Genetic Engineering - The War Goes On

So far this spring, environmentalists and concerned local people have illegally sabotaged two crops of genetically modified (GM) oilseed-rape in Scotland. Owned by AgrEvo, a giant biotech corporation, the crops consisted of rape-seed genetically engineered to withstand repeated sprayings of the company's main herbicide. As with Monsanto and their Round-Up Ready GM sugar beet in Ireland, this system allows AgrEvo's chemical to be used on crops as they are growing, thus killing everything else except the genetically engineered plants.
Working with a group called Fife Earth First!, activist Matthew Herbert is one of the people resorting to "direct democracy", or illegal, non-violent direct action, in an attempt to halt the march of GM foods in Scotland.
"There'd been a lot of work in public awareness raising and signing petitions and lobbying MPs, all that kind of stuff," says Herbert, describing the chain of events that eventually led 50 local people to break the law in broad daylight, and destroy AgrEvo's genetically modified rape-seed site.
"It became pretty obvious," continues Herbert, "that we could lobby and write letters and have public meetings to our hearts' content, but at the end of the day, this site was going to flower. And the moment it flowered, we had a very real risk of genetic pollution. Every single grain of pollen from that crop was going to carry with it genes that had never entered the local environment before, and that was going to have pretty disastrous implications for the future of the local environment and for human health."
The local Earth First! group decided that since no one else had plans to stop the plant from flowering, they would have to do it themselves.
Imagine the scene. You're driving along a main road in the countryside, when you pass a large sign declaring the area a "BIO-HAZARD". Above that, there's a massive red "X" crossing a whole field of plants. Next day you hear, via spoof press releases to the media, that the work was the responsibility of The G-nome Project. "They were a group of angry gnomes," explains Herbert, "who in the middle of the night had marked the field in protest at humans' actions and how little thought they had about the rest of the world. These gnomes had decided to take action because, quite clearly, humans were incapable of doing anything about it."
The anti-genetech gnome action happened in early March. A week later, Earth First! held a public meeting, calling for local people to do something about the GM crop nearby. Some weeks on, seven locals, including an organic farmer, went to the test site with scythes and openly, in daylight, mowed down as many GM rape-plants as they could.
The plants were chopped a week before they were due to flower. However, rape cannot be terminated by scything alone, and though the crop's value as a scientific test had certainly been destroyed, the genetically engineered plants began to grow back again very quickly.
On 29th March, Fife Earth First! organised another public meeting, billed specifically as an anti-GM food festival. The festival was well-publicised, and included speakers, info stalls and a protest at the actual GM rape crop site, where organisers planned to put banners and scarecrows. After some organic food and music, about fifty people, including many children, walked the mile and a half to the protest site and, prompted by the information they'd received earlier in the day, spontaneously decided to pull the rape crop out by its roots.
Several police looked on while this illegal action took place, but they declined to intervene. In fact, none of the 50 people got into trouble; the farmer didn't press charges, and the company AgrEvo stayed remarkably quiet after the event. (In France recently, the same corporation has had to cancel 28 proposed rape-seed trials, probably to avoid negative public reaction.)
In May there was a further sabotage, this time in Aberdeen, where activists scythed a huge X across another field of GM rape. The crop was growing on a FACCT farm, which stands for "Familiarisation and Acceptance of Crops Incorporating Transgenic Technology". According to Matthew Herbert, the Aberdeen farm is one of a string of FACCTs across Britain intended by the biotech industry as "show homes".
"They get farmers in to sell them the idea, to let them know what their site would look like if they buy GM plants. But it was very important that we also let the farmers know what their sites would look like;" hence, explains Herbert, the large X mown into the field.
Discussing these anti-genetech actions in Scotland, Herbert comments: "These people knew that the kind of actions they were taking were illegal, but they were still going to do it. I think that's the kind of reaction you get; when people realise that the law isn't going to protect them from the consequences of genetic pollution and the whole issue of corporate domination of everything we eat, they are prepared to take strong action. And I think that those who aren't prepared to take strong action still support strong action."
But why didn't protesters choose a legal route?
"In Scotland," observes Herbert, "those people that are committed to stopping this are also committed to peaceful direct action. We realise that the legal route isn't ultimately going to supply the support we need, because the law is fundamentally on the side of where the money's lying, and we all know where the money's lying with this one. The law may play with the issue a little bit, and it may introduce bits and pieces, like some kind of labelling, but it's not going to stop these test sites while there's this much money to be made. So the people up here are committed to taking action which may be illegal, but we know it's right.
"We're facing a form of pollution that is invisible and irreversible. It is more serious than anything else we can think of because it is so completely unstoppable once it's out there."
What does Herbert have to say to the public in Ireland, where last month Monsanto planted GE sugar beet in five different sites around the country, despite thousands of objections to the government's Environmental Protection Agency?
"If you can stop it in the courts, stop it in the courts," he advises. "But I would say don't expect the law to protect people against this form of pollution. Also, there's the question of urgency. It's great dragging things through the courts, but the courts take a long time, and every field that flowers is more genetic pollution. And we've got a very real threat to non-GE crops through gene transfer, and then it spreads and it spreads.
"I think the longer we delay doing something about it, the more acceptance it gets, because people are worn down bit by bit by the propaganda of the companies involved, and by the sheer fact that the companies turn around and say, 'Look, we've been doing it for years now anyway, so what's the point?'. You might have seen that quote from Monsanto's European PR guy, that they have 90 million acres of GM crops around the world, so how can Europe possibly resist? What we have to say is that Europe is going to resist, and if Monsanto think we're just going to roll over and let them tickle our tummies, they can forget it."
Matthew Herbert laughs when I mention that Monsanto's latest glossy brochure is full of environmental buzzwords like "sustainable farming" and "eco-tillage".
"Well, I'm not going to sleep any better for knowing that," he chuckles, "but I'm certainly not going to stop hassling the hell out of them and the other biotech companies. You only have to look at Monsanto's record. The people that brought you Agent Orange and PCBs [dangerous chemicals now outlawed because of their links with cancer] - if you trust them, fine, but I really don't think that they're trustworthy. I think at the end of the day, the public have to consider who they want trust on this issue."Yes, there may be a bunch of people that get called 'eco-vandals, eco-terrorists'. But why are we doing it? What is making us take this kind of illegal direct action? I don't do it because I enjoy it; it's got to be something pretty serious before I'll consider going out and breaking the law. We've got nothing to gain from this other than the potential of a lot of legal problems."What have Monsanto got to gain from it? It's very simple; they've got millions of pounds to gain from it. They want to own life, they want to own everything we eat. And I think if you put that to the public, they'll know which choice to make. Do they support us, or do they support Monsanto? Who do they believe? A bunch of people that are putting their necks on the line for nothing, or a corporation who stand to make a lot of money by risking our health, our food supply and our environment?"

