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Canadian growers warn UK farmers of GMO crop risks
(Wednesday, Nov. 5, 2003 -- CropChoice news) -- Reuters, 11/03/03: LONDON - Canadian farmers with first hand experience growing
genetically modified (GMO) crops say the technology will damage
Britain's booming organic food sector and leave fields strewn with
"super weeds" grown from stray, leftover seeds.
"I took the decision to stop growing GM canola (the Canadian variant
of rapeseed) because it was impossible to stop it spreading to other
fields -- the seeds cling to the machinery and are easily transferred,
even with intensive cleaning," David Bailey, a Saskatchewan-based
farmer told Reuters on Monday.
"My neighbors all had the same problem," he added.
But suppliers of GM seeds say the majority of Canadian growers are not
complaining.
"Conservative estimates indicate that 65 percent of the Canadian
canola crop in 2002 was genetically modified. It can only capture this
portion of the market if it offers significant advantages to Canadian
farmers," a spokesman for the London-based Agriculture Biotechnology
Commission (ABC), which represents major biotech firms like Monsanto,
said.
Bailey, who grew herbicide-tolerant rapeseed on around 350 hectares
(865 acres) in the late 1990s, said he also found few economic
benefits in growing the gene-spliced variety.
"The only party to profit was the chemical company that charged me a
license fee," said Bailey, who was invited to Britain to tell local
growers of his experiences by the pro-organic UK Soil Association.
Jim Robbins, a Canadian grower who is converting from conventional to
organic farming and who is also talking with UK farmers this week,
said GMO crops would ruin the livelihoods of organic farmers.
"You can't grow organic canola in Canada anymore, simply because the
GM variety exists," Robbins said.
"The potential problems with GM crops have been well documented in the
UK -- our experiences bear out these concerns."
A group representing 1,000 organic farmers in the Saskatchewan
province has already taken out a class-action suit against two major
manufacturers of GMO crops for making it impossible for them to grow
rapeseed on their land, since they can no longer guarantee that it is
GM-free.
GM WHEAT WORRIES GROW
But David Bailey said Canada's farming sector is now facing an even
bigger GM threat, this time from wheat, which U.S. biotech giant
Monsanto is keen to introduce.
"With GM canola, we lost a C$300-400 million (a year) market share
because Europe stopped importing it. If Canada grows GM wheat, we
stand to lose much, much more than that. It will shut off even bigger
and more important markets for us," Bailey said.
Monsanto has been conducting field trials in western Canada to develop
GM "Roundup Ready" wheat for around three years. The plants are
genetically altered to be unaffected when the herbicide "Roundup" is
used on the fields to control weeds.
The U.S. agricultural sciences firm has said it will not move to
commercially release GM wheat until concerns about segregation and
market acceptance are fully addressed, although it still argues that
GM wheat will cut costs and increase yields by simplifying weed
control.
The UK government has said it will decide whether GM crops should be
commercially grown in Britain once it has weighed up all the
scientific and economic evidence it has at its disposal, as well as
the results of a recent public consultation.
However, research papers published last month by scientists who
carried out the government's three-year-long GMO crop trials failed to
show GMO crops in a positive light, concluding that two crops were
harmful to the environment, while another was not.
And in two separate studies, UK researchers have found that bees
carrying GM rapeseed pollen had contaminated conventional plants more
than 26 kilometers (16 miles) away and that if farmers grew GM
rapeseed for one season, impurities could stay in the soil for up to
16 years if not "rigorously controlled."
Britain's public are also highly skeptical of GM crops.
There are no GM crops in the ground in the UK at present and no
imminent plantings.
Led by the U.S., GM crops are now grown in more than 16 countries
outside Europe.
In 2002, farmers around the world planted 60 million hectares of land
with GM crops. | |
