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from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all,
Another victory this week! Well done all those who asked California Governor "Arnie" and other officials to terminate Ventria's GM pharma rice (HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK - GLOBAL). Your efforts have paid off and the rice will not be grown - for this season at least. Let's hope, unlike the Terminator, it won't be back!
Please keep the momentum going by saying no to GM wheat - see our very important CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK.
Well worth reading is an article from the avidly pro-GM New Scientist, which details the tragic story of Argentina's economic and ecological meltdown as a result of the country's widespread adoption of GM soya (HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK - GLOBAL).
Claire This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
www.ngin.org.uk / www.gmwatch.org
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CONTENTS
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HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK - UK
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK - GLOBAL
INTERVIEW OF THE WEEK: DR MAEWAN HO
CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK - SAY NO TO GM WHEAT
DONATIONS
HEADLINES OF THE WEEK
SUBSCRIPTIONS
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HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK - UK
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+ PROF HILLMAN BLASTS ORGANICS - AGAIN!
Prof John Hillman, director of the Scottish Crop Research Institute, is quoted in an article in the obliging Scotsman newspaper attacking organic farming and hyping the benefits of GM and chemical agriculture. What's more, he has used the SCRI's annual report to promote his views. And it's not the first time Hillman's pulled exactly the same trick.
According to Hillman's startlingly asymmetrical analysis, organic farming has no benefits but multiple problems and risks. It means low productivity, a high dependence on poisonous copper salts, blemished crops, the risk of mycotoxins and reduced vitamin C levels, reliance on faecal fertilisers, raising concerns about food-poisoning, eggs of parasitic nematodes and pollution of water-courses; and reliance on tilling leading to soil structure damage and release of greenhouse gases. Any benefits, he says, "cannot be validated" while its marketing is based on criticism and scaremongering. Furthermore, it has high production costs and cannot meet the increasing demand of global food supply without encroaching on natural habitats.
By contrast, GM crops, he says, "encompass strategies to control pests, weeds and diseases; by, for example, eliminating allergens and anti-nutritional factors they can modify shape, colour, size, aroma, texture, taste and yield; can generate, at low capital cost, pathogen-free, high-value, nutraceuticals, vaccines, antibiotics, enzymes and growth factors; engineer plants to treat wastes and contaminated land; produce industrial feedstocks from specialist proteins; and create renewable sources of energy".
Find out more about Prof Hillman and his total failure to provide the evidence to back up his Dennis Avery style smears. http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3276
+ HIGHLANDS DECLARED FREE OF GM CROPS
Councillors voted on 15 April to make the Highlands the first area in Scotland to be declared free of GM crops. The decision by the Highland Council means the region will join Wales, Tuscany, the Basque Country and Upper Austria in the European network of GM free areas, which aim to protect the future of traditional and organic farming. Expect lots more parts of the UK, which have already voted in favour of staying GM free, joining this pan-European alliance.
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HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK - GLOBAL
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+ SEED GIANTS ACCUSED OF SABOTAGE
Kenyans have been urged to be wary of the activities of multinational seed companies. A former manager of Kenya Seed Company, Mr Michael Rono, said some of the problems facing the agricultural sector have their roots in the quest by the multinational firms to penetrate the Kenyan market.
Rono said the multi-nationals have particularly been keen on introducing GMO seeds into the Kenyan market and urged the government to be on the alert over their activities. "They will not rest until the have wrestled the Kenyan market from KSC," said Rono, the firm's former marketing and processing manager.
Reacting to last weekend's inferno that razed down the Kenya Seed's administration block, Rono said investigations into the fire should be widened to include the multinationals. In the meantime, he said, the Government should establish strict security measures at Kenya Seed and the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (Kari) where the firm's seeds are produced.
He was particularly emphatic that Kenya Seed's Elgon Downs, where the country's strategic seed reserves are kept should be heavily guarded. http://allafrica.com/stories/200404150342.html
+ ARGENTINA'S BITTER HARVEST - NEW SCIENTIST
New Scientist has an excellent article in its current edition, "Argentina's bitter harvest: Genetically modified soya promised so much for hard-pressed farmers. Now it has all gone horribly wrong". The accompanying editorial struggles to maintain the magazine's pro-GM line. It extracts some comfort from its disturbing report by declaring it's not the technology's fault things have gone horribly wrong. The technology is simply being "mishandled" by farmers! Oddly, however, New Scientist's editor presents no evidence that farmers are doing anything other than what was intended by the biotech companies.
