Papaya

Thai farmer in his orchard pointing to a traditional papaya variety called Khak Dam.

GE papaya poses unpredictable and unexpected risks with unknown consequences to the environment. When GE papaya was introduced five years ago in Hawaii the biotech industry said it was a 'solution' to the papaya ringspot virus problem. But instead it has caused serious environmental and economic problems for farmers in Hawaii.

The rejection of GE papaya in overseas markets has been devastating. The selling price of GE papaya has fallen to 30-40 percent below production costs, and the price that farmers get for their GE papaya is 600 percent lower than the price for organic papaya.

Farmers have also discovered that 'SunUp' GE papaya is more easily infected by new plant fungi and diseases like 'blackspot' fungus. This discovery came five years after GE papaya was approved for commercial growing. Now farmers must spray toxic chemical fungicides on their SunUp papaya plants every 10 days.

Some organic farmers have been forced to cut down all of their papaya plants because of contamination by GE papaya. GE papaya seed has contaminated seed supplies and cross-pollination of non-GE plants is widespread.

While GE papaya was proving a disaster in Hawaii, the same US scientists and companies worked with Thailand's Department of Agriculture and the Department of Science & Technology to develop GE papaya in Thailand. Backed by the global GE industry giant, Monsanto, which holds several patents on GE papaya, open-air field trials of GE papaya were carried out in several locations throughout Thailand. Now these corporate-sponsored scientists say that GE papaya is 'safe' and is ready for commercial growing by farmers.

However this was proven to be false when in July 2004 when Greenpeace publicly exposed a scandal involving the illegal sale of GE papaya seeds and the contamination of a farmer's papaya farm 60 kilometres away from the government's Khon Kaen station research station. Instead of investigating and stopping the spread of contamination, officials from the Department of Agriculture sat on the case. Although the government has now admitted that there was contamination it still has not announced any clean-up programme.

The European Union and Japan do not allow the import of GE papaya contamination therefore of papaya farms for export will have negative ramifications to the processed papaya export industry of Thailand. The consequences of growing GE papaya in Thailand are feared to be even more serious than Hawaii. Not only is green papaya eaten as a daily staple food, it is also grown everywhere - in farmers' fields, schoolyards and backyard gardens.

In-Depth:

Click here to see a map showing the spread of contamination in Thailand.

GE papaya scandal in Thailand

The Scent of GE Papaya

Patented Papaya

Precaution Before Profits - GE field trials put our environment, food and fields at risk.

Patented papaya - Extending control over food & fields

Hawaiian farmers warn Thai farmers about genetically engineered papaya: Don't do it!