Winnipeg businessman Kurt Shmon is clear about where he stands on Bill C-474, a bill that would require new genetically modified crops in Canada to undergo a thorough assessment of potential market damage before registration.”I am absolutely in favour of it,” said Shmon, a forage and turf seed exporter. “If Roundup Ready alfalfa is grown in Canada, it will cross-pollinate. It will cross-pollinate with feral alfalfa, the wild alfalfa in ditches, and it will cross-pollinate with other types of (non GM) alfalfa.”The ramifications of that are very plain and simple,” he said.”If we ship something to Europe that has a non-approved GMO seed in it, then that seed shipment comes back to Canada and we’re looking at the contract being cancelled.”Shmon said legislation that would protect Canada’s overseas markets from unapproved GM crops is critical to his future and to the future of agriculture in this country.His company, Imperial Seeds, exports millions of dollars worth of Canadian forage and turf seeds each year to buyers in North America and Europe.If transgenic crops such as Roundup Ready alfalfa continue to gain approval in Canada based on the criteria being used by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, then GM seed is bound to wind up in commercial non-GM seed supplies.”We’re hugely concerned about this,” he said.Shmon’s dilemma is at the heart of a complex debate about how and when Canada should register transgenic crops for commercial production.Proponents of transgenic crops say commercializing new GM crop varieties will increase production, boost producer profits and help Canada retain its position on the leading edge of varietal development and innovation. Approvals should be based on science alone, they say.But opponents note public opposition to GM crops is still widespread in Europe.Until that changes, assessing potential market damage should be a mandatory step in the registration of all GM crop varieties.For Shmon, the issue boils down to economics.About half of the seed his company exports is shipped to GM sensitive markets in the European Union.If those markets are lost, Canadian exports of forage and turf seed to the EU, a market worth roughly $23 million a year, will disappear.”There is no way to contain the (Roundup Ready alfalfa) gene once it’s out there,” says Shmon.”If we … proceed with GM alfalfa in Canada, the Europeans are going to go elsewhere for their seed production.”In the United States, the Supreme Court has been asked to rule on the legality of an injunction banning the sale and commercial production of GM Roundup Ready alfalfa.A lower U.S. court imposed the injunction in 2007 after groups opposed to its release successfully argued that the U.S. Department of Agriculture approved the crop illegally and failed to conduct a mandatory environmental impact study.Before the injunction was imposed, Roundup Ready alfalfa was grown on more than 250,000 acres by about 5,500 U.S. alfalfa producers.Alfalfa is the largest crop by area grown in the U.S., with an estimated 23 million acres in production each year across 48 states. The vast majority is fed to livestock.The Supreme Court is expected to rule on the case in the next month or two.For Shmon and the hundreds of Canadian alfalfa seed producers who grow alfalfa seed under contract, the implications of the U.S. ruling are huge.In Canada, Roundup Ready alfalfa has not been registered for commercial production but it could be imported and grown legally if the U.S. injunction is lifted, said Tim O’Connor, CFIA manager of media relations.Canadian producers who import the seed would grow it only for their own use. They would be prohibited from selling seed or forage from GM alfalfa and they would not be allowed to spray it with Roundup, Monsanto’s popular glyphosate weed control product.The crop has already been granted feed, food and environmental safety approval by CFIA.Monsanto representatives say an application seeking additional approvals from the Pest Management Regulatory Agency will likely be submitted this spring.Even without PMRA approval, the company handling commercialization, Forage Genetics International, could apply to have the crop registered for commercial production at any time, although representatives from Monsanto say that is not likely to happen soon.Shmon is unnerved by the prospect of Canadian producers importing GM alfalfa and growing it for their own use.Earlier this year, the Manitoba Forage Seed Association endorsed a strongly worded resolution at its annual meeting in Winnipeg, vowing to hold Ottawa directly responsible “for any economic loss experienced as a result of trade injury incurred due to a loss of export markets for alfalfa seed and other grass seed and legume crops.””If Roundup Ready alfalfa is registered in the United States, it’s only a matter of time until it comes into Canada,” said former MFSA president Les Jacobson. “We’re putting the government on notice that if he (agriculture minister Gerry Ritz) is not prepared to do what he told us that the federal government would do, we’re going to hold them financially responsible if there’s an economic downturn in the industry.”In letter issued to Ritz in 2008, the Canadian Alfalfa Seed Council raised concerns over the fact that regulatory provisions in Canada’s “own use importation” system would allow GM alfalfa to be legally grown in Canada if the U.S. injunction banning its production and sale is lifted.The letter, endorsed by 10 western Canadian forage industry groups, also raised concerns over Roundup Ready alfalfa seed trials conducted at locations in Western Canada in 2008.Because alfalfa is grown widely and feral populations exist in ditches, pastures and headlands, the alfalfa council argued that cross-pollination via honeybees, leafcutter bees and native pollinators poses a significant threat.”There is … an extremely high probability that there will be a transfer of pollen from Roundup Ready alfalfa plants to non-Roundup Ready alfalfa plants within the areas of Monsanto Canada Inc. field plots, should Roundup Ready alfalfa plants be allowed to bloom,” the letter stated.Shmon believes field trials exposed the Canadian alfalfa and forage seed industries to unnecessary risk and jeopardized the livelihoods of farmers and small business owners.He said it’s apparent that some biotech companies have little regard for any markets except their own.”They don’t care about our exports,” he said.”They develop GM seed and they sell it to farmers. It’s been a real eye opener going against Monsanto on this.”Trish Jordan, a spokesperson for Monsanto Canada, said fears over the release of GM alfalfa in Canada and the unintentional escape of transgenic material are largely unfounded.She said Monsanto has worked closely with alfalfa seed and forage industry groups to ensure that risks of gene escape and market damage are minimized.She also stressed that although Monsanto developed Roundup Ready alfalfa, it is not responsible for the product’s commercialization in Canada or the United States.”It’s not our commercial product. It’s our technology,” she said.”Roundup Ready alfalfa has been licensed to a company called Forage Genetics International and they … have made a commitment that they are not even looking at the Canadian market until such time as the issue in the U.S. is resolved.”Jordan said Monsanto and other biotech companies have nothing to gain by alienating Canadian farmers or seed exporters like Shmon.”Regardless of whether it’s Monsanto or Bayer … or FGI, no company is going to introduce product that’s going to deliberately introduce market harm into the system,” she said.”Obviously, companies want to introduce products that are in demand by growers and that can fit within the system of trade and we’ve had a pretty good track record, I think, of working with industry in that regard.”As for Bill C-474, Jordan said the bill would add uncertainty and ambiguity into the Canadian regulatory system.”We’re not supportive of Bill C-474 because we’re strong advocates of science based regulation,” she said.”That system has served us very well in the past and it’s why companies like Monsanto and many other technology developers continue to invest in Canada.”
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