-Caveat Lector- <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/"> </A> -Cui Bono?- Dave Hartley http://www.Asheville-Computer.com/dave http://www.Asheville-Computer.com/issues ................. http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20000104/1812168s.htm Retailers dropping bio-foods By James Cox USA TODAY, Jan 4, 2000, page A1 The USA's two largest natural foods retailers are stripping their shelves of many genetically engineered foods, prompting manufacturers and supermarkets to keep an eye out for a biotech backlash among consumers. Whole Foods Market and Wild Oats Markets have vowed to rid most of their private-label foods of bio-engineered corn, soy, canola oil and other ingredients this year. ''There's an absolute anger among customers that foods are being genetically modified and they don't know what ingredients are in their foods,'' says Margaret Whittenberg, vice president at Whole Foods. The Austin, Texas, retailer has 103 stores in 22 states. ....... First GM tolerance transfer is feared in Canadian OSR Farmers Weekly 15 January 1999 By Stephen Leahy A CANADIAN field is thought to be the site of the first accidental on-farm transfer of herbicide tolerance between genetically mod- ified and conventional crop plants. Last summer oilseed rape grow- er Tony Huether was surprised to see volunteers thriving after two glyphosate (Roundup) sprayings in a 57ha (140 acre) field where no glyphosate-resistant rape had ever been sown. He had planted a glyphosate- resistant variety in a nearby field in 1997 and believes the trait was transferred by pollen movement. "Cross pollination was going to happen. It surprises me it didn't show up sooner," says Phil Thomas, Alberta Agriculture's provincial oilseed specialist. UK studies have shown pollina- tion transfer up to 400m by wind or insects can result in out-crosses, says Mr Thomas. "Just because you're not growing herbicide-resis- tant canola [oilseed rape], it does not mean you can't get herbicide- resistant volunteers." Mr Huether, who farms 860ha (2100 acres) of oilseed rape, peas and wheat at Sexsmith, northern Alberta, says no one told him GM traits could be transferred. "Monsanto never made farmers aware of the possibility of this hap- pening when we signed the TUA [Technical Use Agreement]." Although 60% of Canada's oilseed rape is now herbicide-toler- ant, 1997 was the first time Mr Huether planted GM varieties. That spring he put the 57ha field into a Smart variety resistant to the herbicide imazethapyr and 8ha (20 acres) of Innovator, a variety tolerant to glufosinate-ammonium ( Liberty). Thirty metres away, on the other side of a dirt road, he plant- ed 16ha (40 acres) of Quest, a glyphosate-resistant variety. Mr Huether says the fields were harvested at different times and rules out mechanical transfer. Before blaming cross pollination, government crop expert John Huffman investigated other possi- bilities. "We have taken this as a serious issue." Researchers, including repre- sentatives from Monsanto, have since taken plants and seeds. Government scientists are growing the seeds on in greenhouses and doing DNA mapping. A compre- hensive report is expected soon. Both Mr Thomas and Mr Huffman say the addition of any broadleaf herbicides, such as 2,4- D, can easily control unexpected GMHT volunteers. Both agree that keeping accurate records is also important. "It may be a bit of a headache to know what your neighbour grows and to plan your strategy accordingly," acknowl- edges Mr Thomas. Mr Huether is less relaxed. "It's not that easy a problem to solve when direct seeding and planting a wide range of crops." He worries about the effects of 2.4-D residues on broad leaved crops and loathes handling the more toxic chemical. Farmers are not getting all the facts they need on GM crops, he fears. ..... The Globe and Mail, Tuesday, January 4, 2000 'Contaminated' farm seed sold in genetic mixup Incident raises questions about Ottawa's controls By Heather Scoffield Ottawa -- The federal government unwittingly allowed the sale of genetically modified canola seeds in 1997 that were "seriously contaminated," according to government documents that have only now come to light. The virtually unpublicized incident involving canola seeds produced by Monsanto Canada Inc., one of the main proponents of genetically modified food, raises questions about Ottawa's ability to tightly regulate food safety in a biotechnological age. The documents say the seeds were not harmful, and they were eventually recalled, the first and only such action involving genetically modified foods. Access-to-information documents show that some of the seeds, marketed on the Prairies in 1997, were planted by two farmers before the recall and that some were processed into edible oil. "This incident has sent shock waves through the domestic biotech-plant-breeding organizations/industry as well as internationally," the Canadian Food Inspection Agency declared in one of the documents. They were obtained by Ottawa researcher Ken Rubin for The Globe and Mail. Yesterday, government officials stressed that the seeds posed no danger to the health of Canadians or to the environment. But the documents suggest widespread confusion at the time. The incident began in March, 1997, when the Canadian Food Inspection Agency approved two new strains of canola that were genetically modified by Monsanto to resist its weed-killer, Roundup. But something went wrong. Limagrain Canada Seeds Inc., which handled, produced and distributed the Monsanto product, sold seeds that were not the same ones approved by the CFIA. The products hit the market just before seeding season, and Canadian farmers quickly bought 60,000 bags -- enough to fill 70 tractor trailers or plant 600,000 acres. "Our office has been advised that seed of LG3315 has possibly been seriously contaminated with genetic material from the parental line, GT200 [which was not approved]," said a letter from CFIA to Limagrain on April 15, 1997. The error was not discovered until April, after some farmers planted the seed. It turned out that seeds that were approved by the government had subsequently been cross-bred with seeds that were not fully approved by the CFIA. The result was an untested product with unknown characteristics. The documents, which include letters, reports and communiqu�s related to the incident, do not explain how the seeds were mixed together. Monsanto -- not the government regulators -- discovered the mistake. "Monsanto has now completed their investigation and found that the varietal purity problem was not a result of genetic engineering," CFIA documents say. The mistakes were twofold, Monsanto told the government. In the first place, seeds that were not approved by the CFIA should have been destroyed; and the companies should not have allowed the seeds to get mixed up and bred together. "While the loss of these acres is disappointing, it is business as usual and a very manageable situation," Monsanto said in a statement at the time. Ottawa and Monsanto agreed that a recall should begin immediately, and the companies and government devised ways to destroy the seeds. But deadlines were missed repeatedly, and the companies found it difficult to track down every last seed and dispose of it, the documents show. Two farmers had already planted their canola, and the companies had to broker deals with them to have their crops plowed under. One farmer resisted for months, the documents show. Some of the seeds used in testing in 1996 were crushed and turned into edible oil and feed for animals. CFIA officials are not certain if these seeds were contaminated. Health Canada tested the contaminated canola in 1997 to see if it would be dangerous, but found no "significant" health risks. When the seeds were finally recovered or the crops destroyed in the summer of 1997, the companies and the federal government could not agree on how to dispose of them. Limagrain wanted to turn the seeds into industrial oil and fertilizer. But much of the seed was heavily treated with fungicides that were considered hazardous waste. Government authorities told the company it had to bury everything in a landfill. By November, 1997, the companies and government officials agreed that the contaminated seeds had been adequately withdrawn and destroyed. The government documents show, however, that there was a discrepancy between the amount of seed bought by farmers and the amount actually disposed. In some cases, the documents show more seed bought than destroyed, but other data show fewer seeds were bought than destroyed. The discrepancy amounts to thousands of kilograms of seed, but a Limagrain report blames the difference on packaging and inaccurate scales. In a separate document, Montsanto fingered Limagrain for the fact that the seed got out at all. Many grain farms and the growing biotechnology industry have embraced genetically modified crops as more efficient, but consumers are increasingly wary about their health and environmental effects and inadequate government testing. The massive recall, and the only one so far in Canada for genetically modified crops, prompted immediate changes in government requirements and company practices, to bolster credibility in an anxious international grain market. The government and the companies believe that the fact that Monsanto detected the error and officials were able to withdraw the contaminated seeds proves that the system works, the documents say. However, environmentalists said the incident proves that government regulators are too reliant on company data and self-regulation. ...... Tom Spears The Ottawa Citizen Wednesday January 05, 2000 Nature frustrates efforts to confine the spread of genetically modified plants Genetically modified crops can send pollen over distances of several kilometres and spread their genes into conventional, non-modified crops, British researchers have found. The discovery, made by analysing pollen found in beehives, is raising startling new questions about whether it's possible to keep the two kinds of crops separate. It also raises new questions about whether GM crops bred to resist pesticides can spread their resistance to weeds, creating a new class of "superweeds." The discovery comes after the British government mandated 200-metre buffer zones around test plots of modified canola, corn and other crops, in order to keep the test crops' pollen from fertilizing ordinary crops. The same 200-metre buffer strip is recommended in Canada to keep corn with a gene that allows the plant to make its own insecticide, called Bt, from mixing genes with ordinary corn. But activists opposed to the tests in Britain set up pollen-catching "traps" over a wide area around a test farm this summer. And they found no limits to how far the pollen -- and therefore the modified genes -- spread. The U.K. chapter of Friends of the Earth hired an independent group, the National Pollen Research Unit, to put out pollen traps beginning 400 metres from the test field. The researchers scattered five more at increasing distances, the final one a full 4.5 kilometres from the test crop. Each trap, says Adrian Bebb of Friends of the Earth, "is a sort of sticky board on the doorway of a beehive. As bees go in they drop some of their pollen on it." The bees came and went through the summer, then the activists took their traps and sent them for analysis at labs in Britain and Austria. All six showed pollen from the genetically modified canola field. "Even the 4.5-kilometre trap -- that's farther than any research had shown pollen could travel," Mr. Bebb said. "We're going to see a 'gene flow' from the test crop" into neighbouring fields. As well as tracking the bees' pollen, the survey set out traps to catch pollen blown on the wind. This found wind-borne pollen travelled 475 metres, again well beyond the official buffer zone. "The genie, to a certain extent, is out of the bottle," said Dr. Vivienne Nathanson, spokes-woman for the British Medical Association on science and health policy. And the head of a major British biotech firm says the industry and government have to think harder about the issue. "These are things which have to be thought through, and in my view should have been thought through much more carefully before there was any extensive commercial planting anywhere," said John Jackson, chairman of Celltech Chiroscience, which makes pharmaceuticals. "Don't forget that one of the reasons that test was done was the assumption that pollen couldn't be moved by any mechanism more than 50 metres," he said. "This demonstrates that is not true. And I think nobody that knows the natural world was the least bit surprised by this. Wind moves it, insects move it, and birds move it," he said. "It might be carried a very considerable distance and germinate in an area where it cannot be observed at all." __________________________________ This is a recent GE News posting. For those who would like to subscribe, the subscription fee is $35/yr for those who can afford it. ($35 CDN for those in Canada; $35 USD for those outside Canada) For those who cannot afford $35, they can pay what they can afford. Cheques/checks/money orders can be made payable to 'BanGEF' and sent to BanGEF, 500 Wilbrod Street, Ottawa, ON Canada, K1N 6N2. Thanks Richard PS. If anyone on this list has sent in a subscription fee for 2000, please let me know by email as I will not be back at my home base until end of Jan to catch up on my postal mail. Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign for Mandatory labelling and long-term testing of genetically engineered food 500 Wilbrod Street, Ottawa, ON K1N 6N2 email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic subcription to genetic engineering news of 12 months is $35 (payable to BanGEF at above address) __________________________________ <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soap-boxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. 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