REVIEW number 311

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GMWATCH REVIEW number 311
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from Claire Robinson, REVIEW editor
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Dear all:

A new report shows that industry and regulators knew from the 1980s-1990s that glyphosate (the active ingredient of Roundup) causes birth defects in lab animals. The US will not commercialise GM salmon - yet. Activists in Sweden have been valiantly battling to prevent GM potatoes being planted. Peru has declared a 10 year ban on GM crops. And the New Zealand government has unintentionally produced transgender GM goats, which they now are going to force to produce milk to see if it contains the intended human protein.

Claire <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
www.gmwatch.org / www.lobbywatch.org
Profiles: http://bit.ly/12UAI2
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GMWatch
Facebook: http://bit.ly/c6OnaX

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CONTENTS
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REGULATORY BREAKDOWN
EUROPE
THE AMERICAS
GM FAILURES
LOBBYWATCH
RESEARCH
ASIA
AFRICA
CODEX
VIDEOS

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REGULATORY BREAKDOWN
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+ PUBLIC KEPT IN THE DARK ABOUT ROUNDUP LINK WITH BIRTH DEFECTS
The pesticide industry and EU regulators knew as long ago as the 1980s-1990s that Roundup, the world's best selling herbicide, causes birth defects but they failed to inform the public. This is the conclusion of a new report, "Roundup and birth defects: Is the public being kept in the dark?" co-authored by a group of international scientists.

The report reveals that industry's own studies (including one commissioned by Monsanto) showed as long ago as the 1980s that Roundup's active ingredient glyphosate causes birth defects in laboratory animals.

The German government has known about these findings since at least the 1990s, when as the "rapporteur" member state for glyphosate, it reviewed industry's studies for the EU approval of the herbicide. The European Commission has known since at least 2002, when it signed off on glyphosate's approval.

But this information was not made public. On the contrary, regulators have misled the public about glyphosate's safety. As recently as last year, the German Federal Office for Consumer Protection and Food Safety, BVL, told the Commission there was "no evidence of teratogenicity" (ability to cause birth defects) for glyphosate.

BVL made this comment in its rebuttal of an independent scientific study published last year by Argentine scientists which showed that Roundup and glyphosate cause birth defects in frogs and chickens at concentrations much lower than those used in agricultural spraying.

In its rebuttal of the Argentine study, BVL cited as proof of glyphosate's safety the industry studies submitted for the Commission's 2002 approval of glyphosate (the approval that is currently in force).

But the authors of the new report obtained the approval documents and found that contrary to BVL's claim, industry's own studies, conducted in the 1980s and 1990s, showed that glyphosate/Roundup causes birth defects in experimental animals.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13228
The new report is available here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/57277946/RoundupandBirthDefectsv5
Good article on the report by Marcia Ishii-Eiteman of PANNA:
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13241
Article by Lucia Graves, Huffington Post:
http://huff.to/j1b6n9
Article in The Ecologist:
http://bit.ly/kuGxtW

+ GM REGULATORS CHOSE IGNORANCE OVER SCIENCE
A new study showing the presence of GM Bt toxin pesticides in the blood points to the remarkable complacency of global safety regulators, says Jonathan Latham in an excellent article for The Guardian. Regulators wrongly assumed that Bt toxin would be broken down in the digestive tract and could not reach blood. But they never tested this hypothesis meaning that they chose ignorance over science.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13251

+ MORE CONFLICTS OF INTEREST AT EFSA
A new report from Corporate Europe Observatory exposes conflicts of interest in the EFSA's ANS expert panel on food additives. Once again we see extensive links with the International Life Sciences Institute, an industry-funded group with funders including the major food, GM, and agrochemical companies. ILSI also has affiliates in EFSA's GMO Panel, which gives expert opinions on GMOs, and its PPR Panel, which gives opinions on pesticides. ILSI has actively involved itself in 'helping' EU regulators make rules for assessing the safety of GMOs and pesticides.

The European Court of Auditors is currently conducting an investigation into conflicts of interest within EU agencies, potentially including EFSA.

Download the new CEO report here:
http://www.corporateeurope.org/system/files/files/resource/EFSA_ANS_panel.pdf

+ EFSA'S DEFENCE OF ITS INDEPENDENCE REVEALS... ANOTHER CONFLICT OF INTEREST
In response to the latest CEO report, EFSA defended its independence in an email to GMWatch, saying: "EFSA has been benchmarked against 10 other peer organisations by an external consultantcy [sic.] who found EFSA to have one of the most advanced and robust systems in place towards ensuring independence of scientific expertise and advice."

