May 18, 2000 / Reuters/Globe and Mail/National Post/ New York Times / Irene Marushko
WINNIPEG -- Canadian canola growers and government officials were cited as dismissing European complaints on Thursday about Canadian rapeseed containing modified organisms (GMOs) that farmers planted inadvertently in Britain, Sweden, France and Germany.
Dale Adolphe, president of the Canola Council of Canada, was quoted as saying, "It's an overreaction from the standpoint that most of what Europe has done with GMOs is an overreaction. It's a paranoia that Europe has over GMOs."
The story says that the difference between European and North American views of GMOs is about as wide as the Atlantic Ocean that separates the two continents. Americans and Canadians have generally expressed little concern about GMO products.
Vern Greenshields, spokesman for Agriculture Minister Lyle Vanclief, was quoted as telling Reuters that the seed was approved for human consumption in Canada, adding, "From our perspective there is no government responsibility in the sale of these approved seeds. It's a seed that's eaten in Canada."
Canada annually produces 6 million to 7 million tonnes of canola, which is chiefly exported to the United States, China, Mexico and Japan.
Adolphe was further quoted as saying, "GMO canola is approved in every part of the world except Europe."
Faced with the growing tempest in Europe, Lyle Vanclief, Canada's Agriculture Minister, was cited as criticizing Advanta yesterday for not doing enough to ensure it met the overseas rules, adding, "It's the responsibility of the company that's doing the exporting."
Howard Morris, general manager of Advanta Canada Inc., was cited as saying the incident does expose the need in Europe to define at what level a batch of seeds is considered free of genetic modification, because zero-tolerance might be impossible.
The Times article begins by saying that if Europe is virtually allergic to the genetically modified seeds that are so popular with North American farmers, it got a reason this week to sneeze with fury. Hundreds of farmers in England, France, Germany and Sweden are finding that they have unwittingly planted rapeseed oil crops for two years from bags of Canadian seed that inadvertently contained a scattering of genetically modified seeds for the plant used to make canola. European newspapers are referring to fields as tainted and contaminated, and environmental groups are calling for all the farmers who bought the company's seed to be tracked down and their fields burned before the crops mature and produce pollen that could blow to other plants. The seed company, the papers say, should pay for the destroyed crops.
According to a spokesman for Advanta, Kees Noome, the problem was found last month, when the German government conducted random checks of seed. Advanta is not sure what "impurity" the seeds have, Mr. Noome said, but the company presumes that it is a resistance to weed killer, a trait that is legal and sought after by many American and Canadian farmers. Advanta also presumes that the trait entered some seeds when pollen blew from other fields. The pollen, Mr. Noome said, would have to have blown "hundreds of meters," because the company "wouldn't buy seeds from a farmer whose direct neighbor grew the crop." Even nonbiotech seeds, he added, need to be grown as far as feasible from accidental pollination, because farmers buy seeds for particular crossbred traits like disease resistance.
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