In a spin-off article on the front page of the Daily Mail, Colin Merritt, biotechnology manager for Monsanto, which markets Roundup Ready soya, said it had been an "exemplary success" in South America, both environmentally and economically! Read on and see if you agree.
Excerpts from the New Scientist article:
When genetically modified soya came on the scene it seemed like a heaven-sent solution to Argentina's agricultural problems. Now soya is being blamed for an environmental crisis that is threatening the country's tragile economic recovery. Sue Branford discovers how it all went wrong
A year ago, Colonia Loma Senes was just another rural backwater in the north of Argentina. But that was before the toxic cloud arrived. "The poison got blown onto our plots and into our houses," recalls local farmer Sandoval Filemon. "Straight away our eyes started smarting. The children's bare legs came out in rashes." The following morning the village awoke to a scene of desolation. "Almost all of our crops were badly damaged. I couldn't believe my eyes," says Sandoval's wife, Eugenia. Over the next few days and weeks chickens and pigs died, and sows and nanny goats gave birth to dead or deformed young. Months later banana trees were deformed and stunted and were still not bearing edible fruit.
The villagers quickly pointed the finger at a neighbouring farm whose tenants were growing genetically modified soya, engineered to be resistant to the herbicide glyphosate. A month later, agronomists from the nearby National University of Formosa visited the scene and confirmed the villagers' suspicions. The researchers concluded that the neighbouring farmers, like thousands of others growing GM soya in Argentina, had been forced to take drastic action against resistant weeds and had carelessly drenched the land - and nearby Colonia Loma Senes - with a mixture of powerful herbicides.
...
Over the past eight years, GM soya farmers have taken over a huge proportion of Argentina's arable land, leading to regular complaints by peasant families that their crops have been harmed by glyphosate and other herbicides.
...
Some years ago, however, a few agronomists started to sound alarm bells, warning that the wholesale and unmonitored shift into Roundup Ready soya was causing unforeseen problems. In a study published in 2001 by the Northwest Science and Environmental Policy Center, a non-profit organisation in Sandpoint, Idaho, agricultural economics consultant Charles Benbrook reported that Roundup Ready soya growers in Argentina were using more than twice as much herbicide as conventional soya farmers, largely because of unexpected problems with tolerant weeds. He also found that they were applying glyphosate more frequently than their US counterparts - 2.3 versus 1.3 applications a year. Saying that "history shows us that excessive reliance on any single strategy of weed or insect management will fail in the long run, in the face of ecological and genetic responses", he advised Argentinian farmers to reduce their Roundup Ready acreage by as much as half in order to cut glyphosate usage. If they did not, he warned, they would run the risk of serious problems. Among his predictions were shifts in the composition of weed species, the emergence of resistant superweeds, and changes in soil microbiology.
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The area under Roundup Ready has continued to grow, and farmers hurt by the collapse of Argentina's currency at the end of 2001 are increasingly moving into soya monoculture, as other crops for the domestic market have become unprofitable. Glyphosate use continues to rise. [Univ of Buenos Aires agro-ecologist Walter] Pengue estimates consumption reached 150 million litres in 2003, up from just 13.9 million litres in 1997.
Initially Pengue believed that with careful rotation of crops and adequate controls over the way the herbicide was applied, the move to glyphosate would benefit the environment. But he is now concerned that the unmonitored use of this one herbicide is leading to the problems predicted by Benbrook. In a study into the impact of Roundup Ready soya on weeds, Delma Faccini of the National University of Rosario found that several previously uncommon species of glyphosatetolerant weed had increased in abundance. In another study, agronomists from INTA's office in Venado Tuerto, near Rosario, found that farmers were having to use higher concentrations of glyphosate. For now, the problem appears to be limited to the proliferation of weeds that are naturally resistant, but some agronomists are warning that it is only a matter of time before glyphosate resistance is transferred to other weed species, turning them into superweeds.
The third problem that was predicted by Benbrook - changes in soil microbiology - also appears to be happening. "Because so much herbicide is being used, soil bacteria are declining and the soil is becoming inert, which is inhibiting the usual process of decomposition," says agronomist Adolfo Boy from the Grupo de Reflexion Rural, a group of agronomists opposed to GM farming. "In some farms the dead vegetation even has to be brushed off the land." He also believes that slugs, snails and fungi are moving into the newly available ecological niche.
