Monsanto May Drop GE Wheat Due to Farmer & Consumer Opposition

GM WATCH daily
http://www.gmwatch.org
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An increasingly-desperate Monsanto's latest pressure tactic for getting out
of its GM wheat impasse is to order wheat farmers to CHOOSE IT OR LOSE IT!
(1st item)

Now we'll see how many industry-guided groups are prepared to see their
wheat growers lose their markets. (see 2nd item).
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http://www.forbes.com/home_asia/newswire/2004/01/24/rtr1225771.html
Monsanto may drop GMO wheat without grower backing
Reuters, 01.24.04, 6:50 PM ET
By Carey Gillam

ATLANTA, Jan 24 (Reuters) - U.S. wheat industry leaders must fully embrace
Monsanto Co's (nyse: MON - news - people). planned genetically modified
wheat and assist the company in gaining market acceptance or the leading
biotech developer may abandon its wheat research efforts, a Monsanto
official said on Saturday.

"If full farmer support is not pledged, "that could be construed as shifting
our focus to other crops," said Monsanto's director of wheat industry
affairs, Michael Doane.

"As we look at our business initiatives and our scarce resources ... we need
to understand the level of farmer support," Doane said.

He made his comments at a meeting with top wheat industry players at the
industry's annual convention in Atlanta.

The request by Monsanto was also spelled out in a letter given to officials
of the farmer-controlled National Association of Wheat Growers, and to U.S.
Wheat Associates, which handles international marketing for U.S. wheat.

The letter asks that for "public acknowledgment of your full support for the
timely de-regulation and commercialization of Roundup Ready wheat;" "strong
alignment" in support from "state and allied constituents;" and asks that
farm leaders develop and execute a strategic plan to "satisfactorily address
public acceptance issues" in the U.S. and abroad.

Public acceptance for biotech wheat has been a hot-button issue as Monsanto
has moved forward with regulatory applications for what would be the world's
first genetically modified crop primarily used for human food.

U.S. Wheat Associates officials have repeatedly warned that many top foreign
buyers of U.S. wheat have threatened to stop buying from the United States
if a biotech wheat is brought to market.

Opposition is particularly strong in the European Union, which bought more
than $220 million of U.S. wheat in 2002.

Domestic millers and other American users of U.S. wheat have also expressed
reservations about buying Monsanto's biotech wheat, which has been
genetically altered to resist applications of Monsanto's Roundup herbicide.

"I understand where Monsanto is coming from. ... At some point you have to
decide whether or not you consider funding research," said Lance Hagen,
executive director of North Dakota Grain Growers Association. "But they have
to understand where growers are coming from, too."

Duane Grant, a member of a wheat industry biotech committee that has been
monitoring Monsanto's plans, said there were concerns that had to be
addressed before the industry could fully partner with Monsanto.

"I'm not comfortable saying I'm ready to go arm in arm with Monsanto," Grant
said. "We have to be careful not to let our policies get dictated around a
specific product."

Doane said the company was not asking growers to do anything more than it
had asked of soybean and corn growers when it introduced biotech products to
those producers.

"We have a pipeline that is very full right now and a lot of those
applications are in crops other than wheat," Doane said. "We need a timely
response."

Copyright 2004, Reuters News Service
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http://archive.greenpeace.org/geneng/highlights/food/gewheat_annex1.htm
Statements from major importers of Canadian wheat opposing GE (or GM) wheat

hese statements of opposition from importers of North American wheat come
from news reports.

1. NORWAY: "We will never be in the market for it," said Kjetil Gran
Bergsholm, a trader at Norwegian importer StakornS.We have to listen to our
customers, and they don't want GM wheat. If the U.S. goes ahead with this,
we'd have to turn to Canada and Kazakhstan to get those supplies." (Greg
Frost, Reuters, Feb. 2, 2001)

2. BRITAIN AND IRELAND: According to Alexander Waugh, director-general of
British and Irish millers' association NABIM, his group is scheduled to meet
Monsanto in the coming weeks to discuss its GM wheat proposal. "The reality
is that for the time being, our customers in Europe don't really want
anything genetically modified, and it's difficult to see that changing in
the near futureS.UK millers have regularly pressed Monsanto that for
genetically modified crops to have any marketing potential, they have to
offer consumers a benefit. Personally, I don't think Roundup Ready offers a
lot to consumers." (Greg Frost, Reuters, Feb. 2, 2001)

3. BRITAIN: According to The Western Producer (February 8, 2001), "A
prominent British bakery that buys wheat from Manitoba and Saskatchewan
farmers may ban the use of Roundup as a desiccant. Warburtons wants to keep
genetically modified wheat out of its identity preserved contract program
run through the Canadian Wheat BoardS.Bob Beard, purchasing director for
Warburtons, said the test that will be used to screen out Roundup Ready
wheat will also identify wheat on which Roundup has been sprayed as a
desiccantS.he said it's critical for Warburtons to make sure its customers
perceive the bakery's bread as being GM-free." (Note: Beard went on to say
that he believes GM food is a decade to a generation away from acceptance in
the United Kingdom.)

