from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:
UC Berkeley's Faustian pact with BP is causing a firestorm of dissent on campus. Look out in particular for a brilliant speech from Dr Ignacio Chapela (BP-BERKELEY DEAL).
The US's rice industry is now verging on meltdown. On top of the existing GM contamination problems arising from field trials with two types of GM rice, a popular BASF non-GM rice has now been recalled from the market on the orders of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) after it was found to be contaminated by an unauthorized GM event of unknown origin. Yet the US is still forging ahead with plans to plant pharma rice genetically engineered with human genes in Kansas (THE AMERICAS).
Finally, if you're in Europe watch out for CAMPAIGNS.
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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URGENT APPEAL
LETTER OF THE WEEK: WHAT BENEFITS?
PHARMA RICE IN USA / ACTION ALERT
BP-BERKELEY DEAL
MORE ON BIOFUELS
THE AMERICAS
ASIA
EUROPE
LOBBYWATCH, GMOs AND CLIMATE CHANGE
NEW BOOK
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URGENT APPEAL
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If you like what we do at GM Watch, then please help us to continue doing it. PLEASE support us either by making a donation online here:
http://www.gmwatch.org/donate.asp
or you can send a check or money order made out to 'NGIN' to GM Watch, 26 Pottergate, Norwich, UK, NR2 1DX.
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LETTER OF THE WEEK: WHAT BENEFITS?
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+ WHAT BENEFITS?
The following letter appeared this week in the Australian newspaper The Age:
WHAT are the supposed benefits of GM crops? Vaccines in bananas? These do not exist. Vitamin A in rice? This does not exist. Grains with omega 3 fish oil? These do not exist. Drought-resistant crops? These have been developed, but with trait-selective, non-GM methods. GM varieties are at least 10 years away. Productivity gains? In 2005, the Canadian Government's rural assistance was $1.6 billion. Its canola markets were lost to Europe due to its GM status. In more than 10 years of production, with billions of dollars spent on research, there are only two commercial GM traits. The second generation of GM crops has failed to materialise. As shoppers, farmers and the food industry around the world reject GM seeds, crops and foods, it would be a folly to remove GM bans and allow commercial GM crops in northern Australia - especially cotton.
Peter Robertson
Environment Centre of the Northern Territory, Darwin
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7623
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PHARMA RICE IN USA / ACTION ALERT
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+ USDA BACKS PRODUCTION OF RICE WITH HUMAN GENES
The US Agriculture Department has given a preliminary green light for the first commercial production of a food crop engineered to contain human genes, reigniting fears that biomedically potent substances in plants could contaminate other foods. The plan calls for large-scale cultivation in Kansas of rice that produces human immune system proteins in its seeds.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7592
+ 3200 ACRES OF PHARMA RICE IN KANSAS - OBJECT!
USDA is announcing the availability of an environmental assessment of Ventria Bioscience's proposal to plant up to 3200 acres of pharma rice in Kansas - the largest acreage ever proposed for a pharma crop in the US. The URL for the notice is:
http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/7/257/2422/01jan20071800/edocket.access.gpo.gov/2007/pdf/E7-3484.pdf
Please comment to USDA, urging an immediate ban on this and all other outdoor production of drugs and industrial compounds in food crops.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7589
+ FOE CALLS FOR OPEN GROWING OF PHARMA CROPS TO BE BANNED
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7599
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BP-BERKELEY DEAL
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+ PROTESTS AT UC BERKELEY
The firestorm of controversy over the $500 million biofuel pact tying UC Berkeley to one of the world biggest and most criticized oil giants intensified last week, with a teach-in, a faculty forum (see below), a demonstration and even 1 or 2 arrests. According to UC Berkeley historian, Iain Boal, BP's half-billion-dollar deal is nothing less than massive greenwashing by a corrupt corporation - supported by a governor eager "to keep his eight Hummers running on alcohol." For good pictures and links to videos of speeches etc.
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/03/04/18372601.php
+ GM RESEARCH DOMINATES BP-BERKELEY PARTNERSHIP
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7602
+ BERKELEY UC FACULTY CRITICAL OF BP DEAL
The BP-Berkeley deal took a pounding at a faculty forum, with a host of speakers critical of the unprecedented partnership. The forum, sponsored by University of California's Academic Senate, was marked by biting criticism from the floor and a brilliant speech from Dr Ignacio Chapela (see below). For a webcast of the proceedings: http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=19207&p=1&ipp=15&category=
+ CORPORATE TIES COULD HIDE GM RISKS
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7618
+ SPEECH BY CHAPELA AT UC BERKELEY SENATE
EXTRACT (but it's well worth reading in full):
May nobody claim that eight minutes of my clumsy words represent any kind of reasonable and legitimizing discussion. May nobody leave this room thinking that there is anything like a legitimate process in place to guarantee that this Faustian deal with the British transnational corporation is not what it portends, the last - and I believe final - coup de grace to the very idea of a university that can represent the best interest of the public...
