from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:

There's a whole heap of craziness this week along with an iota of sanity. Dealing with the craziness first, an ancient GM WATCH prediction has come true: Monsanto is now charging royalties on GM contamination (THE AMERICAS). Such a great idea - making money on a product even if nobody wants to buy it. And Ventria BioScience found it didn't have to flee to the third world after all to plant its pharma rice. After being run out of California and Missouri, Ventria was welcomed by North Carolina, which now has 75 acres of the stuff.

Back in the world of the sane, the environment section of the EU Commission has blocked all new GM crop applications for Europe. And a 22-year study at the remarkable Rodale Institute has shown that organic farming produces the same yields of corn and soy as conventional farming, but using less energy and no pesticides! Why has this study been utterly ignored by the media (as if we didn't know)?

Claire [email protected]
www.gmwatch.org / www.lobbywatch.org

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CONTENTS
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G8/AFRICA/IRAQ/LONDON BOMBINGS
OTHER AFRICA NEWS
EUROPE
ASIA
THE AMERICAS
AUSTRALASIA
LOBBYWATCH
FOOD SAFETY
ORGANICS
CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK

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G8/AFRICA/IRAQ/LONDON BOMBINGS
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+ G8 CREATES "DISASTER FOR THE WORLD'S POOR
Responding to the outcome of the G8 summit, World Development Movement (WDM) Head of Policy, Peter Hardstaff said:

"The final communique is an insult to the hundreds of thousands of campaigners who listened in good faith to the world leaders' claim that they were willing to seriously address poverty in Africa. More importantly it is a disaster for the world's poor. The agreements on trade, debt, aid and climate change are nowhere near sufficient to tackle the global poverty and environmental crisis we face.

"We are furious, but not surprised. Calling on the G8 to Make Poverty History this year was always a brave attempt to put aside 30 years of knowledge of G8 failures and suspend our disbelief at the notion that the countries responsible for causing so much poverty could become the solution.

"A historic breakthrough was promised, instead we saw a tiny step. The deals on debt and aid fall way short of what is needed to achieve global poverty reduction targets and on trade it's business as usual as the G8 attempt to bulldoze more liberalisation out of the poor. These tiny sums of money are nothing more than a sticking plaster over the deep wounds the G8 are inflicting by forcing failed economic policies such as privatisation, free trade and corporate deregulation, on Africa."
***
"...not a word about the agricultural subsidies in the European Union and the United States that make competition so tough they are crippling African farmers and their produce in their own land."
- Sunjay Sury, Inter Press Service
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5476
***
"...nothing changed, absolutely nothing changed [from the initial proposals made by the G8 leaders.] The G8, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank have once again left the poor countries in the dirt. It's yet another crime against these countries."
- Lawyer Amadou Tieoule Diarra, president of Mali's Justice and Human Rights League
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5486
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"We can't blame only the Americans. While Bush's team has been as obstructive as possible [at the G8 on climate change], the UK has scarcely been doing the work of angels. Like Bush, Blair will contemplate anything except restraining the people who are killing the planet."
- George Monbiot
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5486

+ KEY GM FOOD ADVOCATES OPPOSE THE KYOTO TREATY
The key promoters of GM food also have websites that attack the Kyoto treaty on global warming. Robert Vint's analysis, though written 5 years ago, continues to be remarkably relevant, as is shown by the recent G8 meeting where Bush was happy to promote GMOs but opposed taking action on climate change.

An interesting point is that when it comes to GM crops these lobbyists accuse their critics of not kowtowing to what they claim is the scientific consensus. When it comes to climate change, they reverse this and attack people as cowardly for not daring to challenge the scientific consensus!
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5473

+ GM AND IRAQ
Superficially, Iraq and GMOs may seem a world apart. But consider what Professor Guy Cook has to say in his brilliant book on the arguments, metaphors, word choices and analogies deployed to promote GM - 'Genetically Modified Language':

"Both for opponents and proponents [of GM], issues relating to these wars ['against terrorism'/Iraq] and the GM debate often seem to be part and parcel of the same thing. An obvious reason is that both campaigns - for GM food and against Iraq and terrorism - were launched in the USA, both were the occasion for bitter disagreements with Europe, and both gave rise to concern about US policy and motives. Opponents of US policy in the Gulf saw the campaign as an a