2-Plants: UK Government to give GE crops the green light?

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                                  PART I
-------------------------------- GENET-news -------------------------------

TITLE:  GOVERNMENT TO GIVE GM CROPS THE GREEN LIGHT?
SOURCE: Friends of the Earth UK, Press Release
        http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/press_releases/
        government_to_give_gm_crop.html
DATE:   Sep 21 2003

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GOVERNMENT TO GIVE GM CROPS THE GREEN LIGHT?

Friends of the Earth has reacted angrily to reports that the Government
is To pave the way for GM crops to be commercially grown in the UK by
backing European Commission guidelines "banning GM-free zones and
allowing the co-existence of GM with conventional crops" [1]

Today's Sunday Times reports correspondence between Environment
Secretary, Margaret Beckett and cabinet colleagues which spells out
Government support for the proposals which are due to be discussed at an
EU Agriculture Ministers meeting later this month. UK ministers are also
keen to avoid upsetting the US, which has launched a legal action against
the EU under world trade rules. In her reply, Trade Secretary Patricia
Hewitt says "We must also bear in mind the potential impact [on] EU-US
relations".

However, Friends of the Earth insists that it is possible to establish
GM-free zones in Europe. Under Article 19 of an EU GM Directive
(Deliberate Release Directive 2001/18/EC) particular geographical areas
or habitats/ecological zones can be excluded from GM marketing consents
on a case by case basis, provided the environmental case can be made.
Upper Austria's failed bid for a blanket GM ban [2] used different
regulations - EU Treaty (Article 95(5)). A number of local authorities
have already voted to become GM-free and are due to use Article 19 to
help achieve it. See Gmfreebritain.com

Later this week the results of the Government's GM consultation exercise,
GM Nation, will be published [3]. These are expected to show wide-spread
opposition to GM food and crops. During the GM debate earlier this year,
it was revealed that GM crops offer little economic benefit [4] and that
scientific uncertainties about their potentially damaging impacts [5] remain.

European opinion polls show that 70 per cent of Europeans do not want GM
food and 94 per cent want to be able to choose whether or not they eat it.

Friends of the Earth's GM campaigner Clare Oxborrow said:

"The Government's consultation on GM crops revealed that they are
unnecessary, unpopular and offer no economic benefit. But despite this
overwhelming thumbs down, they still seem determined to press ahead with
their commercialisation. If this happens it will lead to extensive
contamination and take away people's right to choose GM-free food.

"There is widespread support throughout Britain and the EU for GM-free
zones, and European law allows this. The Government should back UK local
authorities who are using this legislation to protect their food, farming
and environment from GM contamination, rather than caving in to pressure
from the US Government and its biotech backers."

Notes

[1] The European Commission has published guidelines on coexistence, but
will not pass binding legislation. Instead, under a new amendment to EU
law, Member States "may take measures to prevent contamination" of
conventional and organic crops by GM crops. It is likely that countries
such as Austria will choose to put in place much stricter measures than
the UK.

[2] An EU ruling on 2 September 2003 that Upper Austria cannot declare
itself a GM-free Zone will not impact on those UK local authorities that
have voted to exclude GM crops from their areas. See www.foe.co.uk/
resource/press_releases/local_authorities_can_stil.html

[3] www.foe.co.uk/resource/press_releases/scepticism_as_gm_debate_en.html

[4] www.foe.co.uk/resource/press_releases/government_report_on_econo.html

[5] www.foe.co.uk/resource/press_releases/uncertainty_over_gm_safety.html


Contact details:

Friends of the Earth 26-28 Underwood St. LONDON N1 7JQ
Tel: 020 7490 1555
Fax: 020 7490 0881
Email: info@foe.co.uk
Website: www.foe.co.uk


                                  PART II
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TITLE:  Europe calls the tune as GM gets the green light
SOURCE: The Scotsman, UK, by Brian Brady
        http://www.news.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=9&id=1050112003
DATE:   Sep 21, 2003

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Europe calls the tune as GM gets the green light

MINISTERS are poised to approve the commercial growing of genetically-
modified crops in Britain, it emerged last night.

