International updates on coexistence – July to September 2006
Global
• On 31 July 2006 Bayer CropScience notified the US Food and Drug Administration (US FDA) and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) that trace amounts of an unapproved GM Rice variety (Liberty Link Rice 601) were detected in samples of commercial non-GM long grain rice and may be present in US rice exports. The Liberty Link Rice 601 line was not intended for commercialisation and therefore an application for unregulated status in the US was not sought. However, two GM Liberty Link Rice lines which express the same new protein as Liberty Link Rice 601 have been through safety evaluations in the US and Canada. Both lines were found to be safe for use in food and safe for the environment.
Europe
• Hungary will retain its ban on GM maize crop MON 810 after an EU special committee voted against a draft order from the European Commission for the ban to be lifted. In January 2005, Hungary banned the GM maize event MON 810, and no other GM crops are commercially grown.
• Defra has released a consultation document on proposals for managing the coexistence of GM, conventional and organic crops in England (MAF B107 refers). The proposed coexistence guidelines are a mix of statutory and non-statutory measures. Statutory measures are seen as essential for coexistence and include crop separation distances and compulsory notification of neighbouring farmers. Defra is considering whether special measures should apply for coexistence between GM and organic production, and how liability surrounding GM crops should be managed. Also considered in the paper are the effects of GM crops on honey production, training for farmers growing GM crops and having a public register of GM crops.
• France is expected to witness a ten-fold expansion in biotech corn plantings this year, according to USDA's Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS). In a report written by the US embassy's agricultural attaché, FAS said Bt corn cultivation is expected to increase from 500 hectares last year to 5,000 this year.
• Icon Genetics and Bayer Bioscience NV (German and Belgian companies respectively) have developed a new technology allowing the production of large quantities of human monoclonal antibodies from GM plants in less than two weeks. The antibodies produced can be used for research or health care purposes. Until now the ability of plants to express full-size human antibodies has not been exploited because of low yields and the length of time needed to generate these small amounts.
Asia
• The Supreme Court of India has directed the Government that it should not give any new approvals to GM crop field trials until further notice, while it considers an application filed by four members of the public seeking a ban on the release of genetically modified organisms. The judges have not yet heard from the respondents. The court directed the Government to induct scientists and experts into the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC), a statutory body for regulating the field trials to examine the issue in depth.
• The South Korean Agency for Technology and Standards, an arm of the Ministry of Commerce, Industry, and Technology, announced that it will adopt four international standards for detecting the existence of GMO in food products. From that point on, consumers will be able to tell whether a product has been tested for GM organisms if it displays the letters "KS," which stands for "Korean Standard."
Australia
• Western Australia (WA), South Australia, Victoria, Tasmania and New South Wales (NSW) have state moratoria on commercial scale trials and commercial production of certain GM crops. Recently there has been pressure from various sources on some states to lift these bans. The NSW Farmers Association has withdrawn its support for the NSW ban, and the Tasmanian Farmers and Graziers Association is calling for a debate on the use GM crops in the state. The Federal Agriculture Minister Peter McGauran has joined farm groups in calling for the moratoria to be lifted, and WA’s Agriculture Minister Kim Chance has said he would support the commercial production of GM canola for use in biofuels if cross-pollination and co-mingling with canola produced for food does not occur.
• The South Australian Government, however, plans to extend its moratorium on GM crops, currently in place until 2007, for another year to bring it in line with other states’ moratoria.
South America
• The Brazilian Ministry for Agriculture, Livestock, and Supply (MAPA) announced farmers from the Rio Grande do Sul state will be allowed to plant non-certified GM soybean in the 2006/2007 growing season. MAPA supports a system where farmers can exchange illegal, uncertified seeds for certified seeds, but admits that due to a shortage of certified seeds only two thirds of interested farmers were able to participate in the exchange initiative.
• Chile’s House of Representatives has approved legislation requiring that all food products with a GM content of 1% or more be labelled as such. The bill passed the House by a vote of 94-1 with one abstention, and if it is passed into law, food suppliers will have 180 days to ensure relevant products bear a label saying “This product contains genetically modified organisms” or “This product contains (name of genetically modified organism).”
North America
• GM grass designed for golf courses and lawns with engineered resistance to the herbicide glyphosate has been detected up to five kilometres outside a test site in Oregon in the United States. Nine plants of the creeping bentgrass (Agrostis stolonifera) were identified out of 20,400 plants of various grass varieties sampled within a 4.8-kilometre radius of the cultivation site. The sampling showed that the GM grass spread both by pollinating non-GM plants to form hybrids, and by seed movement. As a result of the spread, the USDA is undertaking its first full environmental impact assessment of a GM plant.
• SemBioSys Genetics Inc, a Canadian biotechnology company, announced it has reached commercially viable levels of human insulin accumulation in GM safflower plants. The company plans to file an Investigational New Drug application with the US Food and Drug Administration in late 2007, to be followed by clinical trials of the plant-produced pharmaceutical. Existing commercial insulin production methods typically rely on GM yeast or bacteria grown in large bioreactors (followed by extraction and purification), whereas with GM safflower, the insulin protein is produced in the seed and after harvesting the protein is extracted.
• A US federal district judge ruled that the USDA violated the Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Policy Act in permitting the cultivation of pharmaceutical producing GM crops throughout Hawaii. The USDA did not conduct even preliminary investigations into endangered species, threatened species and critical habitats prior to its approval of the plantings. The decision is the first ever US federal court ruling on biopharming. There were four permits under scrutiny relating to over 800 acres of drug-producing corn and sugarcane at various sites throughout Hawaii.
• The US Department of Energy recently released a research roadmap for developing cellulosic ethanol as an alternative to gasoline. Cellulosic ethanol is produced from biomass including agricultural or industrial plant wastes, not from grains such as corn and wheat or soybeans. The focus of the research plan is to use advances in biotechnology, including genetic modification, to encourage this fuel industry. There is a significant amount of other research worldwide into developing crops tailored to produce ethanol and other biofuels. For example, agribusiness company Syngenta hopes in 2008 to begin selling genetically engineered corn that contains an enzyme that must otherwise be added separately at the ethanol factory. Another goal of such research is to reduce the amount of lignin – the substance that gives plants the strength to stand upright but makes it harder to turn a plant’s cellulose into ethanol.
• USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service said in its annual acreage report that plantings of GM corn, soybeans, cotton and canola crops this year rose by 11.1 million acres to 128.3 million acres, an increase of 9.5% over last year's total. GM soybeans continue to have the highest adoption rate at 89%, up 2 percentage points from last year; total acreage is 66.7 million. Corn is runner-up in total biotech acreage at 48.4 million, a 13.9% increase over last year, and the fourth highest adoption rate of 61%. GM cotton has the third highest adoption rate at 83%, up 4 percentage points over last year, and the third largest plantings at 12.4 million acres.
Contact for Enquiries
Dr Sharon Adamson
Manager,
Innovation Policy
Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry
PO Box 2526
Wellington
NEW ZEALAND
Phone: +64 4 894 0618
Fax: +64 4 4 894 0741
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