Similar problems are occurring to some extent in the US. According to Joe Cummins, a geneticist from the University of Western Ontario in Canada, studies of the impact of herbicides, particularly glyphosate, on soil microbial communities have revealed increasing colonisation of the roots of Roundup Ready soya with the fungus Fusarium in Midwestern fields.
Argentina's farmers are also having to deal with the proliferation of "volunteer" soya, which sprouts from seeds dropped during harvest and which cannot be eradicated with normal doses of glyphosate. This has created marketing opportunities for other agrochemical companies such as Syngenta, which has been placing adverts with the slogan "Soya is a weed" advising farmers to use a mixture of paraquat and atrazine to eradicate volunteer soya. Other companies, including Dow AgroSciences, are recommending mixing glyphosate with other herbicides, such as metsulfuron and clopyralid.
...
Argentina used to be one of the world's major suppliers of food, particularly wheat and beef. But the "soyarisation" of the economy, as the Argentinians call it, has changed that.
About 150,000 small farmers have been driven off the land. Production of many staples, including milk, rice, maize, potatoes and lentils, has fallen sharply.
Many see Argentina's experience as a warning of what can happen when production of a single commodity for the world market takes precedence over concern for food security. When this commodity is produced in a system of near monoculture, with the use of a new and relatively untested technology provided by multinational companies, the vulnerability of the country is compounded. As yet, few countries have opted for GM technology: the US and Argentina together account for 84 per cent of the GM crops planted in the world. But as others, including the UK, seem increasingly prepared to authorise the commercial growing of GM crops, they may be well advised to look to Argentina to see how it can go wrong. Complete article at http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3280
+ BIOTECH RICE PLANS STALLED
The California Department of Food and Agriculture denied Ventria Bioscience's application to grow more than 120 acres of GM pharmaceutical rice engineered with human proteins in Central and Southern California because federal regulators haven't issued a permit. The Sacramento-based company said it had not yet applied for federal regulatory approval.
State officials also said the public needed more time to comment on an issue that had roiled California's $500-million rice industry. Many rice farmers fear the pharma rice will cost them customers in Europe and Japan if Ventria's permit were granted.
Ventria has been growing GM rice on 120 acres in Northern California on an experimental basis since it received U.S. Department of Agricultural permits in 1997. On 5 April, the USDA refused to renew that permit for this year, saying the company planned to grow its experimental rice too close to crops intended for human consumption. http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3270
+ BIRD FLU FEAR ON GM CHICKEN VIRUS
A plan to infect 5000 chickens with a GM virus has sounded alarm bells among scientists who fear the designer microbe could become a deadly new disease like bird flu. Critics say the risk is so high that the trial should be banned.
"We're so worried about new and emerging diseases like SARS and the West Nile virus in the US, we have to be absolutely vigilant," Australian National University viral immunologist Arno Mullbacher said. He and others argue that the biotech firm behind the project, CSIRO spinoff Imugene Limited, has failed to provide evidence that the virus won't mutate or spread with unpredictable results.
Imugene's goal is a vaccine to boost the immune systems of chickens, now treated with antibiotics to enhance growth. Scientists warn that overuse of antibiotics in animals is breeding drug-resistant bugs that infect people. Imugene scientists have inserted chicken immune cells into the fowl adenovirus (FAV). Imugene chief scientific officer Mike Sheppard said laboratory tests and field trials conducted by CSIRO suggested that the rebuilt FAV boosted chicken growth by 8 per cent and would not infect other animals.
GM WATCH comment: It was of course the same group of CSIRO scientists who in 2001 genetically engineered a strain of the mousepox virus so lethal that it would have killed all mice exposed to it. This accidental discovery arose out of trying to develop a GM mouse contraceptive. The CSIRO scientists then published their research, helpfully highlighting its potential application to smallpox!
