Franken Foods: (Scotland) Farmers' anger over GM's 'undue influence'

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GMW: Farmers' anger over GM's 'undue influence'

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Wed, 27 Apr 2005 09:36:56 +0100

 

 

 

 

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Farmers' anger over GM's 'undue influence'

The Scotsman, 27 April 2005

http://business.scotsman.com/agriculture.cfm?id=448022005

 

A LEADING organic farming lobby organisation has accused a

government-backed advisory body of being overly influenced by heavyweight

biotechnology companies in supporting more tax payer funded research into

genetically modified organisms (GMOs).

 

The Soil Association says that about £100 million of public funds are

spent annually on agricultural biotechnology research in the UK against

only about £2m into organic farming, in spite of sales now topping £1

billion a year.

 

It says this will be compounded by a new report to be published

tomorrow by the Agriculture and Environment Biotechnology Commission

(AEBC),

an independent body set up by the government.

 

It dismisses the commission's initial analysis of the drivers for GMO

research as failing to examine the concerns on environmental, health and

socio-economic impacts as well as leaving huge gaps in the field of

impacts of GM at sell/plant level.

 

" If the AEBC is investigating the drivers of the GM research agendas,

it must produce answers to why these gaps exist, which its initial

analysis does not, " says Gundula Azeez, the Soil Association's policy

manager.

 

She says the AEBC had failed to address the informal pressures compared

with official and positive drivers, particularly those from the GM

companies, and claims the former were probably more important.

 

" Commercial interests are very powerful, " she says. " Not only do they

have a high presence on the boards of the research councils that decide

research agendas ... but they have unique access to the farming

community, the farming media and the scientific community. "

 

She claims that the public, NGOs and the government did not have this

same degree of influence and, in particular, the Soil Association had

found it very difficult to gets its message out to wider audiences.

 

" It is absolutely incredible that, eight years after GMOs were

introduced into the food chain and despite the massive public disquiet

expressed over and over again, there has been no effort to research

the health

impacts. "

 

She goes on to accuse GM companies of encouraging an atmosphere among

researchers who oppose pro-GM messages.

 

" Fear of the inevitable hostility to any unwelcome findings is coupled

with fear of even approaching the boards of research councils with such

proposals. "

 

She points out that while Defra funds organic farming research with an

annual budget of £2 million, under the organic action plan a further

£5 million was due to be provided under the LINK programme. " But the

requirement for industry matching funding meant that projects could only

be found to spend half the funds. "

 

The AEBC is shortly to be wound up following a government review of its

operations. Industry sources on both sides of the GM fence found it was

unable to produce a meaningful consensus of opinion due to the widely

diverging opinions of its membership.

 

 

 

 

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