Councils fund GE study
10 September 2004
The Far North District Council has joined Whangarei, Kaipara, and Rodney District and Waitakere City Councils to support and jointly fund a Risks and Options Report on Genetic Engineering in the Northland peninsula.
The Risks and Options Report will examine in some detail the specific environmental, economic and cultural risks to the region north of Auckland arising from the possible release of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) to the environment.
It will also describe the various options available to local authorities to manage those risks.
These options will range from doing nothing (i.e. leaving regulation of GMOs in the environment to the Environmental Risk Management Authority (ERMA) under the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996) through to regional prohibition.
Their approach is seen as "a cautious yet responsible way to proceed with the issue".
The Risks and Options Report is expected to be completed by the end of October. Each council is contributing $10,000 to the study.
GE Free Northland applauds the commitment of local territorial authorities to a precautionary approach to GMOs.
GE Free Northland spokesperson Zelka Grammer says, "It is critical that the interests of local government and ratepayers are protected and the risks of GE addressed.
The study will examine the risks of GMOs at a local and regional level, something that has not yet been addressed by ERMA. Primary producer and Maori concerns will also be considered.
The results will provide a range of options to respond to the risks of GMOs, including prohibition."
She said sound changes had already been adopted in the Long Term Council Community Plans of the Northland Regional Council: Among the changes adopted by the NRC is one calling for "no further development and field-testing of transgenic organisms envisaged for agriculture, horticulture and forestry in Northland until the risk potential has been adequately identified and evaluated and a strict liability regime put in place."
GE Free Northland wants to see an enforceable regional GE exclusion zone in Northland.
Landmark legal finding - Councils have
jurisdiction regarding GM
Councils have the ability to manage local effects of genetically modified organisms, according to a legal opinion prepared by a top resource management lawyer.
As part of a report on managing genetic modification, Royden Somerville QC concluded that district councils have jurisdiction to manage GMOs and to take a precautionary approach to GM activities in their Long Term Council Community Plan (LTCCP):
"I am of the opinion that there is jurisdiction under the Resource Management Act for (territorial authorities) and the Environment Court to control land uses, regarding activities which involve outdoor field-testing or the release of GMOs for research or commercial use, in order to promote the sustainable management of natural and physical resources".
And in the wake of the landmark finding, GE Free Northland spokesperson Zelka Grammer says the next logical step is for Northland - ideally placed geographically - to become a regional genetic engineering exclusion zone.
She said: “We applaud the commitment of local government to address the GE issue, as the Government continues to ignore the concerns of many eminent scientists, territorial authorities and our key markets, as well as the majority of New Zealanders. It is critical that the interests of local government and ratepayers are protected and the risks of GE addressed.”
The report was jointly funded by the Whangarei District Council, Far North District Council, Kaipara District Council, Rodney District Council and Local Government New Zealand. They were seeking clarification about unresolved GE issues such as liability, ecological impacts, adverse impacts on primary producers and key markets.
Dr Somerville's legal opinion is appended to a wider report prepared by Simon Terry Associates, which notes that the Resource Management Act can be used to establish areas in which GMOs are excluded, if this is what communities consider appropriate: The law does not prevent communities setting higher standards than those that may be imposed by the Environmental Risk Management Authority (ERMA).
But in Parliament this week Environment Minister Marian Hobbs warned that councils’ controls would have to be science-based and effects-based just like those of ERMA, and the hurdles involved might expose councils and communities to legal expense.
Western Australia, declared this week it will ban the growing of all GM crops, a decision which puts Australia at the global forefront of recognising the importance and economic potential of a clean, green image for agriculture. The Bay Chronicle March 2004
GE Free Northland in Kerikeri
www.gefreenorthland.org.nz
Ph 407 8650 Ph 407 6881
GE FREE NZ is not against proper and competent use of biotechnology. But we are against genetically modified organisms in our food and in the environment. The short-term gain may become ashes in our mouths if we don't get the balance right.
Make yourself aware of what you eat.
Marty Robinson (Kerikeri Organics) for GE FREE (NZ) Northland
Jan 3 2002 MEXICO CITY (AP) -- In a cautionary tale about the difficulty of controlling genetically modified plants, corn researchers in Mexico went ever higher into remote mountain villages looking for natural varieties of the 4,000-year-old crop.
Time after time, they couldn't find them.
Samples revealed that just a few years of unlabeled U.S. imports had transferred modified genes to local corn in the southern state of Oaxaca -- even though planting genetically modified crops is banned in this country, the birthplace of corn.
The discovery, confirmed in the science magazine Nature this month, caused outrage among Mexicans, whose ancestors believed the gods created Man from an ear of corn.
"It's a worse attack on our culture than if they had torn down the cathedral of Oaxaca and built a McDonald's over it," said Hector Magallone, an activist with the environmental group Greenpeace.
Concern for diversity and patents
There is no evidence that genetically modified grains harm those who eat them.
