We only have 2 weeks to make a loud noise about this bogus review panel.
It is felt that if we do not and the panel succeeds in their goal of a major PR
coup, in a few months it will be much harder for the US public to hear us. We
have them running already, let's keep it up. Supporting documents are included
or will follow.
Thank you for any help you can give.
Judy
-------
Urgent Action Needed - Biased panel to set US biotech policy, laws
The National Academy of Sciences will begin a "fast track" study on April 8 in
order to give GE foods a rubber stamp of approval - by investigating the
benefits and potential risks of genetically engineered crops with an eye toward
recommending changes in government regulations. (see article below)
The NAS study is an attempt to minimize the effect on the US public of
the European furor over GE food. The NAS is a highly respected body, and
supposedly "independent," so it has the power to pull off a major biotech PR
coup.
The NAS is largely responsible for the US policy on biotech. Since the 70's it
has promoted GE to Congress, to the Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton
Administrations, to Wall Street investors, federal agencies, etc. Also, the
NAS is under the thumb of Monsanto, et al, and under pressure to show the
biotech flag. Plus it wants to protect its reputation.
The study is expected to be narrow in scope, and will conclude that there are
some problems which can be handled, and that the benefits far outweigh the
risks. As Joe Cummins says, it "will show the bias of the committee and serve
as a public relations scheme to revive the worldwide image of biotechnology."
Please note:
1. The panel is stacked in favor of the biotech companies
(you can see for yourself in a separate post (with biotech interest
emboldened or explained) or by going to this URL
http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument
2. Usually NAS studies take 18 months but this study will take 1/3 that
time - 6 months.
3. The review is unannounced. Monsanto was upset when they
heard that the author of the article knew about it.
LET THE NAS KNOW WE ARE WATCHING AND THAT THEY CAN'T DO A WASH JOB.
What you can do:
1) We have until April 8 to flood the NAS with comments on the NAS Committee
membership - demand they reveal any biotech conflicts of interest.
A response form is set up on the NAS website (sample letter below):
http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument
Project ID is BANR-O-99-02-A.
Here you can e-mail the NAS directly, access the committee membership, and the
project scope.
2) Send the article below and this information to as many environmental
organizations, websites, listserves, etc., as possible so their members can
send their responses to the NAS as soon as possible.
3) Contact your Congressperson asking them to inquire whether the panel
members are really objective.
4) Contact media telling them to follow up on the story. Send them the article
with a cover letter (2 samples below).
Sample letter for website:
Dear NAS,
I am concerned that the committee that is reviewing the health, safety, and
environmental impact of genetically engineered agricultural products is made up
primarily of scientists that derive their livelihood from genetic engineering,
work for organizations who rely on grants from bio-engineering companies, or
are official regulators of the technology (and therefore cannot easily take a
public stand against it).
It would almost appear that the role of this committee is to get an NAS rubber
stamp to proceed, while many scientists in the US, Europe and Asia are
questioning the long-term environmental impact of this technology.
- Ornithologists and entymologists are concerned about the destruction of
beneficial insects (through Bt ingestion) and mass death of birds that prey on
these (and pest) insects.
- Ecologists are concerned about horizontal gene transfer to similar species
of plants (through cross-pollination), recombination of plant viruses used as
the DNA transfer mechanism, and genetic pollution of the biosphere.
- Agronomists are concerned about the massive transformation of the
biodiversity of food plant species to monocultures.
- Economists are concerned about the transformation of entire rural economies
from subsistence horticulture to cash commodity agriculture.
- Medical doctors are concerned that the enzymes and proteins expressed by the
inserted or modified genes may have adverse health effects, such as the
increase in allergy to RRS soybeans found in Europe.
Yet none of the many scientifically credentialed critics of agricultural
genetic engineering have been included on the committee destined to provide a
review of this technology in the name of the National Academy of Sciences.
Without such members on the committee, and an unrestricted open debate about
the full range of issues, any report that the committee prepares will, by its
very nature, be discredited before it is published.
I strongly urge you to reconsider the membership of the committee to include
serious critics of the technology, so as to make them at least 50% of the
membership of the committee.
Sincerely,
--------
Sample letter - media 1:
Dear Editor,
On April 8, 1999 the U.S. National Academy of Sciences is going to begin a
"fast track" study to investigate the risks and benefits of genetically
modified (GM) crops. NAS Studies usually take about 18 months but this study is
expected to be completed in six months.
Biotech companies like Monsanto, Dupont, and Dow have invested billons of
dollars in GM food crops. They are now facing a meltdown of public trust in
Europe and the possibility of that happening in the United States.
The NAS panel is stacked in favor of the biotech companies. We believe they
are behind this "fast-track' NAS study in order to gain a rubber stamp approval
for their products..
The URL for the NAS Committee on Genetically Modified Crops is:
http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument
Below please find an article by Journalist Bill Lambrecht of the St. Louis Post
regarding the NAS study.
Sincerely,
-------
Sample letter - media 2:
Dear Editor,
On April 8, 1999 the U.S. National Academy of Sciences is going to begin a
"fast track" study to investigate the risks and benefits of genetically
modified (GM) crops. NAS Studies usually take about 18 months but this study is
expected to be completed in 6 months.
