from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:

A shocking example of how, far from wanting to feed the world, the biotech industry and its supporters shamelessly exploit human suffering for PR purposes is made clear by our story, "GM VULTURES FEED OFF AFRICA" (AFRICA section).

Don't miss two important CAMPAIGNS OF THE WEEK - one very urgent.

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

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CONTENTS
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ASIA
AUSTRALASIA
EUROPE
AFRICA
THE AMERICAS
GM ON THE FARM
PATENTS ON LIFE
CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK

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ASIA
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+ ASIANS CALL FOR BAN ON GM RICE
A coalition of 17 organisations from across Asia have issued a World Food Day (14 October) statement calling for a global ban on the introduction of GM rice.

"Rice is the world's most important staple food crop and we simply cannot allow a small number of biotech companies and GE scientists to determine the future of rice development," said Varoonvarn Svangsopakul of Greenpeace Southeast Asia. "GE rice is not a solution to world hunger. It poses unacceptable risks to health and the environment, as well as people's livelihoods."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5832
More Asian views on GM rice:
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5838

+ CHINA "MORE CAUTIOUS" ON GM RICE
China has been widely touted as the first country to give GM rice the green light. However, a recent shift in the State Agricultural Genetically Modified Crop Biosafety Committee indicates that China is taking a more cautious approach to approving GM crops. The structure of the new committee reduces the influence of GM crop researchers and makes it more likely that decisions about commercialising GM crops will be based on ecological and food concerns.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5850

+ SCEPTICISM OVER GM RICE CLAIMS
Crop researchers have voiced scepticism over claims that GM rice needs less pesticide than conventional varieties.

US and Chinese researchers published a paper in Science this April saying that farmers growing GM rice used 80 per cent less pesticide than those growing non-GM rice.

But in this week's issue of Science, several different researchers raise concerns over the findings, questioning the study's reliability, legality and financial implications.

Amongst the critics are K. L. Heong, from the International Rice Research Institute, and colleagues who argue farmers could well have been using less pesticide for their GM rice crops because they had decided beforehand that they would need fewer chemicals, not because they saw fewer insects.

Farmers tend to spray more insecticide than is needed to ensure all insect pests are wiped out, say Heong's team. Indeed, other research has shown that pesticide use can be reduced without reducing yields, and without the need for GM rice.
Letters, Science, Vol 310, Issue 5746, pp.231-233, Oct. 14, 2005.
http://www.sciencemag.org
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5842

+ CAMBODIA TARGETS ORGANIC MARKET
Cambodia is looking to diversify its sources of income - and one of the areas under consideration is organic farming. The government says it hopes the country could become the "green farm of Asia".
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5844

+ BANGLADESHI FARMERS BANISH INSECTICIDES WITHOUT GM
A 2004 article we've previously reported describes how 2,000 poor rice farmers, whose average farm income is around US$100 per year, proved that insecticides are a waste of time and money, and that they could significantly reduce the amount of nitrogen fertiliser they used. They also saved, on average, US$17 per year.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5842

+ IMPACT OF GM CROPS IN INDIA "DISASTROUS"
An article for Outlook India by KPS Gill, president of the Institute for Conflict Management, points to strong regressive trends in Indian agriculture, which should give pause, he says, "to those who are thinking of grand schemes for another wave of the Green Revolution on the back of the GM crops currently and aggressively being hawked by various multinational corporations - already with disastrous impact on farmers who have sunk deeper into debt in at least some areas where experimentation with these varieties has combined with adverse weather conditions to produce crop failure, indebtedness, pauperisation and, in many cases, eventual suicides."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5843

+ PESTICIDE-FREE VILLAGE IN ANDHRA PRADESH
EXCERPT from excellent article:
Symptoms of acute toxic poisoning in farm workers and ill effects due to long-term pesticide exposures are a common phenomenon in India, with abnormalities in newborn babies found in many villages. Chemical pesticides including Monocrotophos and Methyl Parathion, which are categorized as extremely hazardous by the WHO, are sold to farmers without restriction.

In an effort to deal with this problem, farmers in the Penta Srirampuram village in Andhra Pradesh have, over the last 3 years, successfully eliminated pesticides from their paddy fields. The farmers learnt how to cultivate without the use of toxic chemicals, controlling 'problem' pests by releasing specific beneficial insects onto their crops.

... During this period of change, some farmers in the village prepared to introduce spraying against 'leaf folder' which was then in its initial stage. Seeing this opportunity, the Agric