Save our Seeds

NGOs have given a cautious welcome to the announcement that the European Commission has entered a “period of reflection” with regard to GMO crops and products. The “freeze” announcement, made by Food Safety Director Eric Poudelet of DG-SANCO at a meeting of the EU Petitions Committee on 3rd December, arises out of the intense public debate within Europe on the apparent chronic toxicity of GM food and Roundup residues in the food chain. Mr Pouldelet suggested that he and his colleagues had to be sensitive to public concerns and also mindful of the scientific debate arising from the publication of a recent paper by Prof Gilles-Eric Seralini and colleagues

The U.S. Justice Department has closed a formal antitrust investigation into the U.S. seed industry, which is led by crop biotechnology giant Monsanto Co., without pursuing charges, the government said Friday. [...] The Justice Department, along with the Department of Agriculture, conducted a series of workshops around the country in 2010 examining concentration in the seed, livestock, poultry and dairy markets. The highly-publicized workshops did not result in any major regulatory changes, and Christine Varney, who was the head of the Justice Department's antitrust enforcement at the time, has since left for the private sector.

Agribusiness giants Monsanto, DuPont and Dow are plotting the boldest coup of a global food crop in history. If their requests to allow a massive commercial planting of genetically modified maize are approved in the next two weeks by the government of outgoing president Felipe Calderón, this parting gift to the gene giants will amount to a knife in the heart of the center of origin and diversity for maize. The consequences will be grave – and global. With the approvals and December planting deadlines looming, social movements and civil society organizations have called for an end to all GM maize in Mexico. Mexico’s Union of Concerned Scientists (UCCS) has called on the Mexican government to stop the processing of any application for open-field release of GM maize in Mexico.

Animal rights activists in Germany are contesting three patents on genetically engineered chimpanzees granted this year by the European Patent Office (EPO) in Munich. One of the challenges was filed today; the other two will follow shortly, says Ruth Tippe, a spokesperson for a German advocacy group called No Patents on Life. “It is incomprehensible why the patent office would grant patents on these animals,” Tippe told ScienceInsider in a phone conversation minutes after filing papers with EPO to oppose the first of the three patents.

Claims about drug carrying genetically engineered tomatoes should be treated cautiously. Researchers fed the GM tomatoes to mice as a small part of a Western-style high-fat, calorie-packed diet. The study has not been peer reviewed or published in a scientific journal but its findings are being promoted as a way to “reduce global epidemic of heart disease”. [...] according to the Daily Mail; “Researchers hope to mass produce the GM tomato so it can be eaten around the world”. Dr Fogelman is no stranger to cashing in on his research. Some years ago his private company (presumably something he runs during the evenings and days off from his University job) secured a $200 million dollar deal with Novartis for another application of peptides.

Environmental groups alerted the public on Tuesday on the presence of genetically modified organisms in white corn, a staple in Visayas and Mindanao. Greenpeace campaigner Daniel Ocampo said that recently “contaminated” corn crops are incidental spawns of Bacillus thuringiensis corn, a variety known to contain GMOs, produced by processes supported by the Department of Agriculture. Bohol farmers reported the spread of GMOs in the soil where they grow white corn, and that such cross-pollination cannot be controlled, the group said.

The European Network of GMO-free regions is rapidly gaining new members. After the German states of Schleswig-Holstein and Saarland now Baden-Württemberg joined the alliance. Agriculture Minister Alexander Bonde (The Greens) officially signed the declaration yesterday.

"The only winners of agro-biotechnology are the big corporations. Presently threats to humans, animals or the environment through the use of genetically modified organism can´t be excluded," the minister said after the signing. Bonde announced that with joining the network he also wants to send a signal to the German federal government and the European Commission: "Federal states and regions need to get the opportunity to declare themselves GMO-free.”

The German states of Thuringia and North Rhine-Westphalia also belong to the European GMO free regions network. A total of 57 European regions and local authorities are now on board. They all officially abandon the cultivation of GMO on state-owned land. Since 2008, no more GMO crops have been cultivated in Baden-Württemberg.

