FSG criticises Plant Breeders’ Bill

Food Sovereignty Ghana (FSG), a body opposed to Genetically Modified Foods (GMOs), has described the Plant Breeders’ Bill at the consideration stage before our Parliament as imposition of genetically modified organisms into the food chain.

It said without any form of public awareness and participation in the decision and far from “simply dealing with the rights of the plant breeder, the Bill is designed in such a way as to pre-empt the eventualities of government regulations such as those calling for the labelling of GM foods, or banning some of them for the sake of the environment or the health of Ghanaians”.

The full text of a statement issued by Mr Ali-Masmadi Jehu-Appiah, Chairman of FSG and copied to Ghana News Agency in Accra on Sunday reads:

This is what Clause 23 of the Plant Breeders’ Bill is about:

Clause 23: Measures regulating commerce.

“A plant breeder right shall be independent of any measure taken by the Republic to regulate within Ghana the production, certification and marketing of material of a variety or the importation or exportation of the material.”

The Bill seeks to pre-emptively knock out of order, any attempt by the government to control “the production, certification and marketing of material of a variety or the importation or exportation of the material.” And the “material of a variety” in question is described in Clause 20 (6) of the Bill as follows:

Clause 20 (6):

“(6) An essentially derived variety may be obtained for example by the selection of a

(a) natural mutant or induced mutant,

(b) somaclonal variant, or

(c) variant individual from a plant of the initial variety, back crossing or transformation by genetic engineering.”

For more on the specifics of the bill see: Plant Breeders’ Bill Protects GMOs | Food Sovereignty Ghana http://foodsovereigntyghana.org/plant-breeders-bill-protects-gmos/

Food Sovereignty Ghana is horrified by the mind-boggling attempts by people in responsible positions of public trust who are supposed to know better, to mislead the Ghanaian public and our law-makers that the Plant Breeders’ Bill has nothing to do with GMOs! The Bill has GMOs in the crossed hairs. The objective is to disable the ability of Ghanaians to legally challenge anything relating to the GMO imposition.

The Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, Mrs. Marietta Brew Appiah-Oppong, who ought to know better than this, has been a source of this misleading propaganda to divorce the Plant Breeders’ Bill from GMOs. She is on record to have challenged the FSG linkage of the PBB with GMOs at our meeting with the Parliamentary sub-committee on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs.

It is obvious that there is an orchestrated attempt not only to mislead Parliament into voting for the Bill, but also to throw dust into the eyes of the Ghanaian public about the real intent and import of the Bill vis-à-vis the enabling of the plant breeder to introduce GMOs into our food chain without any public awareness and participation in that decision.

As the debate regarding the linkage between the PBB and GMOs raged on, the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MOFA) through Deputy Minister at MOFA in-charge of Crops, Dr Yakubu Alhassan, joined the fray to publicly deny pushing a legalisation in support of the introduction of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in the country.

“It has, therefore, described as untrue, recent discussions by some institutions, civil society organisations (CSOs) and individuals that the Plant Breeders Bill, currently before Parliament, was meant to give legal backing to the production and consumption of GMOs in the country”. See: No plans to introduce GMOs into Ghana – Agric Ministry

Also, on December, 19, 2013, the Director-General of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Dr Abdulai Baba Salifu, was reported by the Ghana News Agency to have even organised a press conference to claim that “The Plant Breeder’s Right Bill before parliament, is to protect crop variety breeders and has nothing to do with Genetically Modified (GM) foods as been speculated.” See: Breeders’ bill has nothing to do with GMOs – CSIR http://www.ghananewsagency.org/science/breeders-bill-has-nothing-to-do-with-gmos-csir–68771

It would have been bad enough as it is, even if it could be argued that these people in responsible positions such as the Attorney-General, Director-General of CSIR, and the Deputy Minister for Food and Agriculture in charge of crops, made these these wild claims simply because they have not even bothered to read the Bill for themselves before pronouncing on an issue they have no idea of.

What is even alarming is the fact that these people continued to peddle their lies even after being publicly corrected by Prof. Walter Sando Alhassan during the FSG meeting with the Parliamentary sub-committee on Constitutional, Legal, and Parliamentary Affairs on December 4, 2014. They continued to stubbornly peddle these lies even after this! There seems to be a discernible determination on their part to use plain lies and deceit to push the Plant Breeders’ Bill into law.

