Time for the GM Moratorium to GoGREGORY CONKO and C.S. PRAKASH / Wall Street Journal 13may03After months of anticipation, the U.S. government is expected to file a formal complaint today with the World Trade Organization against the European Union's five-year moratorium on new genetically modified crop varieties. The move will undoubtedly be ridiculed as a cynical attempt by Americans to force GM products down the throats of skeptical Europeans. Yet, while the U.S. is surely motivated by a parochial desire to aid American farmers, filing such a complaint will have benefits far beyond U.S. borders. The biggest beneficiaries are sure to be resource-poor farmers in less developed countries. By now, many readers will be familiar with the story of Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa who, last autumn, rejected some 23,000 metric tons of food aid in the midst of a two-year-long drought that threatened the lives of over two million Zambians. President Mwanawasa's public explanation was that the GM maize from the United States was "poison." But, other Zambian government officials conceded that the bigger concern was for future corn exports to the EU market. If even a little of the food aid were diverted to seed stock, it could threaten the exportability of the entire Zambian maize crop for many years to come. Zambia is not unique. European GM restrictions have had other, similar, consequences throughout the developing world. Thai government officials have been warned by European importers not to authorize any GM rice varieties. Uganda has stopped research on GM bananas and postponed their introduction indefinitely. Argentina has limited its approvals to two GM crop varieties that are already permitted in European markets. Even China, which has spent hundreds of millions of euros funding advanced biotechnology research, has refused to authorize any new GM food crops since the moratorium began. Critics often deride GM crops with built-in pest, weed, and disease resistance as helpful only for wealthy farmers in industrialized nations, but developing countries could benefit tremendously from the adoption of GM crops. As much as 40% of conventional crop productivity in Africa and Asia is lost to insect pests, weeds, and plant diseases. But many of the same GM crops available in North America are already helping poor farmers in South Africa, India, China, and the Philippines combat often-voracious insects while reducing the amount of insecticides or eliminating them altogether. Indeed, studies of South African and Chinese cotton growers suggest that small farmers actually achieve disproportionately higher benefits from GM relative to larger competitors, because expensive machinery can at times be made obsolete. What's more, GM crops with added nutritional benefits—such as the much-touted golden rice and high-protein sweet potatoes—are likely to be available within a few years. Still, the EU moratorium persists after five long years despite copious evidence that genetic modification does not pose any risks that aren't also present in other crop-breeding methods. A review of 81 separate research projects conducted over 15 years and funded exclusively by the EU found that GM crops and foods are just as safe for the environment and for human consumption as conventional crops, and in some cases are even safer because the genetic changes in the plants are much more precise. Dozens of scientific organizations, including the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Health Organization, have studied GM techniques and given them a clean bill of health. And in December, the French Academies of Medicine and Science added their names to that growing list and called for an end to the moratorium. Some will claim that the EU is already set to end the moratorium just as soon as its new approval regulations and labeling and traceability rules are implemented by member nations. Why risk a consumer backlash at a time when the moratorium's end is within sight? But this naïve assertion overlooks four important facts. First, several EU members have already missed the first deadline for implementing the new GM rules, and debates still rage over the coexistence of GM, conventional, and organic crops. How close are they really to ending the moratorium? Second, even if implementation is ultimately completed, what is to prevent individual members from ignoring the EU-wide rules? The European Commission has been famously impotent in pressing Austria, Luxembourg, and Italy to accept GM products that have already been approved by the EU. Third, the new GM labeling and traceability rules are hardly an improvement on the current situation. Industrialized countries like the United States, Canada, and Australia may be able to comply. But for poor developing countries, the added cost and complexity of the labeling and traceability rules would only replace a de jure ban with a de facto one, shutting them out of the GM revolution for good. Fourth, special regulations based solely on the process used in a product's creation are just as illegal as a ban under the terms of international treaties signed and ratified by the EU. So, the new GM rules don't even serve to bring the EU into WTO compliance. Nor are they needed, since voluntarily labeled non-GM foods can be found in almost every shop in Western Europe, giving consumers choice. Interestingly, studies of consumer behavior show that, where labeled GM foods and labeled non-GM foods are available, even most European consumers seem to be indifferent to the "genetic status" of the goods they purchase. Indeed, the best possible scenario for all involved would be to end the moratorium immediately and genuinely expand consumers' ability to choose. The EU's blatant flaunting of scientific assessments is why a WTO challenge is likely to succeed. And the fact that less developed countries are most likely to benefit is why the United States should file it. A decision by the 140-member World Trade Organization would send an important signal from the international community that the EU's groundless and genuinely harmful biotechnology restrictions must go. Mr. Conko is director of food safety policy with the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington, DC. Mr. Prakash is professor of plant genetics at Tuskegee University in Alabama. The authors are also co-founders of the nonprofit AgBioWorld Foundation. |