During the past three days, Goldman Environmental Prize winner Sofía Gatica and Maria Godoy, both Argentinian activists and members of the group “Mothers of Ituzaingó”, have been travelling across Spain to expose the dangers of the cultivation of genetically modified soya and the use of glyphosate. Argentina is one of the biggest soy exporters in the world. They warned Spanish citizens - Spain being the first GM producer in the EU - that if herbicide-tolerant GM soya were cultivated in Spain, the social and environmental consequences would be unforseeable and irreversible. The events in Spain are part of a speakers tour across Europe which will end in Brussels, where Sofia and Maria will join the Good Food March today. In conferences and meetings with local groups in Córdoba, Madrid, Zaragoza and Barcelona, as well as through a wide range of media interviews, the two activists described the adverse health effects which Monsanto’s Roundup Ready soy has caused in their neighbourhood Ituzaingó near Córdoba resulting in a high number of cancer, malformations and miscarriages. In the Spanish city of Córdoba, around 80 people, amongst them farmers, neighbours and members of NGOs and organic consumption groups, gathered in the Orive Gardens and discussed strategies on how to avoid the cultivation of GM crops in Spain and worldwide. Sofia and Maria told the audience about the recent court sentence, which found one soy farmer and a pilot of a spraying plane guilty of contaminating the area. On Tuesday, coinciding with the international day against Monsanto, Sofia and Maria held a panel discussion in Zaragoza.

Farmers, agricultural engineers, consumers organisations and local citizens discussed the GM situation in the region of Aragón and the lack of a GMO free label in Spain. In Barcelona, more than 60 people came to hear the two activists, who called for a ban on GM soy into the EU. The discussion focussed on the lack of independent research regarding the health effects of GM crops and pesticide use.

Das Saarland will offiziell auf Gentechnik verzichten und dafür dem Europäischen Netzwerk gentechnikfreier Regionen beitreten. In den nächsten Wochen wird Umweltministerin Anke Rehlinger (SPD) die entsprechende Charta unterzeichnen, teilte eine Pressesprecherin dem Informationsdienst Gentechnik mit. Bislang sind von den deutschen Bundesländern nur Thüringen, Nordrhein-Westfalen und Schleswig-Holstein im Netzwerk vertreten.

Der Beitritt zu dem Bündnis ist für das Saarland „ein wichtiger Baustein in dem Bestreben, auch in Zukunft Gentechnik auf unseren Äckern zu verhindern“, erklärte Ministerin Rehlinger nach der entscheidenden Kabinettssitzung in einer Pressemitteilung. Das kleine Bundesland ist neben den Stadtstaaten Berlin, Hamburg und Bremen das Einzige, in dem bislang keine gentechnisch veränderten Pflanzen angebaut oder zu wissenschaftlichen Zwecken freigesetzt wurden. Diese Position wird nun weiter gestärkt.

Für Rehlinger können durch den Anbauverzicht möglichen Risiken durch die Gentechnik-Organismen verringert werden: „Die Auswirkungen des GVO-Anbaus auf die menschliche Gesundheit, auf unsere Umwelt, die biologische Vielfalt und die landwirtschaftliche Entwicklung sind noch nicht ausreichend erforscht. Wir können aber potenziellen Gefahren vorbeugen, indem wir auf gentechnikfreie Anbaumethoden setzen. Dies ist auch im Sinne der Verbraucherinnen und Verbraucher, die Umfragen zufolge mehrheitlich Gentechnik in Lebensmitteln ablehnen.“

Erst vor wenigen Wochen trat auch Schleswig-Holstein dem Netzwerk wieder bei. Das nördlichste Bundesland war 2003 an der Gründung desselben beteiligt gewesen, aber zwei Jahre später wieder ausgetreten. Momentan gehören dem Bündnis europaweit 56 europäische Regionen und örtliche Behörden an. Sie verzichten auf den Anbau von gentechnisch veränderten Pflanzen und setzen sich in der EU für die Verankerung der Gentechnikfreiheit ein.

In the first case of its kind in Argentina, the poisoning of people through the use of pesticides has been punished. Soya farmer, Francisco Parra, and pilot of pesticide-spraying aircrafts, Edgardo Pancello, were yesterday convicted of polluting the neighbourhood of Ituzaingó Anexo with glyphosate and endosulfan. Both were given conditional sentences of three years, along with community service. A third defendant, also a soy producer, was acquitted due to lack of evidence. In 2001, a group of community activists known as the Mothers of Ituzaingó started to document the high number of miscarriages, infant deaths and illnesses in the area. According to the public attorney, 169 of the 5,000 inhabitants of Ituzaingó Anexo died from cancer between 2002 and 2010. Following the verdict, one of the claimants, environmental activist Sofía Gatica, whose baby daughter died of kidney failure shortly after birth said “It is a historic sentence, but the fact that it is only a conditional verdict is a slap into the face for the victims.” Gatica was awarded the ‘Goldman Environmental Prize’ for her courage in the ten-year battle against pesticides earlier this year. In Argentina, 370 million litres of pesticides are used every year, especially on the soy fields where animal feed for Europe’s meat industry is produced. In September, Sofìa Gatica and Maria del Milagro Godoy will talk about their experiences at the GMO Free Europe Conference, as well as at different events taking place as part of a speakers tour across Europe.