The government is to back new European Union rules banning GM-free zones
and allowing the "co-existence" of GM crops with conventional crops,
according to leaked confidential letters between cabinet ministers.

The move will infuriate environmental campaigners, but it will also quash
the Scottish Executive's hopes of imposing GM-free zones north of the
Border amid fears that the "Frankenstein" organisms could contaminate
conventional crops.

The Scottish National Party, which has campaigned against the widespread
cultivation of GM crops north of the Border until their safety has been
proven, said the decision was a "betrayal" of the feelings of the
majority of Scots.

Farm-scale trials of experimental GM crops in the Black Isle and in Fife,
approved by Scottish Executive environment minister Ross Finnie, have
been constantly disrupted by environmental protestors.

Reports of the ground-breaking decision to support moves to remove the
EU's moratorium on the cultivation of GM foods across the member states
comes as the government prepares to publish the long-awaited results of
GM crop trials in the UK.

The findings, expected next month, are believed to conclude that the
growing of some GM crops could be allowed under regulated conditions.

Prime Minister Tony Blair, and his science minister, Lord Sainsbury, are
known to be keen on breaking the taboo over GM, despite resistance from
campaigners including former environment minister Michael Meacher.
Blair's incoming media supremo, David Hill, is a former adviser to the
American GM food giant Monsanto.

The disclosure will fuel concerns of anti-GM campaigners that the
Brussels rules will be used by Blair to open the floodgates for the crops
to be grown commercially in Britain. Meacher, who was sacked in June, has
complained that the government has not proved that the crops are safe and
that contamination could destroy the UK's burgeoning organic farming industry.

But a letter from environment secretary Margaret Beckett to Cabinet
colleagues reveals that she will support EU proposals at a meeting of the
union's agriculture ministers next month.

"I am proposing that we broadly support the [European] Commission's
guidelines as providing a reasonable basis to address the issue," she
wrote on September 5.

Beckett attached a summary of the EU rules, which state that "no form of
agriculture (conventional, organic, GM) should be excluded from the EU.

"Co-existence measures should be developed and implemented by member
states because farming patterns across the EU are so diverse," the letter
adds.

Beckett's communication also refers to the EU's proposal to stop
governments imposing GM-free areas, which is an idea favoured by the
devolved administrations in Scotland and Wales and some English councils.
This month the EU refused a bid by the Upper Austria region to outlaw GM
crops for three years.

"Our interests are best served by giving broad support to the commission
guidelines," Beckett added.

Beckett's letter was addressed to Foreign Secretary Jack Straw. Blair,
Straw and Trade Secretary Patricia Hewitt are also keen not to upset
trade relations with the US, the world's largest commercial producer of
GM foods.

A five-year EU moratorium on GM crops, which expires this year and will
not be renewed, has caused lasting turbulence with the American
government, which recently launched a legal action claiming it was in
breach of world trade rules.

Beckett's letter said: "We oppose any argument that the de facto
moratorium on GM approvals should be maintained until legislative action
has been taken on co-existence at either EU or national level."

A reply from Hewitt agreed that it was in Britain's interests to support
the commission guidelines. "We must also bear in mind the impact [on] EU-
US relations."

Earlier this year, Scotland on Sunday revealed that ministers wanted to
kill off plans by Brussels to bring in a comprehensive regime for
labelling GM food because they feared "negative fall-out" from Washington.

The government will this week announce the results of a public
consultation on GM technology. Earlier studies have shown that 70% of the
EU public did not want GM foods and 94% want to be able to choose whether
or not they eat it.

Shadow Scottish environment minister Roseanna Cunningham said last night
she was "horrified" by the content of the leaked correspondence. "It's a
betrayal of what the government know is the feelings of the people of
this country," said the SNP deputy leader.

"I would demand that the Scottish Executive make it very clear to
Westminster that genetically modified crops are not wanted here."

A Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs spokesman
declined to comment last night on the leaked correspondence.

--


GENET
European NGO Network on Genetic Engineering

Hartmut MEYER (Mr)
Kleine Wiese 6
D - 38116 Braunschweig
Germany

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