But some scientists worry that genetically modified strains could displace or contaminate Mexico's genetic warehouse of over 60 corn varieties -- a wealth that enriches staple crops worldwide and includes wild varieties that have yet to be cataloged.
The accidental spread of laboratory-inserted genes, scientists fear, could allow aggressive plants to crowd out other varieties, reducing biological diversity.
Diversity is prized as a hedge against disease, pests and climate change. While some plant strains may be vulnerable to one disease, others may have natural immunity that enables them to survive.
The case has drawn international attention. In an open letter, 80 scientists from a dozen countries have asked the Mexican government to stop the genetic contamination.
But supporters of genetic modification say such crops may actually benefit the environment by allowing farmers to use less pesticide or soil tilling, cutting down on erosion.
Mexico is a net importer of corn -- about 6.2 million tons annually, almost all from the United States. Perhaps one-fourth of it is genetically modified.
U.S. grain growers aren't worried by the contamination -- and even want to charge Mexican farmers for it.
"If a locally occurring variety receives some improvement from genetically engineered crops, it's up to the courts to decide whether farmers should be made to pay for that," said Ricardo Celma, head of the U.S. Grain Council's Mexico office. "But we want the patent rights of the owners of that genetic modification to be honored."
Such demands could set the stage for confrontation. "The prospect of some multinational corporation bringing lawsuits against Mexicans farmers would be intolerable," the head of the Mexican government's Council on Biodiversity, Jorge Soberon, said Saturday.
"Their patents may be valid in their country, but not in ours," Soberon told the government news agency Notimex. He also proposed that Mexico pay its farmers subsidies to grow native corn.
That, like the patent issue, could run afoul of the rules of the North American Free Trade Agreement between Mexico, the United States and Canada, which provides for patent protections and discourages subsidies.
Tracking the spread of GM crops
Greenpeace, meanwhile, has called for a ban on imports of genetically modified corn. Corn, Mexico's staple crop, is imported mostly for human and animal consumption -- not as seed.
Yet several modified strains were found, including one that makes the plant produce a toxin to ward off corn borers.
It is unclear how far the genetically modified crops have spread. A study by the Mexican Environment Ministry earlier this year found them in 15 locations in Oaxaca, but in low concentrations of 3 percent to 10 percent of plants in most fields.
"It's likely that these gene sequences may disappear by themselves, or remain at low levels for a long period of time," the Ministry said in a report.
Researchers from Oaxaca's Uzachi agricultural research center weren't looking for genetically modified corn when they went to the Zapotec Indian village of Calpulalpan in late November 2000.
They went to the area high in the Sierra Norte mountains to find pure, locally occurring varieties that would serve as a 'control sample' for a project to produce natural, organic corn.
But researcher Francisco Chapela -- whose brother, Ignacio, published the results in Nature -- recalls that, when they analyzed the sample, it contained a genetic marker commonly used in engineered plants.
"At first we thought our equipment was malfunctioning," Chapela said. "Then, we thought, 'OK, maybe this field had some problems, we'll go to another one farther back in the mountains."'
But even in the hamlet of Trinidad, about three hours from the state capital of Oaxaca, they found genetic alterations. After six tests, they found two fields that did not contain traces of modification.
Planting genetically modified crops has been banned in Mexico since 1998. Officials of Mexico's Agriculture Department said there were no plans to halt imports, or demand labeling of genetically modified corn.
Australia is imposing labeling requirements and has a partial ban on crops. Japan already has such limits in place.
Ironically, the Oaxaca research center that is now fighting for biological purity was set up for an opposite purpose.
It was created in the mid-1990s by the Swiss pharmaceutical giant Sandoz -- which later became Novartis in a merger -- to look for medicinally valuable plant species, a practice decried by some activists as "bio-piracy."
Local farmers later assumed control of the lab.
Chapela speculated that the genetically modified corn found in Oaxaca was planted by local farmers who obtained kernels intended for consumption.
"It could have been accidental," Chapela said. "Or somebody may have seen it in a rural store and said, 'That's a pretty kernel, I think I'll plant it.' It has no warning label. Either way, this shows how negligent authorities were to import this without labels."
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What is Genetic Engineering?
Genes taken from one life form and forced into another life form, eg. Strawberries & tomatoes with fish genes, potatoes with a gene from the long-clawed African toad.
PROS "maybe" – greater yields, economic gains for (?), medical "cures" – personal health benefits and economic gains for pharmaceutical companies.
CONS "known" – human deaths, deformed animals, new diseases created, crops destroyed, soil made sterile (dead), super weeds created, IRREVERSIBLE once released
TAKE ACTION!
Write to Marian Hobbs, Minister for the Environment
Write to your local MP, Dover Samuels or John Carter.
Address: Name, Parliament Buildings, Wellington. (No stamp required)
Make a sign – put it in your window, on your grounds, on your car
Lobby Northland Regional Council to declare us a GE-Free-Zone
