Posted
27th May 2001
UK
180 On GE Putting
GE
trial fields so close to a major Organics research establishment
is going to be one of the significant events in the UK GE scene,
and the consequences will reflect internationally. UK agriculture
ministers have turned on their allies in the genetic modification
industry to try to save Europe's largest organic farming research
centre. In an unprecedented volte-face they are pressuring the
industry to abandon an officially sanctioned trial of GM maize
which ‚ as The Independent on Sunday exclusively revealed two
weeks ago ‚ is two miles from the Henry Doubleday Research Association's
organic farming centre at Ryton near Coventry. They have the
backing of Tony Blair, another committed supporter of GM crops.
The industry ‚ which was on the point of sowing the maize, at
Wolston, early in the week ‚ has been thrown into confusion
by the way its patrons in the Government have switched sides
and has spent days dithering as to how to respond. It believes
that whatever it does will now endanger its plans for growing
GM crops commercially in Britain. Senior sources at the Ministry
of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Maff) agree with environmentalists
that the industry deliberately sought to pick a fight by choosing
the site. The row is developing into a crucial showdown between
the industry and environmentalists, one that it seems likely
to lose.
The
row became an election issue yesterday when the Conservatives
described the choosing of the site as "bizarrely insensitive''
and promised to stop the trial if elected. The research centre
lies in one of the most marginal seats in the country where
Andy King, the Labour MP, is defending a majority of just 495,
making it eighth on the Tories' hit-list. Neither the Government
nor the Scientific Steering Committee, which approved the site,
were informed of its proximity to the centre when they gave
it the go-ahead last month. When he was told, Michael Meacher,
the Environment minister, called it "highly provocative'' and
wrote to the committee, Aventis (the firm responsible) and Scimac,
the industry body conducting the trials, to ask them to abandon
it. Professor Chris Pollock, the committee chairman, wrote to
Mr Meacher on Wednesday refusing to withdraw the committee's
approval. That provoked one member, from the Royal Society for
the Protection of Birds to threaten to resign. The industry
was also ready by midweek to reject Mr Meacher's appeal, confident
that he would lose his job after the election, but has been
astounded to come under pressure from Maff and the Prime Minister,
on whose support it has always been able to count. Industry
sources privately recognise that it is now in deep trouble whatever
it decides. If it submits to the pressure and scraps the trial
it would set a damaging precedent. Research by Greenpeace and
the Soil Association show that 36 organic farms lie within two
miles of trial sites all over the country. And if it was accepted
that no GM crops could be grown that close to organic produce
it would become impossible to grow them commercially in Britain.
On the other hand, if it ignores the pressure it will provoke
the Government's anger and cause the RSPB and possibly English
Nature, the Government's official wildlife watchdog, to resign
from the committee, destroying its credibility and undermining
the trial programme. And if the crops grew they would be bound
to be destroyed by protesters later in the year. Aventis blamed
"election fever'' for the crisis and accused the Government
of "changing the rules'' on the trials. Scimac said that the
scientific procedures followed in choosing the site should be
kept "sacrosanct''. Tim Yeo, the Conservative agriculture spokesman,
has written to Mr Meacher to say that going ahead with the trial
"would send out a signal to the world that the British Government
has no regard for the integrity of Britain's organic produce".
He called on the Government to abandon the trial and said that
the RSPB would be "entirely justified in resigning should it
go ahead''.
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