What is the unnamed "external consultancy" that came up with this ringing endorsement of EFSA's independence? A company called Milieu Ltd. Milieu's senior technical associate is one Dr Iona Pratt, "a consultant toxicologist and chemical safety specialist". But this is not Pratt's only job. Amazingly, she is also vice-chair of the EFSA's ANS Panel on food additives. More specifically, she is one of four members of this expert panel named in the CEO report as having failed to declare an active collaboration with the food industry-funded think tank and lobby group, ILSI Europe.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13260

+ EFSA USES INDUSTRY DATABASE TO CLAIM GM SOY SAFETY
EFSA is heavily populated by affiliates of the industry funded group, the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI). In a new report, TestBiotech demonstrates how ILSI influenced the risk assessment of a GM soy by EFSA. The report says EFSA drew evidence on the GM soy's safety from the handy ILSI database, set up to provide regulators with ready-made comparisons of GM and non-GM plants (no prizes for guessing that this is about showing "substantial equivalence").
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13250

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AUSTRALASIA
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+ TRANSGENDER GM GOATS TO BE MILKED
New Zealand government research body AgResearch's GM goat experiments have a new bizarre twist with surviving GM pregnancies producing mostly unintended transgender offspring, which AgResearch staff term "goys", according to the Soil & Health Association of NZ.

An AgResearch farm manager recently revealed to Soil & Health and GE Free NZ, during a tour of its GM animal field trial site, that most of the GM goats produced were transgender. It appeared that about 75% were "goys" with the remainder female.

"The 'goys', females in sterile male bodies, are to be induced into milking to ascertain whether the intended genetically engineered human protein will be expressed in the milk," said Soil & Health Organic NZ spokesperson Steffan Browning.

Previous GM cattle pregnancies have only 5% success, with the goats reported to have a success rate of possibly 15%, although one flock of about 18 recipient females failed to hold one GM embryo of a particular experiment. AgResearch has a track record of resultant GM offspring prone to a variety of disabilities including arthritis, respiratory distress, deformities and ruptured ovaries.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13242

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EUROPE
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+ SWEDEN: GREENPEACE HINDERS BASF FROM PLANTING RISKY GM POTATO
Greenpeace activists tied themselves to the tractor of the chemical company BASF to stop them from planting their GM Amflora potato. Greenpeace activists were on the spot for three weeks and blocked the building in which the GM potato was stored. After they were arrested, new Greenpeace activists arrived and blocked the planting.

BASF claims that their potato is for industrial use only. But reality shows that Amflora last year received an approval from the European Commission for cultivation, processing, use as feed and even for use in food of up to 0.9%. In other words: Amflora has the approval to contaminate the food chain.
http://www.gmwatch.eu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13232

The GM potatoes are now planted but the Swedish campaigners still need your support please write to Swedish ministers asking them to ban Amflora, as other countries, including Norway, already have:
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/getinvolved/gmo-potato/

Watch video about the protests:
http://www.gmwatch.org/gm-videosb/36-protests/13247

Video about protests against another GM potato in Belgium:
http://www.gmwatch.org/gm-videosb/36-protests/13243

+ NORWAY'S REGULATORS SAY NO TO BASF'S GM POTATO
The Norwegian government has decided that the cultivation and use of BASF's GM Amflora potato should be banned in Norway. It cites the following reasons:
* risk to health from the presence of antibiotic marker gene in the potato
* no need for the product (when considering GMO approvals, the Norwegian government takes into account the benefit to society and ethics)
* "the applicant has not sufficiently assessed the risk to the environment, in particular with regards to effects on certain groups of non-target organisms".
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13222

+ UK GOVT BACKS HIGH SECURITY GM TEST SITES
The UK's Coalition Government has put its support behind conducting GM field trials on high security sites. In a response to a House of Commons Science and Technology Committee Report, the Government rejected the proposal to keep the location of GM sites secret but stated, "Government is ready to facilitate the hosting of any trials at suitable sites that could provide greater security than might otherwise be the case."

Despite restating commitment to "clear GM labelling rules", the Government response makes no commitment to telling consumers which animal foods come from livestock fed a non-GM diet.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13252

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THE AMERICAS
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+ PERU APPROVES TEN-YEAR BAN ON GM CROPS
In a great victory for Peru, the country's government has approved a ten-year moratorium on the import of GMOs for cultivation or breeding.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13231

+ FIFTEEN YEARS OF GM SOY IN ARGENTINA
Poisoning, massive clearing, loss of biodiversity, forced evictions, land concentration and murder are the legacy of 15 years of soy monoculture in Argentina, says a hard-hitting article in the Dutch press by Dario Aranda and Nina Holland of Corporate Europe Observatory. Soy exports have an annual return of 16,000 million dollars, but there are other consequences: 190 million liters of glyphosate are sprayed and there is an exponential increase in deforestation. Two hundred thousand families have been driven from their land and there are conflicts over eight million hectares between soy producers on one side and peasants and indigenous peoples on the other. However, this production model is promoted as an economic success, and now even as "responsible".
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13255

