The Guardian UK, 6th Nov 99

Three year pause to assess
effects of GM crops

GM food: special report
Paul Brown, Environment Correspondent
Saturday November 6, 1999

No genetically modified crops will be grown
commercially in Britain until at least the spring
of 2003, to allow time for a panel of independent
scientists to assess trial plantings and see
whether they damage the biodiversity of the wider
countryside, Michael Meacher, the environment
minister, said yesterday.

The agreement to hold off on commercial planting,
made jointly with the GM industry, is a victory
for the government's official advisers, English
Nature, and the environment lobby. They fear that
heavy doses of insecticide and herbicide used on
the GM crops will kill all other plants and
insects, and that GM crops may cross pollinate
with native plants.

The government had originally intended to press
ahead with commercial planting without any
research into the environmental effects, but the
outcry from the organic farming and green lobby
caused it to think again.

Mr Meacher is credited with finding a way out for
the government by introducing the idea of a
three-year programme of scientific trials to test
the effect of GM crops on the wider environment.
Yesterday he said it was a voluntary agreement
which would "help us make a judgment not only
whether there is a downside to the introduction of
this new technology, but also about any potential
benefits it will bring."

The trials will be held on spring and
autumn-planted GM oil seed rape, maize, and
possibly sugar beet. Plantings will be limited to
between 20 and 25 fields per crop, about 200
hectares, spread out around the country. The
scientific panel will supervise the planting and
the cordon sanitaire around the crops.

Mr Meacher said the sites of the trials would not
be secret but he would be dismayed if "misguided
activists seek to destroy these trial crops. They
will be destroying the evidence of the effect of GM
crops on biodiversity. If they believe that these
crops damage the countryside they should let the
facts be gathered. They will be shooting
themselves in the foot if they destroyed the
evidence which could get these crops banned."

At present, all the crops are destroyed when they
seed and are not used for commercial purposes
because no licences to use them as animal feed or
in food have been granted. Stephen Smith, a
spokesman for the GM companies, said if licences
were granted during the three years, strict
control would be exercised on how they were used.

However, anti-GM campaigners were still not
satisfied with the three-year trial period, seeing
it as paving the way for full-scale farming.

"This is insidious commercialisation. We are not
going to have directly commercially marketable
crops for three years, but what happens when the
hree years is up?" said Patrick Holden of the Soil
Association.

"The government's position seems to be that
'British biotech plc' needs to get a bite of the GM
cherry as quickly as possible because their fear
is that we will lose out on world markets."