Govt says GE contamination OK: NZers disagree
The Green Party is extremely concerned that Cabinet papers released today on GE co-existence confirm that the Government
expects New Zealanders to accept a level of GE contamination of GE-free crops.
"It is an an abuse of human and consumer rights to expect consumers, and organic and conventional farmers and growers,
to accept GE contamination. This is something they have repeatedly said they passionately do not want in field and
food," Green Party Co-Leader Jeanette Fitzsimons said.
It was also greatly concerning that, under the GE regulatory system proposed by the Government, there would be huge
costs to the taxpayer and to GE-free growers. "The conditions proposed will require costly monitoring, enforcement and
testing. And you have to ask for what? There are no demonstrated benefits to New Zealanders," Ms Fitzsimons said.
"The Cabinet papers confirm the Royal Commission's finding that co-existence is only possible if some level of
contamination of GE-free crops is allowed. The Government clearly proposes to put in place a tolerance level of
contamination that growers and consumers don't want, but are going to be forced to accept.
"The Royal Commission pointed particularly to bees as being one of the most difficult areas to manage. The Government
proposes that it will be up to bee keepers to find out from the Internet where GE crops are growing and to keep their
bee hives six kilometres away," Ms Fitzsimons said.
"If they want their bees not to pick up GE pollen and bring it back to the hives and contaminate the honey and any crops
they touch on the way, they will have to waste time finding out where GE crops are. This is completely unacceptable, as
beekeepers will get absolutely no benefit from GE.
"The Royal Commission also identified Bt crops (crops engineered to produce the organic insecticide Bacillus
thuringiensis in all their cells) as a difficult area to manage. Bt is very important, as it is one of the few
insecticides available to organic farmers. They are concerned that insects will become resistant to Bt if plants,
genetically engineered to contain Bt all the time, are introduced here; as opposed to the current practice where farmers
spray Bt onto plants occasionally," Ms Fitzsimons said.
"The Government proposes that every farmer growing GE Bt crops has to plant non-Bt refuges next to them so that some
individual insects which are not resistant to Bt will survive. It is assumed that when these individuals breed with Bt-
resistant individuals the off-spring will also not be resistant to Bt. However, an important paper came out two years
ago that said refuges made resistance to the insecticide worse - the fact is the resistant ones pass on their
resistance.
"There's no reference in the Cabinet papers to that work, so on Bt resistance they haven't even read the latest
research. It makes you wonder, what else haven't they read?"
ENDS