Biotech companies like Monsanto, Dupont, and Dow have invested billons of
dollars in GM food crops. They are now facing a meltdown of public trust in
Europe and the possibility of that happening in the United States.
The furor has reached firestorm proportions in other parts of the world,
with people burning and uprooting biotech plots, UK MPs calling Monsanto
"Public Enemy #1", supermarkets declaring themselves Genetic Engineering-free
zones, the European Union potentially blockading against GM foods, and Brazil
halting all GM seeds.
Farmers in the US have eagerly bought into the biotech revolution, unaware of
the environmental problems and potentially catastrophic economic downside:
inability to sell their crop and contamination of their land and grain silos if
the furor spreads to US consumers.
Thus an immediate whitewash of the technology is crucial for these biotech food
giants and their contractors, supporters, and farm clients.
We believe that is the impetus behind this "fast-track" NAS study. The
composition of the NAS panel is telling because it is heavily stacked in
favor of the biotech industry. Monsanto, Dupont, and Dow already exert
powerful influence in several critical parts of the federal government: trade,
FDA, USDA, EPA, and the President and VP. A rubber stamp of the National
Academy of Sciences might overcome the objections of many researchers and
activists if they don't have the full story in front of them, and would
influence the decisions of regulatory agencies abroad.
The URL for the NAS Committee on Genetically Modified Crops is:
http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument
Below please find an article by Journalist Bill Lambrecht of the St. Louis Post
regarding the NAS study.
Sincerely,
-------
Altered crops will get safety review
By Bill Lambrecht
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau
The National Academy of Sciences is beginning an urgent study of the
benefits and potential risks of genetically engineered crops with an eye
toward recommending changes in government regulations.
Over the next six months, a special committee of 13 scientists and
experts chosen by the National Research Council, which is an arm of the
National Academy of Sciences, will examine not only safety issues but social
and economic implications of plants modified with pesticide
genes. That includes most genetically engineered crops.
Studies by the research council usually take about 18 months. But the
new effort will be conducted in a third of that time because of pressing
questions in need of answers, said the study's director, Michael
Phillips.
"Because of the urgency of this matter, we can't wait two years to
slowly put out a statement," Phillips said. "There are a lot of
questions, and the longer something like this lingers, it creates
concern in the industry and society in general."
The science academy did not formally announce its study; a list of the
members selected for the special committee appeared without fanfare on the
academy's Web site this week. Members will gather in Washington to begin their
work on April 8.
The study is especially important for St. Louis-based Monsanto Co., the global
leader in genetic technologies for farming and food. Philip
Angell, Monsanto's director of communications, said his company welcomes the
government's review.
"We're confident in the science, we're confident in the technology,"
Angell said. "This is certainly a distinguished body that we believe
will validate what we've always known about this."
The National Academy of Sciences serves as a scientific adviser to the
U.S. government, but it is not a government agency. It has about 1,600
members chosen for their achievements. New members are elected by the full
membership.
Usually, Congress or government agencies request and pay for studies by the
academy's research council, but occasionally - about 1 in 10 times - the
academy initiates its own study and pays for it from its endowment. This study
is one of the occasional exceptions. At a meeting on Dec. 9 in Washington, the
academy members agreed to conduct the genetic engineering study and to assume
the cost of about $300,000.
The academy has not issued a report on genetically engineered crops in a
decade. During that time, plantings of such crops in the United States have
soared to more than 50 million acres. The new study will examine field trials
and laboratory studies that have taken place in the 1990s.
Part of the urgency has to do with forthcoming Environmental Protection Agency
regulations. Those rules, which have been in the works since 1994, will govern
farming with crops engineered to produce a protein that kills pests. For
instance, farmers would need to maintain refuges - areas planted with
conventional varieties - adjacent to the modified crops.
Recently, the EPA has said that it will apply the rules sparingly.
Nonetheless, many scientists, among them Washington State University's R. James
Cook, believe that the EPA rules and definitions are too broadly drawn and need
to be scaled back.
"Call us naive academics if you want, but many of us believe that they
scooped up too much to regulate," Cook said. These scientists appealed to the
national academy, which agreed to begin the study.
In other words, the study was initiated not because of concerns that
there may be too little regulation but because of worries about too much
regulation.
No matter how it came about, the study is certain to have broad
implications. In Europe, Asia and parts of South America, a debate is
raging about the safety, morality and politics of altering the genetic
code of food. That debate is beginning to sound in the United States.
To answer skeptics, Monsanto and rivals argue that good science and a sound
regulatory system in the United States underpin their new technologies. Here
and abroad, the new study could validate those arguments. Or, it might identify
where more study is needed and better rules are needed.
Margaret Mellon, of the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington,
said her organization is pleased that the academy's study will take
place even though it was generated by fears of over-regulation.
"We have long been concerned that there is so little risk assessment
being done and so few data being collected to see if the risks are
present or not," Mellon said. "If this is a forum to see if there are
risks, that is fine."
For different reasons, Monsanto and environmental advocates want to keep the
EPA rules that helped to generate the new study. The environmentalists want
strict regulations because of what they see as unknown risks, such as the
outcrossing - or escape - of genes into the wild.
Companies assert that their technologies pose little or no risk that
would require any new regulations that might result from the study. But,
Monsanto's Angell said, companies need reasonable regulations for their genetic
technologies to take root.
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