from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:

It's been a week of bad smells from rotten governments. In Australia, government employees are using public money to attend workshops run by a biotech PR specialist teaching them how to beat citizens' groups and conflate them with "terrorists" (LOBBYWATCH). In Paraguay, the US military is apparently supporting the repression of farmers who are resisting the massive expansion of GM soy plantations by violent and illegal means. And Peru's health minister is being economical with the truth over the babies being used as GM guinea pigs in two of the country's hospitals. (THE AMERICAS).

But there's some very good news. South Africa's normally lax GM regulatory body has turned down an application to conduct laboratory and greenhouse experiments on a much hyped GM sorghum. The application was refused on biosafety grounds, because of concerns that GM sorghum will lead to the destruction of the sorghum varieties prevalent throughout Africa. (AFRICA)

Claire This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
www.gmwatch.org / www.lobbywatch.org

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CONTENTS
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THE AMERICAS
AUSTRALASIA
LOBBYWATCH
ASIA
AFRICA
EUROPE
TERMINATOR
RESEARCH

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THE AMERICAS
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+ ACTION ALERT: URGENT HELP NEEDED FOR PERU
A dangerous new biotech law, which is being called the "Monsanto Law" in Peru, has been pushed through the Peruvian parliament without discussion and by a very small number of members of parliament. 

This law puts at great risk the extremely rich biodiversity of Peru, the food sovereignty of the country and of its indigenous peoples and the livelihoods of small farmers who depend on the extraordinary biodiversity of potatoes, corn, and other Andean and Amazonian crops for their survival.  Many of these crops have their centre of origin in Peru, and were domesticated there thousands of years ago. Now this biodiversity, which has been conserved and developed, is under risk of genetic contamination, if transgenics crops are introduced into Peru.
 
It is regrettable that the lobbying of the big transnational corporations like Monsanto has counted for more with the parliamentarians than the opposition of the many different organizations around Peru and Latin America that expressed their opposition and concern about this law.
 
The law provides special finantial incentives for the national and international companies which want to invest in biotechnology in Peru.

Peruvians are concerned that through this law, Peru will be transformed into a centre of GM experimentation, used for the testing of new technologies, crops and traits that have not been tested anywhere else in the world.

The introduction of GM crops is also likely to exacerbate the process of deterioration of the peasant economies, which will lead to a genetic erosion of some of the crops that right now are feeding the world, like potatoes and corn.
 
For these reasons, international support is being sought for the campaign against this law.  It has to be approved by the President of the country.

So please direct letters of protest to
 
Doctor Alejandro Toledo Manrique
Presidente Constitucional del Perú
Fax: 0051 1 311 43 07

Ask him not to approve this law (Ley General de  Promocion de la Biotecnologia en el Peru)

+ CONTROVERSY OVER VENTRIA PHARMA TRIALS IN PERU WORSENS
A controversy regarding the experimental use of a GM rice product on Peruvian children has worsened following health minister Pilar Mazzetti's dishonest denial that she authorized tests of the product.

Mazzetti rejected the idea that the GM product was given to 140 children and described the denunciation issued by the Peruvian Medical Association (AMP) as "ridiculous".

The AMP considers the health ministry committed a serious illegal act and has taken the case to the provincial district attorney's office, alleging a violation of the children's rights.

But the minister claims "The children participating in this research have not received transgenic rice."

GM Watch comment: The health minister's denial is specious. They're using a transgenic protein in these trials. The transgenic (pharmaceutical) component in the rice has been extracted and then fed (via a beverage) to the children!
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6746

See the excellent Mexican press piece - Babies as Guinea Pigs: Biotech company turns two Peruvian hospitals into laboratories
http://www.etcblog.org/

+ U.S. MILITARY SUPPORTS FARMER REPRESSION IN PARAGUAY
An article in The Nation reports that the US military is supporting the violent repression of farmers opposing the massive expansion of GM soy cropland in Paraguay.

EXCERPT:
The most recent case of this violence is the death of Serapio Villasboa Cabrera, a member of the Paraguayan Campesino Movement, whose body was found full of knife wounds May 8. Cabrera was the brother of Petrona Villasboa, who was spearheading an investigation into the death of her son, who died from exposure to toxic chemicals used by transgenic soy producers. According to Servicio, Paz y Justicia (Serpaj), an international human rights group that has a chapter in Paraguay, one method used to force farmers off their land is to spray toxic pesticides around communities until sickness forces residents to leave.

GRR [Grupo de Reflexion Rural, farmers’ rights group] said Cabrera was killed by paramilitaries connected to large landowners and soy producers, who are expanding their holdings. The paramilitaries pursue farm leaders who are organizing against the occupation of their land. Investigations by Serpaj demonstrate that the worst cases of repression against farmers have taken place in areas with the highest concentration of US troops. Serpaj reported that in the department of San Pedro, where five US military exercises took place, there have been eighteen farmer deaths from repression, in an area with many farmer organizations. In the department of Concepcion there have been eleven deaths and three US military exercises. Near the Triple Border, where Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina meet, there were twelve deaths and three exercises.

"The US military is advising the Paraguayan police and military about how to deal with these farmer groups.... They are teaching theory as well as technical skills to Paraguayan police and military. These new forms of combat have been used internally," Orlando Castillo of Serpaj told me over the phone. "The US troops talk with the farmers and get to know their leaders and which groups, organizations, are working there, then establish the plans and actions to control the farmer movement and advise the Paraguayan military and police on how to proceed.... The numbers from our study show what this US presence is doing. US troops form part of a security plan to repress the social movement in Paraguay. A lot of repression has happened in the name of security and against 'terrorism.' "
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6742

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AUSTRALASIA
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+ AUSTRALIA'S NEW CHIEF SCIENTIST: CONFLICT OF INTEREST?
Australia's new chief scientist, Dr Jim Peacock, is aggressively lobbying for removal of the states’ GM moratoria and ignoring the work of the scientists who oppose his stance. But he has not disclosed to the Australian public the personal or financial benefits he might gain from these changes, says an article for an Australian blog.

The article points out that Peacock:
***is on the board of three biotech companies and on the payroll of one as an 'advisor'
***has at least two international GM patents. It's unclear whether they're privately owned by him; they appear to be owned by a small group including Peacock. Peacock's patents are for what appear to be (and what one microbiologist has confirmed are) GURTs, or gene use restriction technologies. Some GURTs produce 'suicide seeds', preventing farmers from seed-saving and giving GURT patent owners monopoly control of fertility and food security. At the moment GURTs are illegal worldwide, but at a recent UN Convention on Biological Diversity, the Australian government pushed to end to the global moratorium, a move supported by Peacock.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6744

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LOBBYWATCH
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+ GM ADVOCATE'S "DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS"
Now here's a funny thing. A little while back Prof David Miller who heads SpinWatch - an organisation which challenges government and corporate propaganda - raised concerns over a Reuters piece that failed to make it clear that Florence Wambugu was a professional pro-GM lobbyist and that her "African" GM sorghum project was heavily backed by a subsidiary of the American GM giant DuPont.

As a result of the concerns Miller raised, Reuters republished the article to larify these points.

Reuters' corrections were not to the taste of the journalist Lene Johansen. Johansen, who's written a number of pieces on biotech for the St Louis Business Journal, used her website to accuse those reporting the story of failing to "run the expose on Center for Media & Democracy (CMD) as well. CMD runs SpinWatch. Check out CMD's dirty little funding secrets at ActivistCash.com."

But CMD - the publishers of PR Watch - don't run or fund SpinWatch. As for ActivistCash.com, it's the product of the febrile imagination of Washington booze, baccy and biotech lobbyist, Rick Berman, who takes money from Monsanto.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6747

+ WHAT THEY DON'T WANT YOU TO KNOW ABOUT "THE ANTI-ACTIVIST ACTIVIST"
Katherine Wilson went to a workshop in Melbourne, Australia run by biotech PR consultant Ross Irvine to learn about "the best strategies to win against activists". There, she learned how to create bogus community groups, false statistics, and, in Irvine's words, links with "far-right-wing nutso activists". She learned to conflate "activist" with "terrorist" and "security threat".

