List members might be interested in joint spiked & NERC online debate on the
question: 'The Future of GM: why do we need the UK farmscale trials?' to go
live on Monday 16th September mid-day.
http://www.spiked-online.com/science
It should be a lively and important debate - press release follows.
Best wishes, Tony Gilland
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday 12 September 2002
PUBLIC DEBATE LAUNCHED ON FARM-SCALE EVALUATIONS FOR GM CROPS
Genetically modified (GM) crops have been the subject of intense debate. Yet
there has been far less discussion about the purpose or desirability of the
UK's ongoing farm-scale evaluations.
On Monday 16 September 2002, the online publication spiked and the Natural
Environment Research Council (NERC) are launching a debate on the theme of
‘UK farm-scale trials: why are we having them?’
To initiate the debate, five experts have put forth their views:
- DR LES FIRBANK, who leads the farm-scale evaluations, explains that they
‘do not address all the questions surrounding the possible commercialisation
of GM crops’, but claims that they ‘will provide clear evidence that will be
important when decisions about the commercialisation of GM are made’.
- PROFESSOR ROBIN GROVE WHITE, of the UK government's Agriculture and
Environment Biotechnology Commission, says that ‘the trials were born out of
political necessity in 1998, and as the results start to come in, they will
become political again’.
- GREGORY CONKO, director of food safety policy at the Competitive
Enterprise Institute in Washington DC, and DR CHANNAPATNA S PRAKASH,
director of the Centre for Plant Biotechnology Research at Tuskegee
University, argue that ‘farm-scale evaluations of GM crops have accomplished
few of their intended goals’.
- TONY GILLAND, editor of ‘Science: Can We Trust the Experts? ’, argues
that ‘an unquestioning acceptance of negative assumptions about the
destructive nature of modern farming practices has delayed the commercial
use of a benign technology’.
These statements will be followed by responses from experts in the field and
from the public. This is the third in a series of online debates about the
environment published on spiked and sponsored by the NERC.
NOTES FOR EDITORS
The spiked-debate on farm-scale trials for GM crops will be published
online, on Monday 16 September 2002, at:
http://www.spiked-online.com/science
For further details, contact:
Sandy Starr at spiked
Tel: +44 (020) 7269 9234
Fax: +44 (020) 7269 9235
Email: [log in to unmask]
Website: http://www.spiked-online.com
Marion O’Sullivan at NERC
Tel: +44 (0)1793 411 727
Fax: +44 (0) 1793 411 510
Email: [log in to unmask]
Website: http://www.nerc.ac.uk
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