What would certainly come out of the BP-Berkeley facilities would be a large number of genetically altered, reproducing, LIVING organisms to be released in the public environment.
These organisms do not represent science. If anything, they may represent our failure as scientists to assume the deep inadequacies of our understanding about living organisms and the ecology of our planet.
Despite a third of a century and more than $350 billion dollars invested in the trinket, a hurricane remains more predictable, and a wildfire remains more controllable than GMO organisms. Meanwhile, they have proven to be a disastrous economic proposition, not to speak of their environmental and social consequences.
Cognizant of this reality, BP-Berkeley proponents would wish to rename everything in their trade to give it a fresh face of novelty: GMOs should now be called "DNA circuits", pieced together from "Biobricks" through a craft not called transgenesis, but "Synthetic Biology"...
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7617
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MORE ON BIOFUELS
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+ BRAZILIANS PROTEST BUSH VISIT
Landless farmers were among the protesters marking George Bush's arrival in Brazil to forge an ethanol energy alliance with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7622
+ THE SINISTER NEW BIO-FUEL ALLIANCE
The Landless Movement of Brazil and the international organisation Via Campesina have condemned the Bush biofuel initiative. In his trip to Latin America Bush hopes to co-opt the countries of the region into becoming major producers of bio-fuels for export to the US.
Joao Pedro Stedile, leader of the Landless Movement of Brazil (MST) and Via Campesina Brazil, says that the new US plan would be a tragedy for tropical agriculture and would transform major areas of the best lands into monoculture tracts and reduce the amount of land dedicated to food production, forcing millions of peasants from their land and into the slums of the big cities.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7601
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THE AMERICAS
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+ KEY MONSANTO PATENT REJECTED
The US Patent and Trademark Office has rejected a key patent in Monsanto's Roundup Ready arsenal, possibly stripping the agribusiness giant of its power to license the technology to farmers.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7595
+ GM RICE - SECOND U.S. CONTAMINATION INCIDENT REVEALED
It has emerged that the GM rice contamination scandal which caused massive damage to US rice producers last year was not an isolated incident. Now a second incident has come to light - involving a different strain of GM rice and a different contamination history.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7592
+ BASF TAKES $1-9 MILLION HIT FROM GM CONTAMINATION
BASF is pulling one of its Clearfield rice seeds off the market. USDA ordered the company to do so after BASF found GM contamination in the popular rice variety. Ray Gilmer of BASF estimated losses to the company from the incident at between $1 million and $9 million dollars.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7603
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7598
+ MEXICO: THE PLOT AGAINST MAIZE
Big biotech firms are taking advantage of the Mexican corn crisis to force farmers to purchase GM seeds.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7622
+ COLOMBIA: GM CORN APPROVAL
The Colombian Government - a close ally of George W. Bush - has allowed GM corn to enter its borders for the first time, and will apparently authorise plantations of other GM products later in the year.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7622
+ U.S. CREAMERY MOVES TO PREVENT GM CONTAMINATION
Straus Family Creamery, the first certified organic dairy and creamery west of the Mississippi River, will be the first certified organic manufacturer in the US to verify that its products are not contaminated by GMOs. Said Albert Straus, president of Straus Family Creamery, "We have rejected organic feeds for our animals because of GMO contamination. We need better controls over our feeds and ingredients, so we have established this relationship with the Non-GMO Project to ensure that all of our products are verified as non-GMO."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7605
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ASIA
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+ FARMERS WARNED NOT TO GRAZE CATTLE ON BT COTTON
