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GMWATCH number 14 - monthly review (5/10/2003)

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GMWATCH number 14
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From Claire Robinson, GMWATCH editor
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Dear all,

The Royal Society (RS) are up to their old tricks again, coming over all indignant at the Guardian's coverage of the leaked results of the UK GM crop trials showing 2 out of the 3 GM crops trialed harmed wildlife. Such "speculation" should not have been published prior to the research's publication in the RS's journal, they say. The RS's righteous consciences seemed to take a holiday when they tried to rubbish Dr Arpad Pusztai's research showing harm from GM foods prior to its publication in The Lancet.

For those who missed the slew of overwhelmingly anti-GM media reports following the UK public debate, we are including links to the many related articles. The debate revealed that just 2% of people were happy to eat GM foods and 86% were not. What's more, the more people found out about GM, the more their attitudes hardened against it. The industry's only hope seems to be to contaminate the food supply beyond repair and oppose labelling. Pro-GMers could only reply to the debate results by complaining that the wrong sort of public were involved in the public debates and that the process was hijacked by the Women's Institute!

There's an important Campaign of the Month, which encourages President Lula of Brazil to hold to his previous stance that GM planting in Brazil is illegal. In his proposal to legalise GM soy plantings for this season, Lula appears to be caving in to industry pressure and side-stepping responsibility for prosecuting those farmers in the south of the country who have illegally planted GM seed.

Our new archive is at: http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive.asp

Claire Robinson <[email protected]>
www.ngin.org.uk

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CONTENTS
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RESISTANCE TO GM - VATICAN NEVER ENDORSED GM/NZ/JAPAN
REPORT OF THE MONTH: ROYAL SOCIETY AND CROP TRIAL SPECIAL
THIRD WORLD
GM CONTAMI-NATION - RESISTANCE, REPORTS & EVENTS IN UK
WTO
ENVIRONMENT
PHARMING
EUROPE
FOOD SAFETY
CORPORATE TAKEOVER OF GOVERNMENT
GM ANIMALS
COMPANY NEWS
CAMPAIGN OF THE MONTH: STOP BRAZIL GIVING WAY ON GM SEED
SUBSCRIPTIONS

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RESISTANCE TO GM
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VATICAN NEVER ENDORSED GM
The Vatican never endorsed GMOs, a Philippine Catholic outfit has said. "(The) government's claims that the Pope has endorsed GMOs are unsubstantiated and premature," the National Secretariat for Social Action (Nassa), social action arm of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), said in a statement issued on Oct. 1 in which they point to the strong anti-GM sentiments in Episcopal conferences across Asia, Africa and parts of Europe.

As early as last July 19, the Nassa wrote to Archbishop Renato Martino (who has long been making pro-GM statements, implying that he has the backing of the Catholic Church in doing so) informing him of Nassa's concern over the supposed endorsement of GMOs by the council.

"In reply, Archbishop Martino noted the validity of Nassa's arguments about GMOs' being anti-poor," said the CBCP-Nassa. Martino then requested the CBCP-Nassa to substantiate its arguments with evidence. In response, the CBCP-Nassa mobilized its diocesan social action centers, which have since been documenting farmers' experiences with Bt-corn seeds planted in pilot farms.

CBCP-Nassa stressed that it stands by its convictions that "GMOs subvert people's right to food" and this, it said, is "a human rights violation that arises from the patenting of GMOs as mandated by the World Trade Organization." 
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=1552

GMWATCH wonders if, given the increasing media speculation over the Pope's health (he suffers from Parkinson's and some reports say he also has cancer), certain elements within the Catholic Church are taking advantage of the perceived absence of strong leadership.

JAPANESE WARN U.S. ITS MAIN WHEAT MARKET COULD BE DESTROYED:
The premier export market for American wheat could be destroyed if the US approved production of a GM variety of the commodity, a Japanese industry official said this week. In the year that ended March 31, Japan bought nearly 2.5 million tonnes of U.S. wheat, slightly more than half of its import needs.  A Japanese government-sponsored survey conducted a few months ago, showed that almost 68% of consumers opposed GM wheat. In May, a group of South Korean wheat millers visited the US and delivered a similar message in opposition to GM wheat.
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/22173/story.htm

NEW ZEALAND: PROTEST GROWS AS END NEARS TO GM BAN ON PLANTS AND ANIMALS
As the end of a two-year ban on planting genetically engineered crops in New Zealand looms, this nation that prides itself on its pristine environment is turning into a hothouse of opposition to manipulated plants and animals. From eco-warriors threatening to tear up crops to concerned mothers stripping to their bras in Parliament, people across this nation of 4 million are boldly seeking new ways to articulate their opposition.
Read on at
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=1555

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REPORT OF THE MONTH: ROYAL SOCIETY AND CROP TRIAL SPECIAL
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ROYAL SOCIETY ATTACKS MEDIA SPECULATION ABOUT GM SCIENTIFIC PAPERS
The Royal Society has attacked 'The Guardian' newspaper for putting its own "commercial interests" ahead of the public good by publishing a speculative article about the contents of scientific papers due to appear in one of the Society's journals.

In response to publication of the front-page story 'GM crops fail key trials amid environment fear', Stephen Cox, Executive Secretary of the Royal Society, said: "Last week's report on the GM public debate stressed that the public wants 'confidence in the independence and integrity of information about GM - the assurance that it does not reflect the influence of any group with a special interest for or against GM'. We believe that the information in this speculative article, which The Guardian describes as 'a serious setback to the GM lobby', flies in the face of this plea from the public...

"This attempt by The Guardian to summarise in a soundbite the entire contents of the eight scientific papers has not been checked for accuracy by either the authors of the papers, who carried out the farm scale evaluations, or the journal. ... The article in The Guardian is wrong about the publication date of the scientific papers, even though that information was made public three weeks ago, and misrepresents the journal's reasons for rejecting a ninth paper about the farm scale evaluations. You can draw your own conclusions about how accurate the rest of the article is likely to be."
http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/templates/press/showPressPage.cf

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