Considering the far-reaching implications of this Bill on our sovereignty as a people, our health, as well as the sanity of our environment, the behaviour of these public officials goes beyond gross dereliction of duty to a betrayal of public trust and criminal negligence. It is a sad commentary on the entire Mahama Administration that these officials are still in post, and not under investigation for possible conflicts of interest. Monsanto is notorious for bribing their way in several countries. And such blatant lies from people in responsible positions must give cause for concern.

The very fact that the Plant Breeders’ Bill has gone through First and Second Reading without expunging the obnoxious clauses from it speaks volumes of the vulnerability of our branches of government to undue external influences inimical to Ghana. The Bill is being rushed to comply with the World Trade Organisation’s WTO, Trade and Related Intellectual Property Rights, TRIPS-rules without proper scrutiny. Ghana does not have to make the plant breeder’s right over and above the laws of Ghana in order to be in compliance.

The level and quality of the debates on the floor of Parliament over the Bill betrays a lack of information critical in taking these far-reaching decisions. For instance, most Parliamentarians are even unaware that the Bill before them is asking them to evacuate their sacred responsibility to diligently protect the health and safety of Ghanaians. Fewer still even know that the Bill has anything to do with GMOs. And those who did know and tried to speak up, were told publicly, and without any challenge, as trying “to confuse issues of botany with intellectual property”! See: page 483 of the Hansard, Plant Breeders’ Bill, 2013, Second Reading, 8th November, 2013.

It is under an atmosphere such as this that we call upon Parliament to defer debate on the Bill and begin to initiate a process of public consultations regarding the introduction of GMOs into our food chain. FSG feels very relieved that several civil society groups, workers’ unions, religious bodies, as well as political figures and heads of stake-holder public institutions have come out openly calling for a careful look, further public awareness and consultations, before proceeding. We particularly welcome the counsel by the Catholic Bishops Conference to the Parliament to “make haste slowly” with the Plant Breeders’ Bill. Meanwhile, our goods are getting rotten in the farms, our farmers have no security of tenure, our roads are poor and there are a thousand of things the government can do to ensure food security. There is no reason to rush with the Plant Breeders’ Bill. GNA.. source:Vibeghana

British scientists seek go-ahead for GM 'Omega-3' crop trial

The application for permission to conduct the trial, which submitted to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) on Monday, is subject to a public consultation and an inquiry by a scientific committee that monitors such GM plans.

British scientists have applied for permission to run an open-air field trial of a genetically modified (GM) crop they hope may one day become a sustainable and environmentally friendly source of healthy Omega-3 fats.

The proposed trial - likely to generate controversy in a nation where GM foods have little public support - could start as early as May and will use Camelina plants engineered to produce seeds high in Omega-3 long chain fatty acids.

No GM crops are currently grown commercially in Britain and only two - a pest-resistant type of maize and a potato with enhanced starch content - are licensed for cultivation in the European Union (EU).

But scientists at Britain's agricultural lab Rothamsted Research have developed Camelina plants to produce Omega-3 fats that are known to be beneficial to health but normally found only in oils in increasingly limited fish stocks.

The idea, they told journalists at a briefing on their plans, is initially to supply the fish farming industry - which currently consumes around 80 percent of fish oils taken from the sea - with a non-fish source of these Omega-3s. Beyond that, possibly within a decade, the GM-produced Omega-3 oils could be used in food products such as margarine, the researchers said.

"We now have a vegetable oil enhanced with these two critical fish oils," said Johnathan Napier, a professor of plant science and head of a 15-year research project which has so far shown that the fish-oil producing plants can been grown successfully in greenhouses.

"We know it works in the glasshouse, now (we need to see) does it work in the real world?" he said. The researchers said that although the trial would be in the open air, there was no risk of cross-pollination between the Camelina plant and other field crops grown in Britain.

The application for permission to conduct the trial, which submitted to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) on Monday, is subject to a public consultation and an inquiry by a scientific committee that monitors such GM plans.

A decision could be made within 90 days.

While Britain and the EU have been very reticent about the use of GM crops, they are commonplace elsewhere. The first GM seeds were planted in the United States more than 15 years ago and so far no evidence has been documented of adverse health impacts for people eating GM-derived foods. GM crops can also be imported into Britain and used to produce ingredients for human food and for animal feed.

