Hexham, England, United Kingdom
April 25, 2008
The National
Beef Association has called for all resistance to GM crops,
at both UK and EU level, to be abandoned immediately in response
to seismic shifts in world demand for food, the growing danger
of global food shortages, and the prospect of declining domestic
animal production.
It says the UK and EU agriculture industries cannot allow
themselves to be held back by backward and protectionist
attitudes to GM technology now that food is no longer either
cheap, or abundant, and wants to see all available agricultural
tools being used to allow production to keep pace with the
soaring consumer demand.
“Full use of modern technology is essential if more farmers are
to be able to grow more food crops on the increasingly limited
area of agricultural land that is available,” explained NBA
chairman, Duff Burrell.
“Rapid food price inflation is already alarming government and
consumers, and the production of both cereals and meat will
reduce at the same time as shop prices reach toe curling levels
unless GM aids become part of UK and EU farming’s routine tool
kit.”
According to the NBA just one GM crop, an insect resistant maize
planted on just 110,000 hectares, is authorized for use within
the EU while a second crop, a blight resistant potato has still
to complete its production trials.
In contrast huge exporters like the US and Argentina have
between them dedicated almost 80 million hectares GM crops
because they expect them to raise yields by giving protection
against insects and disease – and these countries are now being
followed by Brazil and Canada as well as India and China too.
“This means that as Europe becomes more reliant on food imports
its consumers will buy more products that contain an increasing
proportion of GM ingredient and claims made by uninformed GM
opponents that they are able to protect consumers from GM
products have already become a joke,” said Mr Burrell.”
“The European Commission must accept that opposition to GM
technology lacks logic and agree that the GM import issue needs
an urgent solution because a massive rise in EU and UK livestock
feed prices, and a corresponding reduction in livestock
population, can only be avoided by quickly clearing the backlog
of GM importation approvals.”
“Feed compounders are keen to have access to substitutes for
record priced EU grain and this can only be done if obstacles to
import approval for gluten derived from the new GM maize
variety, Herculex, and new varieties of GM soya, are removed.”
“And the Association has noted that the UK’s former chief
scientist, Professor Sir David King, has estimated that the cost
of the UK’s failure to embrace GM crops has already cost its
cereal sector £4 billion in lost output,” Mr Burrell added. |
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