British politicians will decide in the coming months if farmers in the United Kingdom can grow genetically modified crops.
They will be mulling over many of the same issues the Canadian agriculture community is wrestling with on the GM wheat debate. But there is another reason Britain is interested in the Canadian experience.
The country’s former minister of environment was in Saskatchewan last week, trying to get a handle on how commercialization of GM canola has gone.
He came to one conclusion.
“It is impossible to achieve coexistence,” said Michael Meacher, in a news conference organized by the National Farmers Union and the Saskatchewan Organic Directorate.
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Meacher’s short time in the province convinced him there is no way to grow GM crops without affecting conventional or organic growers.
That is one of many considerations British Parliament must weigh before making its decision on GM crops, said Meacher, who served six years as a junior minister before being ousted in June from prime minister Tony Blair’s cabinet.
Some pundits say he was let go by Blair for his long-standing anti-GM stance. Meacher neither confirms nor denies that assertion.
He told reporters in Saskatoon that one of his biggest concerns with GM crops is the lack of science surrounding potential human health risks. To his knowledge, only one such test has been conducted, he said.
Biotechnology companies have instead relied on evidence that GM crops are no different from conventional crops in terms of nutrients, allergens and toxins. They use the “substantial equivalence” premise to prove their products are safe for human consumption.
“I think that is a profound fraud. It is a public scandal actually,” said Meacher.
He admits there is no proof that eating GM foods will cause illness, but said the substantial equivalence measure doesn’t prove they won’t.
“If I was a doctor and you said, ‘I’ve got this bad condition in my head.’ And I said, ‘Well we’ve got this new drug. We haven’t tested it but it’s substantially equivalent to other drugs you’ve been taking so pop it in your mouth and I’m sure you’ll be fine.’ Would you take it?”
Meacher is urging British Parliament to adopt a “precautionary principle” and spend more time studying the health effects of GM foods before allowing them to be grown in the United Kingdom.
A canola producer attending the news conference took issue with that stance. Fred Meister, vice-president of the Saskatchewan Canola Growers Association, said employing the precautionary principle is just a fancy way of saying no to GM crops.
“You can never prove zero risk,” said Meister.
There is uncertainty surrounding all types of food, but after seven years of growing and consuming GM canola in Canada, there is no proof it causes illness, said the Radisson, Sask., farmer.
“There is not one person in the entire planet who has been diagnosed as sick or dying because they ate GM food.”
Ray Hilderman, director of the Saskatchewan Canola Development Commission, reacted to Meacher’s comment that GM foods may be causing a surge in allergy problems.
“Can you name me one food that is non-GM that somebody would not be allergic to?” he asked the long-standing member of British Parliament.
Liability issue
Hilderman was upset by Meacher’s comment that biotech companies will have to accept liability for their products if something goes wrong, such as the contamination of organic crops by GM canola.
The Strasbourg, Sask., producer said liability issues can be a two-way street. He has nothing against organic producers but said weeds and insects from their crops can blow onto fields of conventional producers.
“Who accepts that liability?” he asked.
Meacher said that is a poor analogy because the organic producer can lose his accreditation and his livelihood if GM crops are found in his fields. Dealing with a few more weeds and insects won’t destroy a conventional farmer.
Talking to reporters after the news conference, both farmers stressed that herbicide tolerant canola has been an agronomic godsend, allowing producers to use fewer chemicals and to generate between five and 10 percent more net income than conventional canolas.
Meacher said that’s part of the problem. The benefits of biotechnology flow to producers, not consumers. If parliament allows British farmers to grow GM crops, British consumers should still have the ability to purchase 100 percent GM-free products, he said.
Meacher said the 0.9 percent labelling provision recently adopted by the European Union isn’t good enough for a country that was recently ravaged by bovine spongiform encephalopathy, a cattle disease that scientists assured consumers could not be passed on to them.
The scientists were wrong. That’s why Meacher said he wants more testing of GM crops and their effect on human health and the environment.
A decision on the commercialization of GM crops in Britain could come as early as this year, but likely won’t be made until the first part of 2004.
