[A-List] Britain/US split: GM crops

["Keaney Michael" <Michael.Keaney@xxxxxx>]

Further to the earlier article centering on Michael Meacher's recent
performance. Notice the omission of Agent Orange from Mr Teather's
"helpful" chronology.


Troubled Monsanto scales down GM hopes in Europe

David Teather, New York
Tuesday August 20, 2002
The Guardian

Monsanto, the US corporation faced with widespread opposition to its
genetically modified products, has conceded that it will take at least
another three years before winning approval for their sale in Europe.

The company, which has become the bête noire of campaigners against GM
crops, said it was working on the assumption that it will make no
progress in Europe until 2005.

There has been a moratorium on the approval of new GM crops in Europe
since 1998 due to public anxiety about potential risks. European
consumers have become unsettled by unrelated food scares, including mad
cow disease.

Monsanto also expects a lack of progress in Brazil, a key producer of
soya beans, which has managed to resist pressure from Washington to grow
GM crops, until 2005.

In the past few days, British ministers have said that they are coming
under intense pressure from the US and the biotech industry to accept GM
products. Such crops have been planted across swathes of American
farmland.

On BBC Radio 4's Today programme last week, the countryside minister,
Elliot Morley, said: "There is enormous international pressure to allow
GM crops and seeds in this country from the biotech companies. They are
going through national governments and the World Trade Organisation and
pressurising the EU."

Britain's environment minister, Michael Meacher, said yesterday that
Britain would not be "bounced" into accepting GM crops by the US.

Hendrik Verfaillie, the Belgian chief executive of Monsanto, told the
Financial Times that the company needed to be more realistic about
growth after a recent warning that profits in 2002 would be a third
lower than hoped for.

"We are assuming no progress in Europe until 2005. We are trying to be
conservative," he said. "It is better to under-promise than
under-deliver, I have learned. I don't like earnings revisions, they are
painful."

Britain has been running a three-year trial of GM oilseed rape in fields
across the country, supplied by Aventis, part of Bayer. The trial, to
measure the seed's environmental impact, is part of a deal between the
government and the industry aimed at trying to reassure the public.

But the disclosure last week that trial crops had been contaminated with
unauthorised GM seeds carrying antibiotic genes did little to calm
campaigners, who now want an immediate halt to the trials.

Mr Meacher also admitted that the pilot may not give a true picture of
the wider effect on the environment.

The decision on whether commercial planting is allowed will be made at
European level, but resistance among some countries, including France
and Greece, is fierce. In turn, Washington is threatening a trade war
unless companies such as Monsanto can sell GM grain and seed in Europe.

The total land under GM cultivation rose from 1.7m hectares (4.2m acres)
in 1996 to 52.6m hectares (131m acres) in 2001. Around two-thirds of
that was planted with GM soya beans produced by Monsanto to resist
herbicides.

Monsanto, which is suffering financial pressures, is eager to persuade
doubters of the merits of GM food.

The controversial company recently tried to raise up to £650m from the
commercial debt markets but was only able to borrow £390m. It also
faces falling sales of its traditional herbicide Roundup after the
patent expired in the US. Roundup accounts for 45% of Monsanto revenues.

The company was weakened further last week when the US drugs maker
Pharmacia split from Monsanto just two years after buying it. Monsanto
denies it is in danger of running out of cash.

The lingering suspicions about GM crops was sharply illustrated recently
when Zambia joined other drought-stricken southern Africa states in
turning away a shipment of GM maize from the US. The shipment was part
of an international emergency relief effort to ease food shortages.

101 years in business

1901 Monsanto chemical works opens in St Louis, manufacturing saccharin
and caffeine

1957 builds futuristic plastic home at Disneyland

1960 launches agriculture division, producing herbicides

1966 invents AstroTurf

1982 makes history by genetically modifying plant cell

1993 first biotech product approved for sale

1997 sells chemicals arm to focus on biotech

1998 EU imposes moratorium on new GM products

1999 a consumer backlash prompts shares sell-off

2000 merges with Pharmacia & Upjohn. Pledges not to use genes from
humans or animals in food chain. UK begins three-year trial of GM
oilseed rape.

2002 India approves GM crops in March. Four months on, the European
parliament votes for tough GM labelling. Monsanto again becomes
independent company.