Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

GM trial trashed ~ 12 arrested

Jean | 18.08.2002 17:04 | Bio-technology | Ecology | Health | Technology

Dozen arrested at illegal GM trial site in Dorset.

News Release - 18th August 2002

Illegal Dorset GM Rape Trial Decontaminated

Over a dozen arrested for 'criminal' damage

Contact number - 07956 334831 or 01300 348420

Interviews available, along with digital photos and video

Today (Sunday 18th August), a group of fifty or more ordinary people met to don protective clothing and remove an illegal public nuisance - the farmscale trial of GM oilseed rape in Hilton Dorset. The field is one of at least 15 at which an unlicensed release of antibiotic resistant rape has been found.

Legal action may be taken against the company for allowing this unlawful release but it seems unlikely as large corporations are rarely held accountable for illegal activities. However, pulling up the crops was deemed to be illegal and around a dozen people were arrested.

Around twenty police officers, four vans, six cars, police dogs, and a helicopter attended the demonstration that had hastily been organised in reaction to the news about the contamination. One of those arrested is a (ex)genetist - others attending included local organic farmers, solicitors, a doctor, gardeners, teachers, grandmothers and local councillors. They carefully baged up the seed pods, to be left for Bayer or DEFRA to disposs of.

Blunders by the biotech company responsible (German chemical giant Bayer, new owners of Aventis Cropscience), resulted in at least 25 of the farmscale trials since 1999 being planted with almost 3% of the unapproved seeds which contain an antibiotic resistant marker gene. Aventis was first informed of the problem in June and quick and descive action at that time could have removed the threat prior to pollenation. However Aventis did not inform the government untill a few days ago.

The government quickly announced that it would suspend the planting of the final trials (which were due to be sown next week) until the purity of the seed could be assured. However while they admit the failure is a significant one and is damaging to the credibility of the farmscale evaluations, they continue to resist calls to abandon the final phase of the trial. They have said that the unlawful crops will be destroyed but are taking no immediate action. The longer the crops remain in the ground, the longer they will shed potentially hazardous reproductive pollution into the environment.

One of the protesters, Sam Regis said;

"How can we trust the biotech industry with the future of our food when they can't even run a experiment safely? When the government chooses to represent the interests of industry over those of the people, we have a duty to remove whatever we can of these illegally GM plants. By doing so we hope to reduce the risk that the antibiotic resistant trait will be taken up by other organisms."

Local mum Claire Taylor said: "These trials aren't about establishing the safety of GM crops, they don't examine the creation of herbicide resistant superweeds, or the effect of an incompetent and unpredictable biotechnology industry on our agriculture. They're an amateurish investigation into the effect of spraying insects. What will it take for the government to admit that they're a threat which must be immediately abandoned? We must start to limit the damage now by cancelling all further planting and banning the growing of related species on land which has contained these antibiotic resistant crops."

Bill Posters, from Weymouth said "The trials are widely recognised as a farce - a waste of time and money and an unnecessary risk to our environment. They should be abandoned. Any information required about the effects of growing GM crops can be obtained by looking to the US, and Canada, were they have been grown commercially for several years. These real life situations show that in practise, growing GM increases the use of chemical herbicides, creates and spreads superweeds, and has failed to provided the promised economic returns for farmers."

----------
Editors notes:

Antibiotic resistant genes have been used extensively in crop genetic engineering as a selectable marker. Selectable markers are used in the laboratory to identify cells or embryos that bear the genetic modifications that the engineer wishes to commercialize. Thereafter the genetically modified organism has the antibiotic resistant gene in each and every one of its cells.

The OSR trials are contaminated with a variety of seed resistant to the antibiotic Kanamycin. This antibiotic is still used medicinally and it is know to cross-react with other related antibiotics. Kanamycin is a member of the family aminoglycoside antibiotics. Cross resistance between Kanamycin and other aminoglycosides including streptomycin, gentamycin and tobramycin has been recorded. All of the antibiotics mentioned are used to treat human diseases. Along with cross resistance to aminoglycoside antibiotics, pathogenic bacteria frequently develop multiple drug resistance transmitted on a single plasmid, and aquire plasmids with multiple antibiotic resistance genes in areas where the antibiotics are used extensively.

Kanamycin is used prior to endoscopy of colon and rectum and to treat ocular infections. It is used in blunt trauma emergency treatment and has been found to be effective against E coli 0157 without causing release of verotoxin. Extensive use of antibiotic resistant marker genes in genetically modified crops is shortsighted.

Many scientists have expressed concern that the gene may leak out into the environment, and particularly to bacteria. This could make the bacteria resistant to antibiotics and so make it difficult for doctors to treat infections. The biotech companies claim there is virtually no chance of this happening but admits it is possible.

It was an agricultural college in Scotland discovered that GM crops that it had planted for Aventis/Bayer were contaminated by another strain of GM seeds, which had an antibiotic-resistance gene. They informed Aventis in early June. Subsequent tests on other sites found that a total of twelve in England and two in Scotland were also currently contaminated with the antibiotic-resistant varieties.

The following is a list of sites at which these seeds have been planted during the last three years;
98/R19/18 1999 SK 968 589 Boothby Graffoe Lincolnshire
98/R19/18 1999 SU 157 919 Hannington Wiltshire
98/R19/18 1999 SU 677 980 Shirburn Oxfordshire
98/R19/18 2000 SK 959 592 Boothby Graffoe Lincolnshire
98/R19/18 2000 SP 069 360 Laverton Worcestershire
98/R19/18 2000 TA 265 382 East Newton Hull
98/R19/18 2000 SP 241 486 Alderminster Warkshire
98/R19/18 2000 NZ 137 115 Hutton Magna Yorkshire
98/R19/18 2000 SO 675 313 Kempley Gloucestershire
00/R14/8 2001 SAC Aberdeenshire
00/R14/8 2002 SAC Aberdeenshire
00/R33/9 2002 SK 600 712 Meden Vale Nottinghamshire
00/R33/9 2002 TF 944 250 Horningtoft Norfolk
00/R33/9 2002 TA 221 373 Aldborough East Riding of Yorkshire
00/R33/9 2002 TM 102 875 Winfarthing Norfolk
00/R33/9 2002 SJ 683 255 Hinstock Shropshire
00/R33/9 2002 NZ 205 365 Oakenshaw Durham
00/R33/9 2002 TF 216 976 Thorganby Lincolnshire
00/R33/9 2002 TF 221 888 Ludford Lincolnshire
00/R33/9 2002 SJ 399 262 Bagley Shropshire
00/R33/9 2002 SE 820 490 Kilnwick Percy East Riding of Yorkshire
00/R33/9 2002 ST 788 028 Hilton Dorset
00/R33/9 2002 TA 065 596 Nafferton East Riding of Yorkshire
98/R19/18 2002 NJ 746 301 Daviot Aberdeenshire
98/R19/18 2002 NJ 772 280 Daviot Aberdeenshire

Jean
- Homepage: http://www.togg.org.uk

Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech