Gene-Altered Rice Laced with Pharmaceutical Diarrhea Drug Stirs Up Widespread Opposition
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Farm Policy Newsletter, June 5, 2006
Straight to the Source
Associated Press writer Paul Elias http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-ventria6jun06,0,6639897.story reported today at the Los Angeles Times webpage that, "In its quest to genetically engineer rice with human genes to produce a treatment for childhood diarrhea, tiny Ventria Bioscience has made an astonishing number of powerful enemies spanning the political spectrum.
"Environmental groups, corporate food interests and thousands of farmers across the country have succeeded in chasing the company's rice farms out of two states. And critics continue to complain that Ventria is recklessly plowing ahead with a mostly untested technology that threatens the safety of conventional crops grown for the food supply.
"'We just want them to go away,' said Bob Papanos of the U.S. Rice Producers Assn. http://www.usriceproducers.com/ 'This little company could cause major problems.'
"Ventria, with 16 employees, practices 'biopharming,' the most contentious segment of agricultural biotechnology because its adherents essentially operate open-air drug factories by splicing human genes into crops to produce proteins that can be turned into medicines."
The A.P. story went on to point out that, "U.S. rice farmers in particular fear that important overseas customers in lucrative, biotechnology-averse countries such as Japan will shun U.S. crops if biopharming is allowed to proliferate. Exports account for 50% of the rice industry's $1.18 billion in annual sales."
Elisabeth Rosenthal, in an article datelined from Athens, which was published in today's New York Times, reported that, "In this famously fractious country, there is one thing on which almost all Greeks agree: They do not want genetically modified crops grown, sold or eaten here.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/06/business/worldbusiness/06gene.html
"'All political parties are opposed,' said Theodore Koliopanos, a legislator and former deputy environment minister, 'which is odd because we disagree on everything else.'
"Greece and a few other countries in the European Union that have banned genetically modified organisms are on the front lines of a war over the future of modified food in Europe, the only large swath of the world that does not already grow or buy the crops. Facing international pressure and a lawsuit brought by the United States, Canada and Argentina at the World Trade Organization, the union said this year that all member states must open their doors to genetically engineered crops and prepare practical and legal regulations to ensure safety for health and the environment.
"But five countries have imposed eight different types of bans. Many others use their votes in Europe's Council of Ministers to block the crops from entering."
In a separate article, also published in today's New York Times, Elisabeth Rosenthal reported that, "For eight years, Spain was the only country in the union to permit commercial cultivation of genetically modified crops. But in the last 18 months, the European Commission has approved 11 genetically modified seeds for planting in the union, and in 2005, France, Germany, Portugal and the Czech Republic began planting small commercial plots.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/06/business/worldbusiness/06geneside.html
"In the United States, the vast majority of large commercial farms plant genetically modified crops, like corn or soy, and there is no general effort to distinguish those from nonbiotech crops and foods in farming or food processing.
"But the cornerstone of the European Union's new open-door policy is the political conviction that it is possible for genetically altered crops and conventional crops to coexist separately within Europe with proper safeguards, like keeping a distance between fields and imposing a liability system for accidents.
"Scientifically, there are strong disagreements about whether 'coexistence' is possible, at what cost and even how it should be defined."
