Press release - 16 October, 2003
Today a study published by the UK Royal Society substantiated Greenpeace's warnings that genetically modified (GM) crops can be harmful to the environment; this according to a three years study carried out by that independent scientific organisation. For years Greenpeace had warned about the risks GM crops pose to environment and challenged the benefit promises of industry as being myths.
Today, World Food Day, the UK Royal Society revealed the
conclusions of the UK Government's experiment with GM crops in
farm-scale trials. The results of these experiments clearly show
that GM rapeseed and GM beet can be harmful to the environment.
There are huge uncertainties about the negative effects.
"These trials were a political fudge that did not begin to
address the possible catastrophic effects of planting GM seeds
could bring about. But even within their limited scope the
conclusions clearly show that the alleged benefits of the use of GM
seeds do not exist. For years, the GM corporations have been
claiming that their crops would reduce weed killer use and benefit
wildlife. Now we know how wrong they are", said Dr. Doug Parr,
Science Director of Greenpeace UK.
In spring 1999, following widespread calls for a halt to the
development of genetically modified (GM) crops in the UK, the
Government launched a programme of farm-scale trials. The UK
Government did not believe that GM crops themselves presented any
direct threat to the environment and so the GM farm-scale trials
were not designed to consider environmental impacts, such as
genetic contamination or impact on soils (1). Despite the limited
scope of the study, it is clear that the use of GM seeds pose
significant risk to the environment.
Although the trials indicated that GM maize could benefit
wildlife there are doubts about the validity of these results
because the weed killer use on GM maize was compared with that of a
herbicide used on the conventional maize which is due to be banned
because of its toxicity and high environmental impact.
There are different approaches to meeting the demand for
environmentally sustainable agriculture. One example comes from
China, where efforts to achieve ecological farming show a possible
solution which governments should explore. Angus Lam, an expert in
ecological farming for Greenpeace China said: "The UK farm-scale
trial makes it clear that the world should close the door on GM for
good. GM food is not the solution to world hunger".
Today Greenpeace in China, together with around 80 other
institutions and organisations from Mainland China, Hong Kong and
Taiwan, launched the first Chinese Farming Solutions website (2),
which presents an array of successful ecological farming stories
from China. Greenpeace calls on governments to ban risky GM crop
trials and to support the real solution to world hunger.
Notes: (1). For detailed review and critique of the UK Farm Scale trial see http://www.greenpeace.org.uk(2). Chinese Farming Solutions website ( http://www.fschina.org ) in chinese, the successful ecological farming stories from China can also be found on http://www.farmingsolutions.org (English) the webpage is a joint project by GP, Oxfam, ILEIA and PAN Africa