provided

to regulators in countries around the world by Monsanto itself.

Excellent article on the Indonesian scandal at

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4874

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AUSTRALASIA

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+ AUSTRALIA: POULTRY GIANTS QUAIL AT GM FOOD PROTESTS

A consumer backlash against GM food has prompted the three largest

poultry companies, which produce 80 per cent of chicken sold in

Australia,

to stop using GM feed. Inghams, Bartter Steggles and Baiada are

expected to announce that they will phase out the use of imported GM

soy. The

decision has been described by Greenpeace as " a major win for consumer

power " , and follows thousands of phone calls, faxes and letters to the

poultry companies.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4891

+ GM COTTON FOR USE IN NZ FOODS: PUBLIC COMMENTS SOUGHT

The trans-Tasman food standards authority says it is safe to eat foods

containing ingredients made from some GM cotton. Food Standards

Australia New Zealand has announced it is seeking public submissions,

by March

23, on the use in foods of GE cotton from the Monsanto strain MON88913,

which has been engineered to tolerate glyphosate herbicides, such as

the company's Roundup.

At the end of last year, Food Standards' managing director, Ian

Lindenmayer announced the approval of foods made using oil and

" linters " from

Syngenta's GM cotton, COT102, Bollgard II. It was the 20th GM food

ingredient to be approved for sale by Food Standards, which said that

foods

containing oil and linters from the GM cotton would be exempt from GM

labelling, because those two parts of the cotton did not contain

engineered proteins. [GM WATCH comment: this is unconfirmed. Samples

of soy

oil have been found to contain detectable GM proteins.]

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4891

+ NEW ZEALAND: EMAIL BLAST PUTS HEAT ON GM BEANS

In case anyone doubts the value of a good old e-mail protest...

A can of chilli beans containing GM corn may be withdrawn from New

Zealand supermarkets after opponents swamped the importer with protest

emails. The Australasian general manager of the US-based importer Hormel

Foods, Scott Martin, said yesterday that he had received 1000 emails from

New Zealand " Green Party supporters " in the past week asking him to

withdraw the product, and he was considering doing so.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4878

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FOOD SAFETY

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+ GM FOOD FIGHT: DAVID SCHUBERT

An article on the lack of safety tests on GM foods, citing various

scientists, is at

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4882

EXCERPT:

GE food skeptic Dave R. Schubert can't be dismissed as some

granola-brained ecohippie. He is head of the Salk Institute's Cellular

and

Neurobiology Lab, with a doctorate in cell biology from UC San Diego.

" The problem is that experimental biotechnology is applied to food with

no mandatory safety testing, " Schubert said. Allergies have gone up

considerably in the decade since genetically engineered foods were

introduced, he said.

Schubert carefully adds that he is not saying such a link exists; there

just isn't enough evidence to say either way. That's what bothers him.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4882

+ MONSANTO'S BOVINE GROWTH HORMONE STILL THREATENS HEALTH

The Cancer Prevention Coalition and Organic Consumers Association have

released a statement replying to the Hudson Institute's

agribusiness-funded Center for Global Food Issues' " Milk is Milk "

campaign. " Milk is

Milk " assures consumers that there is no difference between natural milk

and that from cows injected with Monsanto's GM Bovine Growth Hormone

(rBGH).

The statement is by Samuel S. Epstein, MD, of the University of

Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health and chairman of the Cancer

Prevention Coalition; and Ronnie Cummins, director of the Organic

Consumers

Association.

The statement says that contrary to Hudson's claims, there is a wealth

of scientific information on the toxic veterinary effects of rBGH,

major differences between rBGH and natural milk, and cancer risks

posed by

rBGH milk.

http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4872

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ACTION ALERT - CONTACT DETAILS

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Head of the Canadian Delegation in Bangkok, Robert McLean, Environment

Canada, Robert.Mclean Tel +1 (819) 9971303

Canada's Prime Minister Right Hon. Paul Martin Martin.P Fax:

(613) 941-6900, Tel: (613) 992-4211

Hon. Andy Mitchell, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food,

Mitchell.A Fax: (613) 991-2147 Tel: (613) 996-3434

F.B. Fadden, President, Canadian Food Inspection Agency

faddenr Fax: 228 6608 Tel: (613) 225-2342 extension

3737

SAMPLE LETTER (also at http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4877):

Prime Minister Paul Martin, House of Commons, Ottawa, Ontario

Dear Mr Martin,

I am writing to urgently request that you continue support for the

current international ban on Terminator Technology, officially known as

Genetic Use Restriction Technologies (GURTS).

Terminator technology was developed jointly by the US government and

the seed industry to prevent farmers from saving seed from one year's

harvest and replanting it the next season. It is considered the most

controversial and immoral agricultural application of genetic

engineering to

date. Massive public opposition to the introduction of these " suicide

seeds " in 1998 forced the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) to

impose a de facto moratorium on further development of GURTS.

Until recently, only a few multinational seed companies and the US

government were pressing for a lifting of the ban on GURTS. But it now

appears that the Canadian government is aiding and abetting these vested

interests.

According to leaked instructions to the Canadian delegation at SBSTTA

10 (a scientific advisory body to the CBD) in Bangkok, Thailand, Canada

will insist on Wednesday, February 9, 2005, that governments accept the

field testing and commercialization of GURTS varieties. Canadian

negotiators have been instructed to undermine an official UN report

recommending that governments seek prohibitions on GURTS technology.

They have

also been instructed to " block consensus " on other options if the ban is

not lifted.

Farmers have an inalienable right to save, re-use, and exchange seed

based on the traditional practices of thousands of generations of

cultivators worldwide. The lifting of the moratorium on GURTS would

effectively end farmers' rights to save seed and pose a serious threat

to food

sovereignty.

It is appalling that the Canadian government is adopting such

heavy-handed tactics in support of multinational seed companies and

the US

government. The Canadian delegation's strategy in Bangkok has to be

abandoned. The Canadian government must reverse its stand on this

issue and

join with other governments to prohibit the GURTS technology once and for

all.

In the interests of the world's farmers and people everywhere, I urge

you, as Prime Minister, to immediately take action on this critical

issue by directing the Canadian delegation to support the moratorium on

GURTS.

Sincerely,

...

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WEEKLY WATCH number 111

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