+ BRAZIL SPEEDS UP GM APPROVALS
On May 17 a public hearing was held in Brasilia, Brazil to discuss an application for commercial release of the first GM bean variety. Beans are part of Brazil's staple diet, consumed daily by most of the population. The hearing was held at the head offices of Embrapa itself, the state company making the application. CTNBio, the regulator, attended.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13231

+ URGENT ACTION ALERT FOR A GM-FREE BOLIVIA
A law is about to be approved in Bolivia that will mean the legalization of GM crops. The decision will be taken in the next few days. Please urgently support the Bolivian organizations so that the country is free of GMOs. Send a letter to the president and other politicians (it's quick and easy) at:
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13229 (English instructions and English and Spanish versions of letter)
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13230 (Spanish letter and Spanish instructions)

+ U.S. CONGRESS BANS FDA FROM APPROVING GM SALMON
GM salmon will not go on sale in the US. The House of Congress has voted to ban the Food and Drug Administration from passing the fish fit for human consumption. The FDA said last year that they thought the fish, which grows twice as fast as normal salmon, appeared to be safe. But Alaskan Republican Don Young blocked the approval by offering an amendment to a farm spending bill that would prohibit the FDA from spending money to approve AquaBounty's application. The amendment was passed and The House is expected to pass the bill later this week.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13257

+ U.S: GM SALMON NOT NEEDED
A good article about AquaBounty's GM salmon says that apart from the health and environmental risks posed by the fish, the product simply isn't needed. There are plenty of wild salmon, whose numbers are increasing and plenty of non-GM farmed salmon. The article concludes, "Despite AquaBounty's appeals to our concern about overfished oceans, the environmental and market advantages they claim for their genetically modified salmon are readily debunked."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13223

+ HERBICIDE USE FAILS TO DECLINE WITH GM CROPS - OFFICIAL
According to the 2010 Agricultural Chemical Use Report released last week by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), use of the herbicide glyphosate, associated with GM crops, has dramatically increased over the last several years, while the use of other even more toxic chemicals such as atrazine has not declined. Contrary to common claims from the GM lobby that the proliferation of herbicide tolerant GM crops would result in lower pesticide use rates, the data show that overall use of pesticides has remained relatively steady, while glyphosate use has skyrocketed to more than double the amount used just five years ago.

GM proponents have often said that even if farmers are increasingly reaching for glyphosate, this simply means that they are using less of more toxic weed killers like atrazine. However, the data show the opposite is true.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13246

+ SCOTTS UNVEILS ERADICATION PLAN FOR ESCAPED GM BENTGRASS
In a presentation before the Oregon State Board of Agriculture, GM bentgrass developer Scotts Miracle-Gro has laid out its plan for eradicating plant escapes from an Idaho field of the GM bentgrass. The escapees were found several miles away in irrigation canals south of Ontario, Oregon. Scotts is using local pesticide applicators to spray the plants with two herbicides the Oregon Department of Agriculture has registered under emergency use permits. The USDA in 2007 slapped Scotts with a $500,000 fine for allowing GM bentgrass seed to escape from a Central Oregon field trial.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13237

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AFRICA
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+ NIGERIA'S SENATE PASSES BIOSAFETY BILL IN WHOSE INTEREST?
Nigeria's national biosafety bill has been passed by the country's upper house. Critics of the bill say it has been kept away from public scrutiny and backs a hidden foreign agenda to legalise GMOs. Mariann Bassey, food and agrofuels programme manager for the Nigerian advocacy group Environmental Rights Action, called for a transparent process that includes the views of all stakeholders, "not one that is shoved down our throats by biotech agents".
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13254

+ GM FOOD: POISONING SOUTH AFRICA?
South Africans are the first people in the world to consume GM food as a staple. According to industry sources, more than 75% of the country's white maize is now GM. This means that the maize consumed daily in the majority of South African households is now mainly comprised of GM maize. Glenn Ashton of the South African Civil Society Information Service says, "The industry claim that nobody has become ill from GM foods is scientifically dishonest. It is based on the principle of 'don't look - don't find'. Because GM foods are not clearly identified through clear labelling, it is impossible to know what sicknesses are related to the consumption of the product."