EXCERPTS:
Filing in to see him was a Who's Who of powerful industry and government flacks. David Gazard was there. He's adviser to the Federal Treasurer [Australia's finance minister Peter Costello]. Special Minister of State, Eric Abetz's adviser was there, too. And PRs from Rio Tinto, Shell, Dow Chemical, Avcare, the Victorian Farmers' Federation, Department of Primary Industries, Bayer, GrainCorp, Dairy Australia, Nufarm (distributes Monsanto herbicides) and Orica (industrial explosives). ”¦

We'd all gathered to hear a man who claims that corporate responsibility is... letting someone else set the agenda. We'd learn that sustainability is "an extremist position", that science's 'precautionary principle' is "extreme", and that maintaining biodiversity "turns back the evolutionary clock millions of years and eliminates humans from the face of the Earth! That's extreme!" Animal protection bodies, we'd learn, really want to "sever all contact between humans and animals!" ”¦

But government employees be they federal or local have no place in a forum that promotes ways to stop citizens participating in the democratic process, says economist Clive Hamilton. Hamilton heads the Australia Institute, a public policy research body funded by grants from philanthropic trusts and staffed by economists. (The Institute claims to be neither left nor right wing.) Given an audio recording of the workshop, Hamilton responded, "Why a government agency would attend a seminar like this is beyond comprehension. These agencies are owned by the public, yet by attending seminars to learn how to beat citizens' groups by means fair or foul they are turning on their owners. Only an organisation that has wholly alienated itself from the public would even consider attending an event like this."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6738

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ASIA
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+ GM TECHNOLOGY IS NO SOLUTION TO INDIA’S AGRICULTURE CRISIS
Farmers from Haryana, the Delhi area and Western Uttar Pradesh led by the Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) on 10 June gathered in New Delhi to oppose the proposed introduction of Bt brinjal, India's first GM food crop. Bt brinjal has a bacterial gene whose patent is owned by Monsanto. The Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) has invited comments regarding the biosafety and socio-economic studies on Bt brinjal by July 15.

"We condemn the government's plans to irresponsibly introduce GM food crops without proper long term studies of its impact on the health of the people and environment and on the socio-economic realities of the farmers of this country" said Yudhvir Singh of BKU, representing millions of farmers in a coalition comprising Bharatiya Kissan Union in North India, Shetkari Sanghatan, Maharashtra, Karnataka Rajya Raitha Samithi (KRRS) in Karnataka and the Tamil Nadu Farmers Association.

"Our experience in Vidarbha shows that fancy technologies like GM seeds which are introduced as a saviour for farmers, are a pretext for reaping profits by seed companies who get massive royalties from seed sales leaving the farmer with nothing but unfulfilled promises", said Vijay Jawantia, Shetkari Sangathan.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6733

+ STOP BT BRINJAL TRIALS - ALL INDIA PEASANTS' UNION
A letter written by K Varadharajan, general secretary, All India Kisan Sabha [All India Peasants’ Union], to the prime minister on July 5, 2006 protesting at the impending release of GM brinjal for field trials, is at
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6734

+ NO GMs, PERIOD, SAY INDIAN FOOD SCIENTISTS, FARMERS AND CONSUMERS
In a Round Table titled "Should India be fed GM Food?" held at Bangalore, Karnataka on July 5, a 52-member group of food scientists, nutrition experts, agricultural scientists, law specialists, farmer leaders, consumer groups, media people, and environmental NGOs discussed the GM labelling rules being proposed by the Indian government.

The result of the Round Table, the "Bangalore Declaration", states that India should say “No to GM”, not debate whether it should be labelled or not. Food and nutrition scientists from some of the premier food institutes of the country said at the Round Table that the traditional farming and food systems in India can provide all the food and nutritional security that the country needs.
Full Declaration: http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6736

+ THE KILLING COTTON
An article with this title looks at the appalling and destructive impact of Bt cotton on India's poor farmers.

EXCERPT:
Cotton in Vidarbha, once referred to as king cotton because of the high price it fetched, has now come to be known as killer cotton. ”¦

Indian film star Nana Patekar, the brand ambassador of Monsanto, toured this region to promote Bt cotton seeds. In 2004, up to 80 percent of cotton growers harvested Bt, genetically modified seeds produced by Monsanto. The seed, with prices ranging above Rs 1,600 ($34.88) a packet, compared to the normal hybrid variety of Rs 450 ($9.81) a packet, have demonstrated no sustainability in the parched environment of Vidarbha. Meanwhile, the cotton farmers have been destroyed and Monsanto and Nana Patekar have made a small fortune.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6737

+ COTTON PEST CAME FROM AMERICA
The notorious pest of the Indian cotton crop, the American bollworm, found its way into India when American varieties of cotton began to be cultivated in the country, says a study conducted by the Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment (CSE).

