1.Government face GM legal threat
2.Blinded by the light of technology - Sue Mayer
3.Elliot Morley, UK Minister, in Kuala Lumpur - partially transcribed comments
4.Planting a GM future - a crop of pro-GM Guardian letters
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1.Government face GM legal threat
Sat 21 February, 2004 02:27
http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=462054§ion=news

LONDON (Reuters) - The government's plans to commercially grow genetically modified (GM) maize could face a legal challenge from environmental lobby group Friends of the Earth (FOE) who said testing had failed to rule out risks to human health and the environment.

"The only feeding study to look at the impact of feeding animals the whole plant was severely criticised for poor science...(and) other studies using the GM protein failed to show that the crop was safe," FOE said in a statement on Saturday.

"No feeding studies were carried out on cattle, the intended recipients of the GM maize," the statement added.

The government was engulfed in a fresh row about the technology this week amid claims it was poised to allow farmers to grow Bayer's gene-spliced maize variety T25/Chardon LL in spite of public opposition.

The maize is a fodder crop, intended for use for cattle feed only.

FOE also said it was urging the government to consult with regional authorities before making any announcement since they have to the power to block any move to have the crops grown commercially.

Before any particular crop can be grown, it needs to be added to the UK National Seed List -- and this requires the consent of regional parliaments in both Wales and Scotland.

"This maize has not been shown to be safe and it should not be grown commercially," FOE spokeswoman Clare Oxborrow said.

A three-year trial of three herbicide-resistant GM crops found that pesticides used on two of them -- sugar beet and rapeseed -- posed a greater threat to the environment than those used on conventional crops.

Only T25/Chardon LL maize fared better.

But environmentalists said results for this type of GM maize were skewed, mainly because the herbicide used on the neighbouring conventional crop has since been banned.

Proponents of technology argue that GM crops could benefit the environment through reduced pesticide use, while farmers gain by growing better-yielding varieties.
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2.Blinded by the light of technology
The Guardian, 20 Feb 2004
http://www.guardian.co.uk/gmdebate/Story/0,2763,1152693,00.html
Science plays a disproportionately large role in the government's thinking on GM crops, argues Sue Mayer
by Sue Mayer

Many people are probably wondering why the government bothered to hold a public debate on GM crops and foods last year.  Reading the leaked minutes of last week's Cabinet Office committee meeting makes it seem as though the public debate findings are being used to inform the government about what opposition it has to overcome, and how it might wear that down, rather than being a guide to policy.

Scientific authority is brought in to justify going forward with plans to grow GM crops, despite public anxieties. But, if the science is so convincing, why should the public's views matter? And isn't the government right to take the scientific path?

For many years, politicians have used the authority of science to support their actions. Basing this authority on the "facts" and "independence" that science is supposed to bring to issues, political, social and economic judgments are apparently absent, giving us a purely rational decision-making basis.

However, as most people have become all too aware, science rarely deals in facts. It often has only a very restricted perspective, and is inevitably affected by political and social judgements. This is all too true in the case of GM crops.

It the UK, it is difficult to find senior plant molecular biologists who have not had some connection with the biotechnology industry. Ecologists have become thin on the ground, because the focus of science is at the molecular level and ecology does not perform well under the "wealth generating" criterion of our science policy.

Only a public furore led to the farm-scale evaluations (FSEs) of GM crops, and that knowledge would never have been gained without critical questioning by the public. In reality, we have an impoverished scientific base from which to judge the performance of GM crops.

While the government worries about how our science base would be affected by a decision not to proceed with GM crops, it has not evaluated the adequacy of science's depth and breadth or the implications of an intellectual and social bias towards a molecular view of the world.

The government, still blinded by the white light of technology, neglects these issues. It wants to be the friend of industry and maintain good relations with the US.

However, the public asks wider questions - and that is why it is so crucial that people's views should be heard and acted upon.

People see a lack of convincing evidence about the long-term impacts of GM crops, and have little confidence in the government or industry. They want to see clear benefits to offset any risks, and not just in economic terms to food producers. According to the public debate and the food standards authority's citizens' jury, people do not want commercialisation now.

The major reason given by the government for proceeding with growing GM herbicide-tolerant maize is that FSEs have shown it is better for farmland wildlife than conventionally grown maize.

The GM maize is tolerant to the weedkiller