For Immediate Release

WASHINGTON approved the open field trial cultivation of a genetically engineered (GE) rice that contains human proteins, defying the US rice industry’s opposition to the trial and ignoring the economic impacts that would be caused by contamination of GE-free rice, Greenpeace said today.

The ‘cannibal rice’ is intended to produce drugs for alleviation of diarrhea and if contamination to rice food crops occurs, the effects could be disastrous.

“Crossing human genes into rice is bad enough, but to engineer drugs into a food crop and then release it into the environment, is completely insane,” said Jeremy Tager, Agriculture Campaigner with Greenpeace International.

Last year, almost half of the US rice supply was contaminated with several varieties of unapproved GE rice produced by Bayer CropScience – contamination that originated with field trials. It caused significant losses for the US rice industry.

The USDA still doesn’t know how or why the contamination occurred, but it spread all over the globe, resulting in major financial losses for the rice industry – US production of long grain rice, the type affected by the scandal, is expected to fall by 18% in 2006/7 with further declines expected in 2007/8.

Even more extraordinary, is that the USDA has not required an Environmental Impact Statement be prepared. In this case they are not only threatening the US rice industry but traders, processors and retailers all over the world.

“No one in the rice industry thinks using rice to produce drugs is a good idea,” said Doreen Stabinsky, Greenpeace GE campaigner currently attending the Rice Congress of the Americas in Cancun, Mexico. “In fact, the food industry as a whole considers it one of the stupidest ideas put on the table by the genetic engineering industry. But the USDA has been mindlessly approving these crops with no regard for the strong concerns raised by food producers, most recently rice growers and sellers.”

The GE industry has shown they are both completely unable and unwilling to prevent contamination. Food crops should never be used to produce drugs or industrial chemicals and drug-producing plants should be kept under lock and key in secured laboratories and not released into our environment.

Contacts:

Jane Kochersperger, Greenpeace, US on +1 202 680 3798

Dr. Doreen Stabinsky, Greenpeace (attending the America’s Rice Congress in Cancun) on +1 202 285 7398