4. EUROPE: An unnamed purchaser at a large northern European miller said,
"Our customers -supermarkets, bakeries and the like - they're not ready for
it," noting European shoppers were increasingly aware of what went into the
products they buy. (Greg Frost, Reuters, Feb. 2, 2001) According to another
web media report, "Jef Smidts of Andre & CIE Antwerp, a European importer
and trader of U.S. wheat, wrote in a letter: 'We are absolutely convinced
that the European miller will abandon GMO (genetically modified organism)
hard red spring wheatSGMO wheat for sure will be a market destructor.'"
(Cropchoice News, www.cropchoice.com, March 12, 2001). In the same article
it was reported that "Another letter came from Julian Watson of Rank Hovis,
one of the largest EU millers. It said: 'So that you are completely clear on
Rank Hovis's policy toward GM wheat. We do not want any level of such grain
in our supplies from you. To date, we have been able to say to our customers
that GM wheat has not yet been brought to the market. This now needs to be
backed up with preventative actions. Please advise us of what steps you have
taken to ensure that GM wheat is prevented from entering or commingling with
wheat in the entire spring wheat supply chain. You should treat this issue
with the utmost gravity and priority given that the alarm generated by even
the perception that spring wheat may contain GM traits, could be enough to
jeopardize the entire export programme to the EU.'" (Cropchoice News,
www.cropchoice.com, March 12, 2001).

5. UNITED KINGDOM: According to this AP story by farm writer Philip Brasher
(Feb. 17/01), "SU.S. Wheat was notified earlier in January by Britain's
biggest miller, Rank Hovis Ltd., that it would not accept 'any level' of
biotech wheat." In another story, "A European grain market representative
gave the meeting a feel for how deeply sentiments run against bioengineered
crops on the Continent. 'We don't want GM wheat,' said Jim Shine, wheat
importer for United Kingdom-based food group Rank Hovis McDougall."
("Monsanto seeks to ease biotech wheat concerns", (Carey Gillam, Reuters,
February 21, 2001). 6. BELGIUM: According to this AP story by farm writer
Philip Brasher (Feb. 17/01), "SU.S. Wheat was notified earlier in January by
Britain's biggest miller, Rank Hovis Ltd., that it would not accept 'any
level' of biotech wheat. This month, U.S. Wheat received a similar letter
from a Belgian company, Andre & Cie SA, that supplies American wheat to
mills across EuropeS.The Japanese millers association also said recently
that it does not want the wheat.

7. JAPAN: "Japanese flour millers say that efforts by Monsanto Co. to bring
a genetically modified (GM) wheat to market could lead Japan to stop buying
U.S. wheat, the U.S. Wheat Associates trade group said on Thursday. Board
members of the Japan Flour Millers Association (JFMA) adopted a position
statement at their monthly meeting held on Wednesday that outlined their
concerns about GM wheat, according to a report sent by the Wheat Associates'
country director in Japan to the group's Washington headquarters. ' Japanese
consumers are highly suspicious and skeptical about safety of GM farm
products, which may be hazardous to human health and environment,' the JFMA
statement said. 'Under the circumstances, flour millers strongly doubt that
any bakery, noodle and confectionary products made of GM wheat or even
conventional wheat that may contain GM wheat will be accepted in the
Japanese market,' it said. 'The flour milling industry will not use any raw
ingredients that will be unacceptable to consumers,' it said. The JFMA is
comprised of 36 large flour millers who have more than 90 percent of the
total wheat market share in Japan." (Reuters, Feb. 22, 2001). In another
news report: "Tsutomu Shigota, senior managing director of the Japan Flour
Millers Association, earlier this month told Dow Jones: 'Under the
circumstances, I strongly doubt that any bakery and noodle products made
from genetically modified wheat or even conventional wheat that may contain
modified wheat will be accepted in the Japanese market. World wheat supply
has been abundant in recent years, and I don't see why we have to deal with
modified wheatS.I believe the production of modified wheat at this time will
be a very risky challenge for U.S. producers.'" (Cropchoice News,
www.cropchoice.com, USA, February 2, 2001) Also from Japan: "With the corn
problems still ongoing, earlier this week a Japanese customer expressed
strong reservations to the U.S. wheat industry about GM wheat prospects
there, adding to a long list of negative comments and concerns that have
been recorded from many countries, according to U.S. Wheat Associates, which
markets U.S. wheat internationally." (Carey Gillam, Reuters, Feb. 1/01).

8. ALGERIA: On Jan. 5, Algeria, which imports large amounts of durum wheat
from the United States, announced that it would not import any genetically
modified wheat. Egypt and Saudi Arabia are taking a similar tack with
respect to wheat. (Cropchoice News, CropChoice.com, USA, February 2, 2001)

9. ITALY: "Canada has, according to this story, told its wheat exporters
that Italian buyers are worried over possible contamination of supplies by
genetically modified (GM) grain. The story says that a Foreign Ministry
website, entitled Canada-Italy Strategic Business Plan 2000-2001, said,
'Fears towards possible contamination by Canadian GM-wheat are rapidly
spreading and pose a potential threat.' The report on www.infoexport.gc.ca
was quoted as adding, 'Given the situation in Italy, with (leading farmers'
group) Confagricoltura promising consumers to use only GM-free wheat,
attention and effort should be directed to this subject.'"(David Brough,
Reuters, January 3, 2001)

10. INDONESIA AND MALAYSIA: "Within the last month two more major customers
- Indonesia and Malaysia - have told the wheat board [i.e., the Canadian
Wheat Board] they don't want GM wheat in their imports from Canada, joining
others like Japan, the United Kingdom, Italy and Algeria." (The Western
Producer, January 18, 2001)

11. FRANCE: According to a PRNewswire story (Paris, 2/26/01) reporting on
the 9th annual AGROGENE Seminar on Genetic Traceability in Paris, France on
February 22, "Perhaps the GMO concern for U.S. farmers was best summarized
by a representative of the largest wheat miller in France who told the
seminar attendees that in 2003 GMO spring wheat will be introduced in the
U.S. and in 2004 France will stop buying Dark Northern