What's more, most tests on GMOs have been undertaken and submitted by the very companies seeking approval. Research has shown results to have been routinely manipulated and skewed to the extent that epidemiologist Judy Carman said, "Their whole approach to the analysis would fail a basic statistics class."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13225

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ASIA
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+ PAKISTAN REGULATOR QUITS OVER ATTEMPT AT CLANDESTINE APPROVAL OF GM CORN
The head of a Pakistan committee involved in regulating the commercialisation of GM corn has resigned after a regulatory scandal involving Monsanto's GM corn/maize. A Pakistan news outlet said that Monsanto actually wrote the report for the regulatory committee on the supposed trials of its GM corn, and that the report contains false information on the trials.
http://gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13240
http://www.gmwatch.eu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13253

+ PAKISTAN EXPERTS SAY NO NEED FOR GM COTTON
Agricultural experts in Pakistan have said that the country could reap a record cotton harvest this year, with proper crop management and without using the currently available GM seeds. Pakistan Farmers Associates Director Hamid Malhi said that hype about Bt cotton success was overstated. He said the gains from Bt cotton seed have been stagnant.
http://gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13236

+ GM-FREE RICE VICTORY IN THAILAND
The Thai government has written its commitment to GM-free rice into policy. Thailand's Rice Masterplan not only protects rice farmers and consumers, but also safeguards Thailand's thousands-year old rice heritage from the risks posed by GM crops. Greenpeace hailed the move as an official acknowledgement that GM crops are unnecessary and a risk to sustainable future for farming. Greenpeace advised the Philippines government to follow suit.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13224

+ ILLEGAL GM RICE SPREADS IN CHINA
GM rice has been spreading illegally for years in China, officials have admitted, triggering a debate on a sensitive aspect of the food security plan in the world's most populous nation. Two strains of GM rice were approved for open-field experiments but not commercial sale in 2009. In January, the agriculture ministry said "no genetically modified cereals are being grown in China" outside the test sites. But in April, an environment ministry official said a joint investigation by four government departments had found that "illegal GM seeds are present in several provinces because of weak management".

Greenpeace testing has found illegal GM rice in baby formulas and dried noodles, as well as rice purchased from restaurants near schools in Hubei province. Greenpeace has warned of health risks to children.
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13248

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RESEARCH
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+ NEW PLANT DISEASE LINKED TO GM CROPS AND PESTICIDES
US scientists claim to have discovered a dangerous new plant disease linked to GM crops and the pesticides used on them. The research, which is yet to be completed, suggests the pathogen could be the cause of recent widespread crop failure and miscarriages in livestock.

Emeritus Professor Don Huber from Purdue University says his research shows that animals fed on GM corn or soybeans may suffer serious health problems due the pathogen. "They're finding anywhere from 20 per cent to as much as 55 per cent of those [animals] will miscarriage or spontaneously abort," he said. "It will kill a chicken embryo for instance in 24-48 hours."

Professor Huber says it isn't clear yet whether it is the GM crops or the use of the pesticide glyphosate that causes the pathogen. But he says his research shows both the pesticide and the GM crops also reduce the ability of plants to absorb nutrients from the soil that are necessary for animal health.

"All the red flags are standing in a row for us," he said. "I would certainly express serious concerns with deregulation of our genetically modified crops."
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13258

+ SCIENTISTS' SHAKY TECHNOFIX FOR HERBICIDE RESISTANT WEEDS
A story for ScienceDaily says scientists have discovered a mechanism that may account for glyphosate resistance in horseweed. They are using this knowledge to come up with alternative management methods intended to allow farmers to outfox weed resistance namely, spraying earlier in the growing season, during cooler weather.

But GMWatch believes that if the new management methods work at all, they won't work for long. Some weeds will survive and it will be those that pass on their traits to future generations transforming the existing plague of superweeds into a plague of uber-superweeds.

And Dr Doug Gurian-Sherman of the Union of Concerned Scientists suggests a further reason why the strategy is flawed: "A fundamental problem with this strategy is that, like many weeds, horseweed can emerge in flushes throughout the growing season - not just during cooler weather (although more may emerge in spring than latter in the year). So while it may help somewhat, and latter emergence will face more competition from established, growing, crops - it will not eliminate the problem. And, as you suggest, there will likely be selection for more emergence of horseweed during warmer weather - especially since this is already not uncommon. The high selection pressure from glyphosate use may push this pretty rapidly, depending on the genetics."
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13261

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WEIRD SCIENCE STORY OF THE WEEK
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+ TECHNO-UPOOPIA "LET THEM EAT CACK" - ROUND 3
Japanese scientists have found a way to create edible steaks from human faeces.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/digitaltrends/20110615/tc_digitaltrends/japanesescientistscreatesmeatoutoffeces

They are not the first scientists to come up with this idea. We previously reported on a scientist at Liverpool University who in the 1970s ate his own excrement as part of an experiment to see if it held the key to feeding the world's poor.
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/10877

And the idea isn't new - it first seems to have been put forward by the 18th century satirist Jonathan Swift, who wrote in his novel Gulliver's Travels about an imaginary scientific academy where the professors were engrossed in such projects as making spiders spin naturally coloured silk for stockings and converting excrement into food. Swift's satire was inspired by a visit he made to the Royal Society in 1710. Today the RS is dominated by GM supporters and is an enthusiastic ally of the genetic engineering and geoengineering industries.
http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/10877