The reappointment of Sir John Krebs as the head of the UK's Food Standards Agency (FSA) is nothing if not controversial given that, 'There is a strong consensus amongst consumer and environment organisations that the published views and statements of the FSA and its Chair are indistinguishable from those of the pro-GM lobby and do not properly represent public health and consumer interests.' (from item 2 below)

1.Sir John Krebs reappointed as Chair of Food Standards Agency
2.Sir John Krebs - a GM Watch profile
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1.Sir John Krebs reappointed as Chair of Food Standards Agency
Thursday, 12 February 2004
Ref: 2004/0463

Sir John Krebs, current Chair of the Food Standards Agency, has been reappointed for a further four-year term by the Secretary of State for Health, John Reid and the appropriate devolved authorities (Scottish Ministers, National Assembly for Wales, and the Northern Ireland Executive).

Sir John Krebs was first appointed as Chair of the newly-created Food Standards Agency on 24 January 2000, for an initial term of four years. On hearing the news of his reappointment, Sir John said:

'I am delighted to be given this opportunity to continue my role as Chair of the Food Standards Agency for another four years. I am extremely proud to have been involved in helping establish the Agency on a firm footing and look forward to building on this achievement in the future.'

Notes to Editors:

Sir John is an internationally renowned scientist. He holds a Royal Society Research Professorship in the Department of Zoology, Oxford University, where he is also a Fellow of Pembroke College.

Between 1994 and 1999, Sir John Krebs was Chief Executive of the Natural Environment Research Council. Sir John is a Fellow of the Royal Society, a member of Academia Europaea and of the Max Planck Society, an Honorary Foreign Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a Foreign Member of the American Philosophical Society. He has received numerous awards and honorary degrees for his scientific work.  

Sir John Krebs' reappointment runs from 24 January 2004 to 23 January 2008. He will continue to work for the Agency four days a week.
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2.Sir John Krebs - a GM Watch profile
http://www.lobbywatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=73&page=K (for all the links)

Sir John Krebs, the head of the UK's Food Standards Agency (FSA), is the son of Hans Krebs, the German biochemist who described the uptake and release of energy in cells (the Krebs cycle).  Sir John is a leading Fellow of the Royal Society and since 1988 has held a Royal Society Research Professorship in the Department of Zoology, Oxford University. His specialty is bird behaviour.

Between 1994 and 1999, Sir John was Chief Executive of the Natural Environment Research Council. He became the first Chairman of the UK Food Standards Agency in January 2000.

Sir John is also a co-founder and non-executive Chairman of Oxford Risk Research and Analysis Ltd (ORRA). ORRA's work includes research and advice on risk and decision making for the oil and pharmaceutical industries, as well as a wide range of other businesses. According to Krebs, 'History is littered with examples of companies that were too risk averse or saw risk as a threat rather than an opportunity.'

Before Sir John's appointment as head of the FSA, he had no  direct involvement with food safety or farming issues. However, he had, at the request of the Ministry of Agriculture Food and Fisheries (MAFF), designed the so-called  'Krebs experiments' to investigate whether badgers are responsible for the increasing incidence of TB in cattle. Krebs' approach - one which ignored the important role of cattle husbandry in the disease - was one already favoured by the vets within MAFF, leading some to see the experiments as symptomatic of Krebs' willingness to toe the MAFF line. The experiments are alleged to have lead to the slaughter of 20,000 badgers. In November 2003 the government decided to end a badger cull after it was found that cases of bovine TB in the trial area had actually increased by 27 per cent against a control area where badgers were not slaughtered.

If the experiments had made Krebs controversial even prior to his appointment, things have got worse since. On the day it was announced that he was becoming the first head of the FSA,  Krebs publicly endorsed GM food in a radio interview, saying all GM products approved for sale in the UK 'were as safe as their non-GM counterparts'.

But while Krebs was not prepared to reconsider the issue of approved GM foods, despite the high level of public concern, he quickly showed a willingness to tackle the issue of organic food which enjoyed a considerable degree of public confidence.  Appearing on BBC TV in August 2000, Krebs announced that consumers who were buying organic food were 'not getting value for money, in my opinion and in the opinion of the FSA, if they think they are buying extra nutritional quality or extra nutritional safety, because we don't have the evidence.'

The Times reported his comments as dismissing organic food as 'an image-led fad' (The Times, September 2, 2000, 'Organic produce attacked by food agency'). A month later Dr Patrick Wall, the chief executive of the Irish counterpart agency, the Food Safety Authority of Ireland, dismissed Kreb's views as extreme and reminded people to buy organic food because it was more 'environmentally friendly, more wholesome, and better produced'.

In March 2002, Krebs was again criticized on the organic issue. This time by John Paterson, a biochemist at Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary, for having attacked organic agriculture 'on the basis of very little information'. That autumn it was revealed that Krebs had been refusing to back the government's drive to promote organic food and farming, prompting the Environment Secretary to write to him to clarify his views. Sir John also admitted that comments he made that manure caused more air and water pollution than chemical fertilisers had been designed to undermine claims that organic farming is more environmentally friendly than conventional agriculture.

While Krebs brought a strongly sceptical, not to say combative,  tone to the FSA's treatment of organic food, his attitude to GM contrasted markedly. Even prior to