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| NCGA
First Vice President Leon Corzine, left, and President Dee Vaughan,
right, visited a European corn field during the recent NCGA-U.S. Grains
Council biotech mission to the European Union and Russia. |
NCGA Leaders Share Lessons Learned on Biotech Mission to EU, Russia (7-6-04)
The use of biotechnology in agriculture continues to ignite debate
among farmers, governmental officials and consumers in the European
Union (EU). While many European growers recognize the potential
of biotechnology, alarmist consumer groups and media have prevented
widespread acceptance of biotech crops, according to National Corn
Growers Association (NCGA) leaders who recently returned from a
fact-finding mission to the EU and Russia.
Joined by members of the U.S. Grains Council, NCGA leaders spent
nearly two weeks in Italy, Austria, Hungary, Poland and Russia
gauging attitudes toward biotechnology. NCGA President Dee Vaughan
said attitudes toward biotechnology have changed since the first
USGC-NCGA joint mission four years ago.
“We’ve seen some incremental progress, especially
with the governments, but there is still much work to be done,” Vaughan
said. “These governments argued before that biotech acceptance
was a food safety issue, but now most of them appear to understand
that isn’t the case. Now they’re arguing that biotech
crops can’t co-exist with organic crops, so now we’re
addressing that concern.”
While countries
like Russia and Poland seemed more open to biotechnology, other
nations
like Austria appeared as unreceptive as ever, according
to Vaughan. “From what we gathered, Austria has no desire
to use biotech at all,” he said. “Most farms in Austria
are very small and they’re looking to simply maintain the
status quo.”
The group was
encouraged by its talks with Russian officials, Vaughan said. “Russia seemed much more receptive to biotechnology,” he
said. “They’re a science-based society and they seemed
very willing to look at this issue with open minds.”
NCGA Biotech Working Group Chair Helen Inman said many of the
farmers the group met with seemed to appreciate the promise of
biotechnology. But because of consumer attitudes and regulatory
challenges, many EU growers view the use of biotech products as
a hopeless endeavor.
“There are some farmers in the countries we visited that
probably would be interested in using biotechnology,” Inman
said. “But they’re worried that there won’t be
a market for their crops because of the widespread misunderstanding
and fear of biotech products in the EU.”
Inman said
the international press, consumer groups and environmental activists
have perpetuated
misinformation and inaccuracies concerning
biotechnology. “Fringe groups like Greenpeace have had quite
an influence on public opinion in the EU,” she said. “Because
of these groups and negative media reports, many of these countries
don’t completely trust this technology and they don’t
want to change.”
Vaughan said
one of NCGA’s goals is to dispel popular myths
by continuing an open dialogue with EU governments and farmers. “We
heard all kinds of myths about biotech,” he said. “One
of our objectives was to put out as much good information as we
could and get the facts into the hands of the decision makers.
We’re not pushing biotech for biotech’s sake. We’re
advocating biotech as another tool in the farmer’s toolbox.
If it doesn’t make sense for the farmer to use it, we certainly
understand that. But we do believe the farmer should at least have
the choice to decide.”
Inman agreed,
stating, “Our purpose was not to travel around
the EU and tell everyone ‘you have to use biotech.’ We
just want farmers and consumers in the EU to have the option to
use biotechnology in agriculture and to buy products that contain
biotech.”