| WEEKLY WATCH number 220 (15/6/2007) | |
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WEEKLY WATCH number 220 Dear all: The big story this week is that EU ag ministers have decided to allow up to 0.9 percent GM contamination in organic food. The problem is that many people who buy organic food rely on the organic label to indicate a GM-free status. (EUROPE) Claire [email protected] ------------------------------------------------------------ TECHNO UTOPIANISM ------------------------------------------------------------ + DOES THE KNOWLEDGE-BASED BIO-ECONOMY ADD UP? A lifeline for the industry has been public money and support from local and national politicians desperate to lure biotech companies to their neck of the woods. "This notion that you lure biotech to your community to save its economy is laughable," according to Joseph Cortright, a U.S. economist who co-wrote a report on the subject. "This is a bad-idea virus that has swept through governors, mayors and economic development officials." Now an incisive, and at times funny, critique of the gung-ho-for-GM BIO4EU report for the European Parliament has been published by BioscienceResource.org, which points the finger at technological utopianism. EXCERPTS: Experts do not have an entirely unblemished record of predicting the future of agriculture. In the 1950s it was envisioned that agriculture would be irrigated with water from icecaps that had been melted by nuclear explosions, this water (naturally) would be stored in ponds, also "dug" by nuclear explosions. In the 1970s another generation of experts were predicting an era of remote control tractors and multi-story farms. Electromagnetic ploughing would prepare the soil for crops that would require only half an inch of recycled water per year and specially coated seeds would be blasted from pipes into crop-specific patterns channelled by underground magnetism. More recently, official predictions of the future have been more biological in character and centred on the "knowledge-based bio-economy" (KBBE). [In the BIO4EU report] ... outcomes of biotechnology that can be construed as positive are explored in some detail while outcomes of biotechnology that are, might be, or might become, less than positive in their consequences, are sidelined or ignored ... On economic issues also, BIO4EU sometimes pushes the envelope of optimism to breaking point... Including GMO detection in a list of economic benefits seems no different to arguing that crime has benefits since it boosts the economy by increasing the need for police officers and prisons. ...the difficult part of futurism is not imagining technical possibilities but the factoring in of the inevitable confounding influences imposed by legal, social, cultural, economic and biological realities that collectively determine the course (and value) of technological uptake. These factors are not mere details that can be ignored. John Gray, the English political philosopher, has proposed that a fundamental characteristic of western thought is "technological utopianism", the belief that we will eventually attain a heavenly state of social and economic bliss in which all our needs will be painlessly met through technology. This belief, he suggests, is essentially irrational, in that it is supported by neither science nor history. He would find nothing to contradict his thesis in BIO4EU. ------------------------------------------------------------ + IRELAND AIMS TO BECOME A GMO-FREE ZONE + MINISTERS OPEN DOOR FOR GMOs IN ORGANIC FOOD Environmental groups criticised the decision as it goes against the principle of consumer choice. Organic farming is the most competitive and environmentally friendly agricultural sector. In Europe it is creating new jobs and has wide public support. Helen Holder of Friends of the Earth Europe said: "Now that the EU has declared traces of genetic contamination in organic crops acceptable, organic farmers will find it increasingly difficult to keep their crops GM-free. The EU |
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