A notice issued to farmers by the Animal Husbandry officials of Adilabad district, India, marks the first occasion that Indian officials have admitted the toxic effects of Bt cotton on animals: "It has come to our notice that in several blocks of the district, animals are falling sick after grazing on Bt cotton fields ... because of a yet-unidentified toxic material in these plants, it has come to our notice that animals which are grazing on these fields are exhibiting symptoms like shivers, convulsions, running nose, bloat, bloody diarrhea etc., and are dying. Therefore, we appeal to farmers not to graze their animals on Bt cotton fields..."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7614
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7596
+ INDIA: PMK OPPOSES USE OF GM SEEDS
The PMK, a political ally of the ruling DMK in Tamil Nadu, has urged the government to ensure that GM seeds were not used in the state and asked the farmers to resist moves to introduce them. PMK is the first political party in India which has taken a totally unambiguous stand against GM crops.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7594
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7588
+ ASIA: CAMPAIGN AGAINST GM FOOD
13 Asian countries are taking part in the Week of Rice Action (WORA) campaign against GM food.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7588
+ INDIA: THE BOLLWORM RETURNS
Suman Sahai, writing in India Together, reports on how Bt-based pest resistance is collapsing.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7585
+ GOVT OF INDIA DOLES OUT CORPORATE WELFARE FOR GM CROPS
While Indian farmers whose GM cotton crops have failed continue to commit suicide in vast numbers, the government has announced a special subsidy package to promote GM crops in the country.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7619
+ INDIAN WOMEN LEADING THE ORGANIC REVOLUTION
In Bhubaneswar, says a report for the Hindu Business Line, 3,000 tribal women staged a demonstration demanding the declaration of Orissa as an "organic" State. In Medak, Andhra Pradesh, 1,000 women marched through the streets demanding a ban on hybrid and GM seeds. For millions of rural Indian women, organic agriculture offers escape from the three demons of debt, disease and destitution.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7588
+ EU AG CHIEF SEES INCREASED RICE IMPORTS FROM INDIA IF GM-FREE
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7619
+ PHILIPPINES: GROUP OPPOSES BAYER GM RICE
The Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives for Community Empowerment (SEARICE), a non-government organization, has urged the Bureau of Plant and Industry to turn down the application of Bayer for its GM rice to be used for feed, food, and processing.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7597
+ PHILLIPINES: PEOPLE HAVE EATEN GM RICE DUE TO GOVT NEGLECT
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7597
+ FORMER-MONSANTO EXEC FINED FOR BRIBE
A former executive at Monsanto was fined $30,000 for bribing an Indonesian official in an unsuccessful bid to repeal an environmental rule, the US Securities and Exchange Commission said. Charles M. Martin, Monsanto's former government affairs director in Asia, violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in 2002 when he told a consultant to pay a senior Indonesian environmental official $50,000, the SEC said. Monsanto was seeking the repeal of a rule requiring it to assess the environmental impact before planting GM cottonseed.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7607
An excellent Wall Street Journal article describing Monsanto's bungled attempt to bribe Indonesia's government into accepting GM is at:
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7608
NB Charles Martin, the Monsanto man at the centre of the bribery scandal, now heads the US Chamber of Commerce in China, of which Monsanto is a paid up member. Note also the following statement by Martin, quoted by the WSJ: "When the government plays classical music, we play classical music; when it plays jazz, we play jazz; if it plays bribery, we play bribery; but if it plays clean, that is what we like."
http://www.gmwatch.org/p1temp.asp?pid=58&page=1
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EUROPE
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+ SICK PEOPLE USED LIKE LAB RATS IN GM TRIALS
An article in the Independent on Sunday (UK) reports on the Russian GM potato human feeding studies carried out on hospital patients.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7593
+ HOW GM CORPORATIONS KILL "INCONVENIENT" RESEARCH
An interview published on a Russian news website has provided chilling evidence of how the biotech industry kills off "inconvenient" GM research and ensures that independent scientists are silenced.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7621
+ CLONED MEAT COULD BE ALLOWED IN EU
The prospect of cloned meat being sold in Europe drew nearer after the EU's food safety authority was asked to rule on the matter. The US approved in principle meat and milk from cloned animals for consumption last year.
