GM crop taints honey two miles away, test reveals
The Sunday Times, September 15, 2002
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-416027,00.html [you have
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EVIDENCE that genetically modified (GM) crops can contaminate food
supplies for miles around has been revealed in independent tests
commissioned by The Sunday Times.
The tests found alien GM material in honey from beehives two miles
from a site where GM crops were being grown under government
supervision. It is believed to have been carried there by bees
gathering pollen in the GM test sites.
The disclosure, showing that GM organisms can enter the food chain
without consumers — or even farmers — knowing they are present, will
undermine assurances by Tony Blair and ministers that such crops can
be tested in Britain without contaminating the food chain.
The test results come as ministers, under pressure from the
American agrochemical lobby, mount a huge consultation exercise to
persuade the public of the virtues of GM foods. They have previously
given assurances that consumers “are not being used as guinea pigs”.
The GM material was found in honey sold from farmer David Rolfe’s
hives at Newport-on-Tay in Fife, almost two miles from one of 18
sites holding trials of GM oil-seed rape.
A test carried out by GeneScan, a respected independent laboratory
in Bremen, Germany, checked for traces of an NOS terminator, one of
four modified genes which make the crop resistant to pesticides. This
proved positive.
A second test confirmed that GM material in the honey could have
come only from oil- seed rape grown at Wester Friarton, in Newport-on-
Tay, by Aventis, one of the world’s biggest biotechnology firms. The
fact that the GM material travelled such a distance makes a mockery
of the government’s 50m-200m crop-free “buffer” zones that were
created around GM sites to protect neighbouring farms. Critics have
claimed that the GM crop trial sites are too close to other farms.
America has buffer zones of up to 400m, Canada up to 800m, and the
European Union recommends a 5km (three-mile) zone for GM oilseed rape.
When Rolfe first raised his concerns, government officials said
that although it was not possible to rule out cross-pollination, they
did not believe it should be “a source of concern”.
“I’m very angry and disappointed,” Rolfe said last week. “I feel
I’ve been denied the right and freedom to eat my own GM-free produce.
Now we can’t eat the honey or sell it.”
This weekend Defra, the ministry responsible for the crop trials,
said: “We have not seen the results of the study but will treat any
such findings extremely seriously.”
In the case of GM rape, like most GM products, there is no evidence
that contamination poses a health risk. Concern centres on
maintaining the integrity of traditionally produced products.
Tim Lang, professor of food policy at Thames Valley University,
said: “The early assurances from the industry and the government that
a buffer zone would allow safety and choice for consumers are falling
apart. It raises environmental health worries, and what we don’t yet
know is whether these warnings will translate into a risk to human
health.”
Britain has imposed a moratorium on the widespread planting of GM
crops until it has analysed the impact of GM crop trials at 18 farm-
scale sites around Britain.
However, The Sunday Times’s tests confirm earlier work that was
carried by Friends of the Earth, the environmental group, and will
increase pressure on the government to scale down its support for the
GM industry.
It will also come as a personal setback to Blair, who is determined
that British companies will win a share of the potentially lucrative
bioscience industry. In May the prime minister attacked GM protesters
as part of an “anti-science fashion” in Britain.
The tests will bring pressure on Aventis, which was accused of a
“serious breach” of regulations earlier this year after GM trials in
12 sites were contaminated with antibiotic genes. These are
controversial because of the danger of gene transfer to bacteria in
animals and humans, who could become immune to common life- saving
antibiotics.
While the government tends to support the GM lobby, food retailers
have been more cautious. The big supermarkets insist that such
products are properly labelled and refuse to take honey from within
six miles of UK test sites.
In Canada, a leading cultivator of GM crops, sales of honey have
plummeted by 50% amid concern that the integrity of the product has
been compromised.
A spokesmen for Aventis said: “We would be very interested in
looking at both the origin of the honey sample and how the tests were
carried out. We would like to look at this further
