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WEEKLY WATCH number 196 (13/10/2006)

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WEEKLY WATCH number 196
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from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:

UK supermarkets don't sell GM food and 18.5 million UK citizens live in self-declared GM-free zones but the big biotech companies are still trying to sneak GM into our food - by getting the Government to legalise GM contamination of our crops.

The Government is now asking us what we think, so please respond urgently by e-mail to the consultation because numbers matter and the deadline is 20th October.

Go to
http://www.stopgmcontamination.org where there's a 1 page model letter, and tell the Blair Government to keep our food and farming GM free!

Watch out too for our CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK.

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

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CONTENTS
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CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK
GM RICE CONTAMINATION SCANDAL
GM RICE FEST!
AUSTRALASIA
ASIA
AFRICA
THE AMERICAS
EUROPE

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CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK
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+ SAY NO TO GM WINE!
The South African campaign group SAFeAGE is calling for everyone to make South Africa's wine industry aware of the dangers from planned field trials of GM grapes in the Western Cape - the first application for a release of GM vines on the African continent.

Co-existance between GM and non-GM crops simply does not work. There are already 132 recorded cases of unintended contamination worldwide and some have had severe economic consequences for farmers, companies and exporters.   

Tell 'Wines of South Africa', which represents all exporters of South African wines, your opinion of the GM trials - just click the link below to automatically send an e-mail. It only takes a minute.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/p1temp.asp?pid=87&page=1

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GM RICE CONTAMINATION SCANDAL
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+ BIOTECH INSTILLS FEAR AND LOATHING IN CALIFORNIA RICE BELT
That was the title of an Associated Press piece this week about the economic impact on California's farmers of "a biotechnology blunder so disastrous that it prompted the rice industry's biggest export customer -- Japan -- to prohibit some varieties and threaten to ban all U.S. imports. The European Union is making similar threats because genetically engineered rice continues to turn up on grocery shelves in Europe."

Here are some quotes from the article:

"It has given everybody a new perspective on this technology and it's not positive." - Grant Lundberg, chief executive of Richvale-based Lundberg Family Farms, one of the state's biggest rice growers

"It's pretty much economic suicide to let genetic engineered rice creep into California and pose a contamination threat." - John Hasbrook of SunWest Foods Inc., California's largest rice miller

"If that happens, the California industry will evaporate." - Fourth-generation farmer Greg Massa
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7124

+ UK: STORES TOLD TO REMOVE GM RICE FROM SHELVES
The government's food watchdog has changed its advice to retailers about GM rice. Stores must remove any rice known to contain GM strains from their shelves, the Food Standards Agency said.

Selling products known to be contaminated with GM material is illegal in the UK, but the FSA previously told businesses that actively tracking down and removing contaminated rice products was unnecessary because they didn't pose an "imminent" health risk.

An FSA spokesman said today: "We are doing this because there is new information."

Friends of the Earth complained that the stepped-up advice had come too late.

FoE's Clare Oxborrow said: "The FSA should have issued this advice right from the start, instead of playing down the seriousness of the issue. The agency is still refusing to carry out any testing of rice on shelves and still failing to require retailers to carry out such testing themselves."
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7106

+ GERMANY FOUND ILLEGAL GM RICE FROM U.S., CHINA
German consumer protection authorities have said that they detected the presence of banned GM rice from the US and China in various food products.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7106

+ USDA SEEKS PUBLIC COMMENT ON DEREGULATION OF ILLEGAL GM RICE
The US Dept of Agriculture is seeking public comment on a petition to deregulate LL601 rice.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7106

+ CENTER FOR FOOD SAFETY COMMENTS ON "DEREGULATION"
An extremely useful critique of the current attempt to approve ("deregulate") LL601 in the US.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7119

+ JAPAN'S RICE TESTING STUNS INDUSTRY
California Rice Commission president Tim Johnson reacted with surprise and disapointment to the requirement from Japan's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries that US-origin short and medium grain rice and rice stocks be tested for the presence of Bayer's LibertyLink 601 rice.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=7106

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GM RICE FEST!
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+ GM RICE "PERFECTLY SAFE"
This week saw an international rice conference in India at which GM rice was repeatedly promoted without any reference to the FEAR AND LOATHING GM rice has been causing in the US rice belt.

Robert Zeigler, Director General of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), was busy punting GM rice on the sidelines of the conference.

Ziegler claimed China has already developed a GM rice variety that "is perfectly safe to consume".
But the rice in question contains a gene which "has not been approved for human consumption in any food crop", according to leading international scient

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