The study found that though American cotton varieties were not sustainable in India owing to lack of climatic compatibility. It has led to frequent crop failures and brought in numerous diseases. It also requires at least three times more water and other inputs and the yield plummets after 3 years, while the Indian cotton varieties give the same level of yield for 30 years.

Bt cotton hybrids have introduced to the country to resist attacks by the American bollworm. In this context, the study noted that the Bt cotton hybrids were not suited in the rainfed areas of the country. About 66% of the cotton area are in the rainfed zone. The study records said that Bt cotton hybrids had resulted in higher inputs costs and in places, lower returns to farmers.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6735

+ BIOPIRACY BY AGREEMENT
An article for Indian environment magazine Down to Earth asks who benefits from the recent Indo-US deal whereby US private capital will freely access India's research facilities. The answer is not, of course, India.

EXCERPT:
”¦ how feasible would it be for India to open up its research institutions for foreign "collaboration"? The clandestine biopiracy in the 1960s, aided and abetted by our own native collaborators, which led to the theft of our famous basmati and came to the world market as "Texmati", released by Rice Tec - a Texas-based agribusiness company - needs to be kept in mind as a cautionary example. Besides, Monsanto charges farmers Rs 1,850 or more for a 450-gramme packet of BT cotton, while the native hybrid variety for the same quantity comes for just Rs 350.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6739

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AFRICA
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+ NO GATEWAY TO AFRICA'S SORGHUM
The African Centre for Biosafety, based in Johannesburg, South Africa, has applauded the decision by the South African GM regulatory body to turn down an application by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) to conduct laboratory and greenhouse experiments with transgenic sorghum in South Africa. The Executive Council (EC) established in terms of South Africa's GMO Act, refused the application on biosafety grounds, fearing that GM sorghum will lead to the destruction of the sorghum varieties prevalent throughout Africa.

This decision represents a severe blow to the African Biotechnology Sorghum Project (ABS), bankrolled by Bill and Melinda Gates to the tune of $450 million to bring GM sorghum to Africa's poor. The ABS is spearheaded by a consortium, which includes Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Florence Wambugu's Africa Harvest Biotechnology International, Rockerfeller Foundation-backed African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF), the CSIR, the Agricultural Research Council, Ghana’s Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) and University of California, Berkeley.

Notwithstanding the "lofty" agenda of the ABS, the EC has for the first time deemed it prudent to protect an African cereal in the face of huge international funding.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6732

+ NIGERIAN PUPILS AGAINST GMOs
Over two hundred pupils from schools in Benin City attended a workshop on GMOs organised for the Young Environmentalist network by Committee On Vital Environmental Resources (COVER) and the Environmental Rights Action (ERA) in Benin City, Nigeria. At the end of the workshop the students made the following declaration (EXCERPT):

Having carefully considered what GMOs are and their possible effects and impacts on our health and environment, we resolve that:
***GMOs do not increase crops yields, neither are GMO crops more nutritious than traditional varieties;
***Our farmers will be forced to use more chemicals in cultivating GMOs and spend more money than necessary in the farming efforts;
***This technology promotes few crop varieties and is not suitable to our cultural and social way of life. We reject the idea of farmers having to buy seeds continually and being unable to save seeds.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6741

This report is refreshing after all the attempts by pro-GM interest groups to propagandise children for GMOs - see links at
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6741

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EUROPE
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+ EUROPE'S BIOTECH IMMIGRANTS TO AMERICA
When the Scottish government injected $9 million into the biotech company Cyclacel last October, the country's enterprise minister explained that "there could not be a more important company for Scotland's future."

So how did Cyclacel show its gratitude just two months later? By moving its headquarters to Short Hills, New Jersey, and merging with a publicly traded American company.

