ecoglobe
{transcript from Environment News 1999L-04.HTM]
Giant Companies to Phase Out Biotech Foods
LONDON, UK, April 28, 1999 - The world's two largest food production
companies are withdrawing their acceptance of genetically modified foodstuffs.
Foods giant Unilever UK said Tuesday it would phase out genetically engineered
foods, a move that was closely followed by a similar announcement by Nestle
UK tonight.
Unilever, an Anglo-Dutch firm, sells over 1,000 brands of foods through 300
subsidiary companies in 88 countries world-wide with products on sale in a
further 70 countries. Nestle, headquartered in Switzerland, is the world's largest
food production company with 495 factories around the world.
Nestle CEO Peter Brabeck-Letmathe (Photo courtesy
Nestle)
The announcement by Nestle UK has major implications
for the company's international production system, as
most of its centralised production facilities produce for the
entire European market and not for the UK alone.
The announcements are in response to continued
demonstrations by European consumers of a strong resistance to foods
containing genetically modified crops. In February, an unprecedented wave of
debate on genetic technologies in agriculture swept the country, putting the
government and biotechnology firms firmly on the defensive. Fears were founded
on research that showed experimental rats had been harmed by eating modified
potatoes.
Greenpeace spokesperson Benedikt Haerlin said the Nestle and Unilever
announcements represent a major victory for European citizens. "When
Monsanto's first GE (genetically engineered) soya beans were shipped to
Europe Nestle, Unilever and Monsanto told us there was no way to stop having
GE ingredients in our food. Three years later they have learned that there is no
way to ignore the concerns and demands of the majority of consumers," said
Haerlin.
"With Nestle and Unilever, the two biggest food producers in the world, have now
broken ranks with international agro-chemical companies like by Monsanto, Du
Pont/Pioneer, Novartis and AgrEvo and started a stampede out of GE food," said
Haerlin.
Chairman of Unilever N.V. Morris Tabaksblat (Photo
courtesy Unilever)
The UK's Iceland Stores is opposed to the introduction of
genetically modified (GM) foods and has banned all GM
ingredients from their own-brand products. Other
supermarkets have followed Iceland's lead. Marks and
Spencer's own-brand products will be GM free by the end
of June 1999. Charles, the Prince of Wales, has come out
against genetically engineered crops, saying, "I am not convinced we know
enough about the long-term consequences for human health and the
environment of releasing plants (or, heaven forbid, animals) bred in this way."
"I suspect that planting herbicide resistant crops will lead to more chemicals
being used on our fields, not fewer. But this isn't the whole story," the Prince
said. "Such sterile fields will offer little or no food or shelter to wildlife, and there
is already evidence that the genes for herbicide resistance can spread to wild
relatives of crop plants, leaving us with weeds resistant to weedkiller."
Meanwhile, Friends of the Earth UK has criticized U.S. biotech giant Monsanto
for trying to use the law to deter public debate and protest over genetically
modified food.
Monsanto has obtained an injunction against six named defendants. The
company asked the High Court April 19 to order the defendants to hand over a
mailing list of recipients of a "Handbook For Action." The Handbook, which
outlines ways of protesting against genetically engineered foods, is believed to
have been sent to public figures including Prime Minister Tony Blair, Prince
Charles and the Pope. Monsanto's intention may be to target any individual or
organisation who might be held to have "encouraged" direct action against
genetically modified (GM) crops, by for example, publishing details of trial sites,
Friends of the Earth believes.
In the United States such legal action is known as a SLAPP (Strategic Action
Against Public Participation) lawsuit, a tactic sometimes used by large
companies facing environmental protests.
Genetically modified corn (Photo courtesy the
Prince of Wales)
Friends of the Earth would consider such an order
a gross intrusion of civil liberties and "one which
would bring our system of justice into disrepute,"
the group said in a statement.
Tony Juniper, policy and campaigns director of
Friends of the Earth, said, "Monsanto have lost the public arguments over GM
crops, and are now resorting to legal strong-arm tactics in response. I'm not the
least bit surprised, given Monsanto's track record. They would be better advised
to accept the failure of their marketing strategy and to accept the opinion of the
British public who do not want GM food foisted upon them."
The first farm to take part in the UK government's farm scale trials of GM crops
may be forced to plough up seed that it planted over the Easter weekend.
Friends of the Earth is calling on the government to suspend farm scale trials of
genetically modified crops at Lushill Farm, in Hannington, near Swindon,
Wiltshire following revelations that AgrEvo, the company undertaking the trials,
appears to have broken the law by not informing local people of its plans.
AgrEvo, now plans to notify the local public. But it has already planted GM seed
on the farm and that the law requires GM seed firms to notify the public prior to
planting.
[transcipt for educational not-profit purposes only]
news
(29 April 1999)