ResponseI have read the article Time for the GM Moratorium to Go, by G. Conko and C.S. Prakash published in the Wall Street Journal (Europe), May 13, 2003. [At left] The article quotes, as many others do, that in India, poor farmers have benefited greatly from GM crops, in this case, Bt cotton. The article says, "But many of the same GM crops available in North America are already helping poor farmers in South Africa, India, China, and the Philippines combat often-voracious insects while reducing the amount of insecticides or eliminating them altogether". This is simply not true of India, and the authors know it. They are both familiar with the public debate on the Indian Bt cotton experience. Gregory Conko was present at a seminar I gave in IFPRI, Washington recently, where I presented results of a field study conducted by Gene Campaign, in two Indian states where Bt cotton was grown. This study shows that Bt cotton has performed very poorly in these states, pesticide use is only minimally reduced and these savings are not enough to offset the huge difference four to five times) in the price of seed. The Gene Campaign study shows that about 60 % of the farmers could not recover their investments and made losses. There are other reports which point in the same direction. Studies done by the FAO, Greenpeace and the Government of Andhra Pradesh (AP), show similarly poor performance. The AP state government has admitted that Bt cotton has not done well and they are seeking compensation from Monsanto for farmers who have suffered losses, as is Gene Campaign. The Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC), India's apex regulatory body has asked for a state wise review of why the crop has performed poorly. The Standing Committee on Agriculture, in the Indian Parliament has pronounced after seeing the data, that it "sees no merit in Bt cotton" because the performance did not match the exaggerated claims. The GEAC has since witheld approval for commercialising Bt cotton in the North Indian states after the poor experience in South India. Despite all this information floating on list serves and the media, Conko and Prakash, both well known biotechnology lobbyists, deliberately make a claim that is unsubstantiated and false. This kind of misinformation can be dangerous because it can influence policy makers to take decisions that could ultimately end up hurting the farmers. The Biotech lobby must draw the line somewhere and exercise some restraint in its promotional efforts.
Response from Andrew Apel (AgBiotech Reporter) Maybe it's time to call a spade a spade. Since eco-faminist Suman Sahai and the Gene Campaign are "in the business" of opposing modern agriculture, nothing associated with them is credible. If either admitted that facts are more important than hysteria, they'd be bankrupt by next Wednesday. I have to wonder if she or this group is funded by the European Union or members of the EU. All the activist groups involved in the Mexico Maize Mess were funded by Europeans, and with the US challenging the EU over its trade protectionism, it's time for the antis to come clean on who's paid for what. Those who don't already know that Europe pays activists to beat its trade-protection drum should visit http://www.consumerfreedom.com/headline_detail.cfm?HEADLINE_ID=1785 It's notable that the US is supported by a number of countries in its complaint against the EU, while the EU has no foreign supporters-- other than activist groups, many of them funded by the EU or its member states. After 9-11, anti-biotech violence became suspect, and diminished. With the US v. EU in the WTO case, the world will be equally suspicious of those who spout anti-biotech rhetoric. How pleasant to know Mr Apel - a profile
Andrew Apel is the editor of the biotech industry newsletter, AgBiotech Reporter. He is also one of C S Prakash's closest supporters. Apel used the Sept 11 attacks to put forward the view that critics of GM, like Dr Mae-Wan Ho and Dr Vandana Shiva, had "blood on their hands". With equal humanity and perception he wrote of the WTO meeting in Genoa (where the media reported brutal attacks by police on sleeping/peaceful demonstrators): "From everything I have seen, the police in Genoa never did anything other than defend themselves... Police are dangerous people, that is why they are hired for the job they have. Only a fool goes against them, and in Genoa many fools have received their due." Apel has also been at the forefront of attempts by GM lobbyists to use the resistance of countries in southern Africa to accepting GM-contaminated food aid, as a way of attacking biotech industry critics. Apel called on the U.S. to bomb Zambia with GM grain if it continued to reject it. On a discussion list Apel wrote of the crisis, "I can almost picture the darkies laying down their lives for the vacuous ideals... their death throes, how picturesque, among the baobab trees and the lions!" In October 2002, Monsanto's electronic newsletter, "The Biotech Advantage," carried the headline "Academics Say Africans Going Hungry Because of Activist Scare Tactics". The "activists" in question turned out to be the staff of a Catholic theological centre and a Zambian agricultural college who had expressed concerns about GM crops. Their "academic" attackers, by contrast, included Andrew Apel together with AgBioWorld's co-founders, CS Prakash and Greg Conko of the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
Many thanks to NGIN for sending the response and additional notes! |
|
If
you have come to this page from an outside location click
here to get back to mindfully.org |