GM WATCH comment: While we know that cloned animals are genetically defective - with as many as 4-5% of their genes expressed incorrectly - it would be no surprise if the EFSA, through its reductionist prism, failed to take account of the implications. What's inescapable, though, is that this technology is an animal welfare disaster, generating death and abnormality on a totally unacceptable scale.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7613
+ WALES: MONSANTO'S TOXIC SITES COULD COST A BOMB
Taxpayers may have to pay hundreds of millions of pounds to clean up toxic sites in Wales unless a claim is made on the assets of a bankrupt American company by the end of the month. Douglas Gowan, an expert who began monitoring two of the sites 40 years ago, says it is vital that British authorities take action to hold the Monsanto group to account. The bankrupt company Solutia is part of the Monsanto group, which he accuses of being the major polluter. Gowan said, "The discharges sampled contained highly toxic pollutants and factual evidence suggests that the cattle deaths, reproductive problems and abortions, were a direct consequence of that pollution, and of the ingestion of PCB, which were found in the stream and well water."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7609
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LOBBYWATCH, GMOs AND CLIMATE CHANGE
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+ THE SHAM OF PATRICK MOORE
Two articles expose the sham of the claimed environmental credentials of Patrick Moore and his arguments in support of GM.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7584
+ GM-LOBBYISTS AND CLIMATE CHANGE
The growing concern over global warming has triggered 2 quite distinct responses from pro-GM lobbyists. The first has been climate change denial. This has been the favoured response of corporate libertarians, many of whom enjoy the financial backing of both Exxon and Monsanto. An obvious example of this would be the Monsanto/Exxon funded co-founders of AgBioWorld - the Competitive Enterprise Institute. CEI has been at the very heart ofclimate change denial in the US. Other notable GM-promoting 'climate skeptics' include Dennis Avery, who's just co-authored a book on the subject, Paul Driessen, the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), and Steve Milloy (aka the Junkman).
Among avid GM supporters actively promoting climate change denial in the UK have been Martin Durkin and the LM network (see below), the Scientific Alliance, Philip Stott and the International Policy Network. Other keen GM supporters, like Dick Taverne and Sense About Science, are closet skeptics who stray dangerously close to denial or are notable for their public silence on the issue.
The biotech lobby's other response to global warming has been to try and use public and governmental concern as a platform for greenwashing GM crops - see below.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7625
+ NEW STUDY GREENWASHES GM CROPS OVER CARBON EMISSIONS
GM crops are reducing farming's carbon footprint, according to a new report. It's based on a study commissioned by Monsanto from Graham Brookes and Peter Barfoot of PG Economics Limited. The study - called, "GM Crops: The First 10 Years" - is an updated replay of a report PG Economics produced a year earlier for Monsanto. The GM-supporting proprietors of PG Economic have a long history of producing these kind of reports to order for the biotech industry - see
http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=308
Aand they can be seriously misleading. See how amazingly misleading their reports are in relation to global warming at
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7625
+ LM-CONNECTED DIRECTOR BEHIND "GLOBAL WARMING SWINDLE"
This week, Channel 4 in the UK screened what it called a "polemical and thought-provoking documentary" - "The Great Global Warming Swindle". But the director Martin Durkin has a long history of misleading people on science and technology issues, including GM. He also connects closely to the GM supporting, environmentalist-hating LM network.
http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=78
A Leading US climate scientist is considering legal action after he says he was duped into appearing in Durkin's latest documentary. Carl Wunsch, professor of physical oceanography at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said the film was "as close to pure propaganda as anything since World War Two".
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7626
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NEW BOOK
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+ JEFFREY SMITH'S NEW BOOK
New book from the author of Seeds of Deception:
Genetic Roulette: The Documented Health Risks of Genetically Engineered Foods In his foreword to Genetic Roulette, former UK government environment minister Michael Meacher says, "This is the authentic book on genetic modification that the world has been waiting for . . . The case presented is absolutely a smoking shotgun that should stop in its tracks any dabbling with GM foods, whether by individual families, food companies, or indeed nations."
GMO experts Arpad Pusztai and Susan Bardocz write, "Jeffrey Smith's Genetic Roulette destroys the myth that genetically modified organisms are safe and will give sleepless nights to uncritical supporters of GMOs . . . It is a real treasure and the most important GMO source book for policy makers, scientists, and the public."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7615
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CAMPAIGNS
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+ LOBBY MEPS AGAINST PRO-GM PROPOSAL
A European Parliament plenary session on Wednesday March 14th will vote on an EU proposal submitted by Finnish MEP Kyosti Virrankoski. Virrankoski's proposal strongly promotes the further development of GM food and farming throughout Europe.
SO please contact your MEPs on a country by country basis. Point out that independent surveys show 80% of Europeans have consistently rejected GMOs and remind your MEPs that you are one of those citizens and that you want them to act accordingly. You could also tell them that you would rather see the money used to promote organic and diverse traditional farms.
You can find the e-mail details of all MEPs by country at:
http://icppc.pl/pl/gmo/eng_index.php?id=eng_eu_a
Details of the Virrankoski proposal at
http://www.icppc.pl/gmo/635387en.pdf
+ SUPPORT GM WATCH
PLEASE support GM Watch either by making a donation online here: http://www.gmwatch.org/donate.asp or you can send a check or money order made out to 'NGIN' to GM Watch, 26 Pottergate, Norwich, UK, NR2 1DX.