"We would expect people to abide by the law," says Michael Keane, when I ask for his reaction to the sabotage of genetically engineered crops. Former editor of the Sunday Press, Keane currently works for Fleishman-Hillard Saunders, the international communications agency who do Monsanto's PR in Ireland.
"One of the things that opponents of genetic engineering have been seeking is further scientific information about genetically-engineered food, and what Monsanto are trying to do in the trials that are currently underway is to get further information," Keane insists. "You can't have it both ways - you can't look for information and then when we actually go about it, oppose it. The people who destroyed the beet in Carlow last year, destroyed a scientific experiment. And they broke the law, and they have threatened to do it again.
"They've announced that they are going to have a public protest on the 21st June, but they've also said that they are going to trespass on the trials. Trespass is against the law. We have no problem at all with people making their voices heard; public protest is a right, but it is against the law to trespass on private property, and it is very much against the law to destroy private property.
"That is matter for the law and the gardaí. The gardaí must deal with questions of trespass. If people want to make a public protest, that's fine, but breaking the law is a different matter altogether."
What does Keane make of the claim by activists that if people delay, then opposing public opinion will be worn down bit by bit by what they call the "propaganda" of the companies involved?
"This is a convenient way around," he responds. "It's nonsense. They just don't want these experiments to go ahead. It would be different if there was evidence that genetically engineered food is environmentally dangerous, but there's no such evidence whatsoever."
Here lies the crux of the matter. Environmentalists and genetic scientists who oppose genetech food claim to hav

e more than enough information showing
that genetic engineering in agriculture poses unacceptable risks to human and ecological health. According to such sources, the risks include:
* the transfer of antibiotic resistance from plants to humans, because many GE crops contain antibiotic resistance genes;
* an increase in the use of dangerous herbicides and pesticides, since chemicals like Round-Up can now be sprayed more freely on plants genetically engineered to be resistant to them (herbicides are implicated in cancers, and are increasingly associated with rising levels of breast, prostrate and testicular cancer);
* the creation and spread of viral disease due to the method of gene transfer from one species to another;
* the unpredictable impact that non-evolutionary gene spill from test sites will have on species in the wider environment;
* new allergens and toxins in our food, and a very serious threat to the stability of our food supply.
Michael Keane counters these fears by suggesting that people should have more faith in the authorities.
"The regulations and the conditions that are laid down by all of the environmental protection agencies are very stringent," he says. "And at the end of the day, they have decided that these experiments are safe and can go ahead. And we will be delighted to observe all of their restrictions and conditions. And we are convinced - and they must be convinced, otherwise they wouldn't have given permission - that there is no danger to human health or environmental health in Europe. We understand that there are concerns, and we're meeting those concerns, and we don't see that there is any danger.
In Monsanto's work, opponents see threats to food, health and the environment in general; for Monsanto's part, the company claims its experiments are completely safe and conducted for the greater good.
The genetic engineering issue boils down to this: who do you believe? n