While he acknowledged there is likely to be some public opposition to the idea of a GM field trial, Napier said he hoped the potential for boosting health and protecting the environment would persuade sceptics of the project's value.

"If you have a crop that has got potential health benefits and sustainability and environmental benefits, and we can articulate that clearly, then I think people will see this is an OK thing to do," he said. Omega-3 oils found in fish are known to help reduce the risk of cardiovascular diseases including heart attacks and strokes. Agri.eu

Ag leaders work to smooth over GMO corn issue with China

DES MOINES | Genetically modified corn from Iowa and elsewhere isn’t cutting it in China, according to news reports.

Iowa agriculture officials and corn industry leaders acknowledge that China recently rejected a shipment of GMO corn from the U.S., but they also say talks are ongoing to smooth the rough spots out of what they call a misunderstanding of what GMOs are all about.

“It’s really hard to know what the reasons would be for something like that,” said Bill Northey, Iowa’s agriculture secretary.

Factors other than the presence of GMOs could be at play in the rejection, Northey said.

“We’ve seen the corn market go down in price, and some suggest some of this corn was probably bought at higher prices ... so there’s some motivation to reject it and not have to pay the higher price,” he said.

Pam Johnson, a sixth-generation corn farmer in Floyd and president of the National Corn Growers Association as well as part of Maizall, a new international corn industry alliance of the U.S., Brazil and Argentina, recently went to a food security summit in China to meet with agriculture leaders and regulators to work through any difficulties.

“We were there to talk about how important biotechnology is, not only to food but to food security,” Johnson said. “We all know we’re fierce competitors in the global marketplace, but we all realize we have challenges and opportunities we all share and it’s to all our benefit if we work together.”

More than 40 speakers from China’s government and regulatory system addressed the summit, and they indicated an openness to working with international partners, Johnson said.

“They said they’re looking at changing their definition of food security,” Johnson said. “Instead of saying food security means we can grow it all by ourselves, they’ll be looking to growers in other countries and saying, ‘We want an open and transparent signal about how much we need and what we need, which other markets can respond to.' It’s a huge deal and something we’ve needed.”

One of the messages brought to China was how important that market is to Iowa corn, Johnson said.

“We know livestock and ethanol are very important, but we need to remember 95 percent of world’s population lives outside our borders,” she said. “The issues may be complex, but we think we can and will work on them to make sure we have a global trading system that is efficient, because it’s important to all of us.”

There’s nothing new in biotech crops, and China understands that, Northey said.

“China itself has bought gobs and gobs of U.S. soybeans, and all those are biotech,” he said. “All the corn we’ve shipped has been biotech. But they’re really starting to grow as a corn buyer.”

There are plenty of global markets for Iowa corn, Northey said.

“It matters to the corn market, but if the corn finds another home, it matters to the total demand,” he said. “To most Iowa farmers, we don’t know if it’s going to a chicken feeder in Arkansas or a feed miller in China or Japan. We just know it left, and that disappearance matters.”

Biotech is as much a part of farming as soil and water, said Nick Sawyer, a corn and soybean farmer in Tama County.

“To feed people and feed them effectively, we have to grow the best crop at the highest levels we can,” he said. “Just with the way the system is right now and some of the problems we have with weeds and things, growing with non-genetically modified crops just hurts the yield so much, it probably hurt a lot more people if we didn’t have them. We wouldn’t have enough to feed them.”

Shannon Textor, director of market development with the Johnston-based Iowa Corn Growers Association, said she was in China when some of the corn shipments were stopped.

She said she also has sat in on a number of “really good meetings” that addressed concerns.

“We went to the ports and talked to end-user customers for both pork as well as corn and distillers' grains,” she said. “There’s an understanding why we use technology on our farms. I think there was an appreciation and understanding why farmers use that.”

The U.S. Grains Council has boots on the ground in China and continues to meet with officials, Textor said.

“They’re working on this issue, and it’s all-consuming of their time,” she said. “It’s created a roadblock for trade, so they’re working with the ministry of agriculture.”

Textor said she is optimistic that further understanding will lead to future sales.

“We as farmers need that tech, and the consumers do, too, and I am optimistic we’ll overcome the problems,” she said. Cedar Valley Business