In Scotland, Cyclacel's expatriation did raise concerns among that country's biotech boosters. But Scottish Enterprise, the government economic development agency that gave Cyclacel the $9 million, put the best face on the situation. It said that having a Scottish-born company listed on Nasdaq was an endorsement of Scottish biotecH.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6743

From GM Watch's profile of Scottish Enterprise:
In October 2002 the then Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer of Monsanto, Hugh Grant, joined the newly formed international advisory board of Scottish Enterprise, Scotland's main government-funded agency for economic development. Grant's fellow board members included the chief executive of pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca, and the senior vice-president of Genzyme Corporation, one of the top ten biotech and pharmaceutical companies.
http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=118&page=S

+ UK: HOW THE FLOOD OF GM FOODS WAS DRIVEN OFF THE SHELVES
In The Independent on Sunday, Geoffrey Lean gives an uplifting summary of the success of British opposition to GM foods.

EXCERPT:
Seven short years ago, when The Independent on Sunday began its campaign on GM foods and crops, 60 per cent of the products on our supermarket shelves contained modified ingredients. Now only two GM products are left on sale: Schwartz's Bacon Flavour Bits Salad Topping, and Betty Crocker Bac-Os - neither exactly household names.

Then, too, widespread cultivation of GM crops throughout Britain was thought to be only a year away. No less than 53 of them were confidently awaiting approval. Now not a single GM plant is growing anywhere in any British field, and no one expects any to be sown any time in the foreseeable future. ”¦

The Prime Minister privately dismissed public opposition as "a flash in the pan", and so it appeared. Ranged against the Goliaths of the boardrooms and the cabinet rooms were a motley band of Davids, ranging from Prince Charles to pressure groups such as Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and the Soil Association.

But we reckoned without the most powerful force of all, the superwomen (and supermen) of the shopping aisles who, informed of the presence of GM products in their foods and the arguments for and against, simply refused to buy them. Thus the public achieved what parliament has repeatedly failed to do - stopping one of Tony Blair's dodgier crusades in its tracks.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6730

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TERMINATOR
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+ TERMINATOR TECHNOLOGY
An article in the Ethiopian press reports that the seed industry body, the International Seed Federation, now openly endorses terminator technology, which renders seeds sterile and prevents seed saving. ISF is now working hand-in-glove with industry-friendly governments to dismantle the United Nation's de facto moratorium.

Telling quote:
"The very companies whose GM seeds are causing unwanted contamination are now suggesting that society accept a new and unreliable technology to contain genetic pollution. If GM seeds are unsafe they should not be used. Most importantly, food security for small-scale farmers must not be sacrificed to solve the industry's genetic pollution problem."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6745

+ COMPLAINTS ABOUT TERMINATOR "LUDICROUS" SAYS AMERICAN FREE MARKETEER
An article in "The Free Liberal" by Paul Jacob argues that concerns about terminator are "ludicrous”. His reasons? Farmers in the first world grow hybrids, for which seeds have to be bought yearly anyway, and because "sterile seeds can't spread their sterility". Jacob does not consider the impact of non-saveable seed on third world farmers and offers no evidence for his claim about 100% sterility.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6745

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RESEARCH
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+ GENE SWAP CLAIM USED TO PROMOTE GM FOOD
The logic of an article which has been circulating round the pro-GM lists defeats us. We are told that research published in the journal Nature Genetics has provided the first evidence of a gene having naturally moved from one fungal disease to another. This, the research leader Prof Richard Oliver tells us, is "the first time that a fungal gene has been shown to move between different fungal species."

So far so good, but on the basis of this initial evidence of this single gene transfer between these two highly specific fungal species, we are told that biology is set to be fundamentally rewritten.

Professor Oliver provides no explanation as to why we should rewrite our understanding of the whole of biological creation on the basis of this one incident. He simply makes a series of assertions:
*genes are probably transferring all the time;
*all the gene combinations that we can think of have probably already been tried in nature;
*biologists need to review their "most cherished notion" that species are distinct entities.

These speculations are then used to assert that this provides "a powerful new argument in favour of genetically modified food"!

We are also told, "There've been... many billions of years to put all these combinations together, and any one that would actually survive and cause an impact in the environment, you could argue has already been tried in the environment and shown (to be) wanting."

So, on the basis of initial evidence of a single gene having moved in nature between one specific fungal disease and another, we can apparently conclude that all genes are safely transferable by humans between all species!

Yet the claim that all possible gene transfers have probably already been tried out and we shouldn't worry about it, is directly contradicted by the researchers' own findings. They tell us that the single gene transfer they have identified took place relatively recently - "in the early 1940s" - and it "created a new, damaging wheat disease" that has caused problems worldwide!
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6740