Although CSIRO is promoted as Australia's pre-eminent public science organisation, in reality it is one of the most corporate-friendly public science bodies in the world. According to CSIRO former chief executive, John Stocker, "Working with the transnationals makes a lot of sense... Yes, we do find that it is often the best strategy to get into bed with these companies." CSIRO scientists have consequently been very active in the promotion of GM.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3271
+ VERMONT GM LABELLING BILL PASSES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
The Vermont House of Representatives voted to endorse the Farmer's Right-to-Know Seed Labeling Bill (H-777) on 8 April, an act defining GE seeds as different from conventional seeds in the state of Vermont seed statute, and mandating the labeling of all GE seeds sold in the state. The bill goes back to the Senate next week for confirmation of final changes, before going to Governor Douglas for final approval and enactment.
The overwhelming yes vote comes as the Vermont Senate has unanimously approved the Farmer Protection Act (which makes biotech companies and not farmers liable for GE contamination) in March, and 79 Vermont towns have passed Town Meeting measures calling on lawmakers in the state capital Montpelier and Washington to enact a moratorium on GE crops. http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3273
+ US IS BIGGER THREAT THAN TERROR - BBC POLL
Globalisation, the US and giant multinationals pose a more serious threat to the world than war and terrorism, according to a BBC poll. Respondents from Europe, Asia, North and South America, the Middle East, Africa and Australasia, ranked the power of the US and large corporations as the biggest worry (52.3%). Corruption came second. Conflicts - war and terrorism - ranked third, with 50%, followed by hunger, 49%, and climate change with 44%.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3277
+ GERMAN GM WHEAT TRIALS CONTINUE
Syngenta has replanted GM wheat in a test field in Germany that was recently damaged by environmental activists. Rainer Linneweber, spokesman for Syngenta's German subsidiary, Syngenta Agro, said the prime reason for conducting the GM wheat test in Germany was to gather scientific data.
But Linneweber added: "Also, it is a possible signal to the rest of the world: Look, GM trial fields are possible, even in Germany." In March, Syngenta planted wheat genetically modified to resist fusarium fungus on two fields in the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt. On March 29, around 130 activists invaded the farm fields and planted nearly 5 metric tons of organic wheat.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3275
+ EU INTRODUCES STRICTER GM FOOD LABELLING
Sales of food in the EU containing more than minute traces of GM ingredients will soon be illegal unless indicated on content labels. A new law stipulates that any food containing 0.9 percent or more of GM substances must display details of the amount on packaging.
From Sunday 18th April the tougher GM labelling rules will:
*Cover 'derivatives' from GM crops including oils and lecithin, both mainly found in processed food;
*Tighten the labelling threshold from one per cent to 0.9 per cent;
*Include 'feed' fed to animals.
The UK's biggest food companies have indicated they will continue to reject GM ingredients in their products when the tougher GM labelling laws are introduced on Sunday. A similar survey in Belgium showed the same results.
Meanwhile the UK Government, which opposed plans for tougher GM labelling rules to "minimise the risks" of alienating the US, is backing applications for GM rice and sweetcorn to be imported into Europe.
+ SHOULD INDIA GROW GM RICE?
Suman Sahai of Gene Campaign reports that in India, the centre of genetic diversity for rice, GM rice projects are attempting to change the quality of rice starch. Disturbingly, one company is producing rice containing the Bt cry9C gene, which is the gene used in Starlink corn, suspected of having allergenic properties and therefore banned for human use by the USDA. http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3269
+ THE TRUTH ABOUT "TRUTH ABOUT TRADE & TECHNOLOGY" - A GM WATCH PROFILE
Truth about Trade & Technology is a US-based group with a "grassroots" pro-GM campaign led by influential members of the farming community. But when Truth about Trade fulminates against "ignorance and deceptive propaganda" on the GM issue "spread by entrenched special interests" some might consider it more than a little guilty of projection. Not least as it is led by a man who has been accused of consistently selling out ordinary American farmers and jumping into bed with agribusiness.
The main feature of its website is a news section offering the latest GM-related headlines, plus regular weekly commentaries by its Chairman, Dean Kleckner - 'Kleckner Speaks Out', and more occasional comment pieces from other members of its board. Kleckner's commentaries are also circulated on the internet, most often via the pro-GM listservs AgBioView and Agnet.
According to Truth about Trade's website, 'In the 21st century, trade and technology are inextricably linked... concerns about technology, both feigned and authentic, are increasingly used to justify protectionism. These fears are not based upon scientific fact, but upon a mixture of unfortunate misunderstandings owing to ignorance and deceptive propaganda spread by entrenched special interests.'
Read on at http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=267&page=T (for links to sources)
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INTERVIEW OF THE WEEK
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+ PUNCTURING THE GM MYTHS
Below are excerpts from a scorchingly brilliant interview with Dr Mae-Wan Ho, director of the Institute of Science in Society, by Anastasia Stephens of the Evening Standard (Interview in full at http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3268 )
AS: Are the anti-GM brigade anything more than a bunch of conspiracy theorists?
MWH: There is no "anti-GM brigade". There are ordinary citizens angry at the lies they've been told, and the undemocratic way in which GM crops are foisted on them. There are angry farmers who will be out of business once their crops are contaminated by GM genes. There are scientists incensed at the abuse of science that has allowed GM crops to be approved, which have all the signs of being unsafe.
There is no "anti-GM brigade"; on the contrary, there is a distinct pro-GM brigade that will stop at nothing to promote the corporate agenda. They've infiltrated the science-media establishment and the government, and using smear tactics borrowed from America's far-right to try to discredit and silence all critics.
...
AS: Doesn't genetic modification follow what nature does already - the evolutionary principle of genetic selection?
MWH: No, GM breaks all the rules of evolution, it short circuits evolution altogether. It bypasses reproduction, creates new genes and gene combinations that have never existed, and is not restricted by the usual barriers between species. Evolution happened over billions of years, each species has its own space and time on the evolutionary stage, they didn't all evolve at once, so gene exchange between different species were restricted by space and time as well as by biological barriers.
AS: If as manufacturers and governments argue, GM could lead to crops that are more productive, grow on land that is otherwise barren, and decrease the use of pesticides, shouldn't it be hailed as a breakthrough?
MWH: We've been hearing those promises for more than 30 years, and they still remain distant potentials. US Department of Agriculture documents a net increase in pesticide use of 50 million pounds after GM crops have been grown since 1994. The biotech bubble has burst several years ago. All the agro-biotech companies have been falling in the stock market, led by Monsanto. They no longer invest in GM crops research. They are now trying to use GM crops to produce pharmaceuticals in the open field, which will contaminate our food supply with vaccines, immune- suppressive chemicals and worse.
AS: A GM strain of rice that produces high levels of Vitamin A is already helping to prevent blindness in South East Asia. Isn't this good news for producers and consumers alike?
MWH: That is yet another lie that they keep retelling, long, long after it has been exposed. This "Vitamin A rice" or "Golden rice" produces such a minute amount of Vitamin A precursor carotene that a person has to eat some 3.5kilos per day to get the minimum requirement. But, anyone who is malnourished won't be able to convert carotene into Vitamin A anyways. Besides, many green leafy vegetables that anyone can grow in their own backyard will supply lots more Vitamin A and other essential nutrients and minerals.
Why did the scientists embark on such a stupid, useless project in the first place, at the cost of tens of millions to the taxpayer only to produce a junk crop that has more than 70 patents attached to it? Why don't scientists learn and work together with farmers who are doing sustainable non-GM agriculture that recovers local varieties adapted to grow and flourish in the local environment, which has proven much, much more successful?
AS: One of the first commercially approved GM crops is a soya bean modified to be tolerant of the herbicide glyphosate. Manufacturers argue that spraying with glyphosate replaces a more toxic regime involving several herbicides. Isn't GM in this case helping the environment?
MWH: Glyphosate is not a benign herbicide. It is a broad-spectrum herbicide that will kill all species of plants indiscriminately, broadleaves and grasses both, so it is actually much more devastating for the environment. It also destroys nitrogen-fixing bacteria and kills earthworms, both of which are crucial for maintaining soil fertility. New research is linking glyphosate to cancers in humans, spontaneous abortions and neuro-behavioural defects in children born to people using the herbicide. It causes genetic damage in mammals, fish and frogs.
New data from the US Department of Agriculture actually found that glyphosate tolerant GM crops have increased the use of herbicides, especially as fields have become infested with glyphosate tolerant weeds after just a few years.
...
AS: The Institute of Food Science and Technology claims that since 1987, more than 25,000 field trials of GM plants have been carried out in 45 countries without adverse environmental consequences. Surely this is enough to allow the use of these crops?
MWH: More lies. The most devastating environmental consequences have been documented by scientists in Argentina, the second largest grower of GM crops after the US. This country, once known as the "world's granary", has spiralled into despair from planting GM crops, especially GM soya. It is having huge problems with hunger, displaced rural populations and loss of traditional food crops. Weeds have multiplied, as resistance to glyphosate (the herbicide used with RR soya) soared. The herbicide has had to be applied more frequently and at higher concentrations. Toxic older herbicides, such as 2,4 D and Paraquat, banned in many countries are back in use. The pampas - the beautiful natural grasslands for which the country is renown - has disappeared, as have hundreds of thousands of hectares of forest. Aeroplanes are used to spray herbicides on RR soya, subjecting local populations to tremendous health risks.
...
AS: A few genes straying here and there - is it really that dangerous?
MWH: "A few genes straying here and there" is what makes new viruses and bacteria that cause disease epidemics, like the recent SARS and AIDS. If you want to know the truth, the toolkit for GM is precisely the same as that for making biological weapons: viruses and bacteria that cause diseases and spread antibiotic resistance genes to make diseases more difficult to treat. Nasty surprises have already surfaced in 2001 when researcher in Australia "accidentally" created a lethal virus that killed all mice injected, in the course of modifying a harmless mouse-pox virus to create a vaccine. Nowadays, there are laboratory techniques that can chop up different viruses into small pieces and make the pieces join together again at random to generate in a matter of minutes millions of new viruses. You won't even have time to look through them to see how many deadly ones you have created.
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CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK
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+ SAY NO TO GM WHEAT
PLEASE SEND A FAX TO THE CANADIAN PRIME MINISTER TODAY - TELL HIM THAT YOU DON'T WANT MONSANTO'S GE WHEAT IN YOUR FOOD
PLEASE CIRCULATE WIDELY
Greenpeace needs your help in the fight against GE wheat. For the past several years, the Canadian government has been collaborating with Monsanto on the development of Monsanto's GE Roundup Ready wheat.
This is despite near-unanimous protest from farmers, environmentalists and wheat buyers around the world. Canada continues to allow open air field trials that could contaminate farmers fields and also refuses to reject Monsanto's application for commercial growing of GE wheat. They need to hear from the world that no one wants GE wheat!
Ask Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin to Say NO to Monsanto and YES to the environment.
Fax the Canadian Prime Minister TODAY at: http://www.wildcanada.net/greenpeace/faxengine.asp
NOTE: If you are outside of Canada or the US, please ignore the 'Province' and 'Postal Code' fields. http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3266
+ CANADA FARMERS SHOULD BE WARY OF GM WHEAT - ANDREAS
Canada and its farmers need to tread gingerly when considering how to approve and handle GM wheat, the chief executive of Archer Daniels Midland Co., one of the world's largest food processors, said.
ADM does not advocate for or against GM crops, but rather focuses on giving customers what they want, G. Allen Andreas told Reuters on the sidelines of the Canada Grains Council conference. "So if you get a lot of backlash across the world of people who are not interested in consuming bread that is made with genetically enhanced wheat, then farmers clearly have to take a very serious look at this, and so does the country of Canada," Andreas said. "... to be the pioneer out there when the rest of the world doesn't accept your product is not something that you should ask of any farmer of any country today." http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=3266
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DONATIONS
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HEADLINES OF THE WEEK: from the GMWATCH archive
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15/4/2004 Argentina's bitter harvest
15/4/2004 Despairing GM firms halt crop trials
15/4/2004 GM farmers "destroying neighbouring produce and causing sickness"
14/4/2004 German GM wheat trials continue despite crop destruction
14/4/2004 Prof Hillman blasts organic crops - again!
14/4/2004 The truth about Truth about Trade
14/4/2004 US and corporations "bigger threat than terror" in BBC global poll
11/4/2004 Vermont - House Passes Labeling Bill for GM Seeds / GMOs have contaminated Vermont
10/4/2004 Bird flu fear on GM chicken virus
10/4/2004 California rejects GM rice
10/4/2004 Undisclosed Affiliations - 'From genocide deniers to biotech apologists' - pt 4
9/4/2004 Evening Standard interview with Dr Mae-wan Ho
9/4/2004 Should India cultivate GM rice? / Tell Arnie to terminate pharma rice
8/4/2004 THE WEEKLY WATCH number 67
FOR THE COMPLETE GMWATCH ARCHIVE: http://www.gmwatch.org/archive.asp