A lot of people do not want to consume genetically modified foods. And a lot of farmers do not want to see genetically modified crops grown, particularly when they are open to lawsuits by the GM-producing companies when the altered seeds get mixed into their crops. The issue of GM crops is even more contentious in Europe, where country after country has waged a war against GM foods causing the US, Canada and Argentia to file a lawsuit against these countries to MAKE them take GM foods, even when they do not want it.
So, it came as no surprise that some trial fields have been razed. And in order for some of these companies to grow their frankenfoods, they are now requesting that the field locations are kept secret.
Genetically modified crops may be grown in hidden locations in Britain amid fears that anti-GM campaigners are winning the battle over the controversial technology, the Guardian has learned.
Officials at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) confirmed they are looking at a range of options to clamp down on vandalism to GM crop trials, after intense lobbying by big crop biotech companies. The firms have warned that trials of GM crops are becoming too expensive to conduct in Britain because of the additional costs of protecting fields from activists.
Business doesn’t always listen to the people, which is most obvious in the case of GM foods. This is not a case of supply and demand, rather GM foods are being pushed on unsuspecting people because business has found a way to exploit farmers and consumers.
A group representing the major biotech companies has asked the government to oversee specific changes to the GM trial process that would make fields of crops harder for activists to locate. Under existing laws, full details of every GM crop trial must be disclosed in advance on a government website, with a six-figure grid reference identifying the precise location of the field.
The group has asked Defra to keep details of locations on a register, which would only be shared with people who apply and who can prove they have good reason to know. Another option is to release only a four-figure reference for the trial site.
“These trials are legal, so why give carte blanche to anyone who wants to destroy them? In most countries, there is nothing like the sort of specific information that has to be given in Britain,” said Julian Little of the industry group, the Agricultural Biotechnology Council. The need to give the location of a GM crop is contained in a European directive, but it is interpreted differently across member states.
The trials are legal, I’m not going to argue that. But, changing the laws so that the people do not know where GM crop trials are taking place is more than excessive. The people living in the area of a GM-food crop trial have the right to know, expecially when increased pesticide use will most likely be taking place. Ultimately, don’t those people, the very people living in the area have the right to decide if they should be subjected to this?
Most American’s have no idea how much genetically altered foods they eat in a day. And to keep it that way the bio-tech companies have lobbied hard against truth in labeling, again, even though the vast majority of people want truth in labeling. The biotech companies have worked very hard to hurt small farmers, sending investigators to take plant samplings from farmer’s fields. And then there is the environment, including the disappearance of the bees.
This idea of keeping field trials secrest isn’t about stopping anti-GM activists. It is about cloaking themselves in secrecy, the same sort of secrecy and power the biotech industry has gained in the US. And, of course, treating activists as terrorists.
The GM companies are also keen to see stiffer penalties for activists caught damaging crop trials.
Okay, so I’m taking a page from the Bush Administration, that eco-activists are terrorists, but it’s a close assessment.
Some GM companies fear future crop trials are in greater danger because of what they claim is a “broadening out” of anti-GM activists to include anti-globalisation and possibly animal rights campaigners.
The whole point is, when the vast majority of people in a country do not want something, you cannot continue to try to push it on them, even in secrecy.
Update: Here’s some more information on the foothold agri-business/biotech industries are gaining in the US.
