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Corinne Lepage in Caen: April 2004 |
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Written by HH
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Sunday, 25 April 2010 |
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“Modern Risks and the Precautionary Principle as a Principle of Action and Management”.
Corinne Lepage will explain how trustworthy politics ought satisfy safety and precautionary requirements for critical questions such as the deterioration of climate, biodiversity, agriculture and arable land which promote famine, health risks as well as ethical risks in relation to food and biotechnologies, as well as crucial legal issues. Corinne Lepage, who is a lawyer and a former Environment Minister, is a passionate advocate of noble causes for citizens and for the planet. She is also, among other things, the President of the Committee for Independent Research and Information on Genetic Engineering (CRIIGEN), an organization advocating a better control of GMOs throughout the world. She will sign copies of her most recent books for the public of the InterAges University, and give a conference on Monday, 24 June from 2:30 pm in the Marie de Clèves Lecture Theater, Vissol Building, Campus 1, in the centre of Caen. |
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Last Updated ( Sunday, 25 April 2010 )
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The Use of GMOs Increases the Use of Pesticides |
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Written by HH
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Sunday, 25 April 2010 |
Internationalstatistics for 2003 on cultivated GMOs for commercial purposes in the environmentshow clearly that all GMOs are either developed with a transgenic characterlike the tolerance to a herbicide, or the actual direct production of an insecticide by the plant itself, orboth. The GMOs awaiting for a commercialization authorization in Europe havethe same features. The other claimed properties of GMOs have remained in thefield of research for the last twenty years. However, according to a reportwritten by Charles Benbrook detailing the American data of UDSA, the use of pesticides on GMOshas exceeded by more than 30.000 tonnes their use on conventional crops in thelast three years, mostly due to the outbreak of self-propagating weeds that areless sensitive to herbicides. The risks of pesticides associated to GMOs forhuman health remain to be studied, and CRIIGEN is undertaking an independentcritical expertise mission in this field. We demand that toxicity tests onanimals should be conducted over several months, before any human consumptionis envisaged, and such tests remain to be provided to the public for the GMOsawaiting for a European authorization, before we start talking about removingthe moratorium. http://www.biotech-info.net/technicalpaper6.html |
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Last Updated ( Sunday, 25 April 2010 )
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Poor Control Over GMOs: May 2004 |
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Written by HH
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Sunday, 25 April 2010 |
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CRIIGEN is not an organization fighting GMOs, but an organization advocating for a better control of GMOs, which is quite different. CRIIGEN, the Committee for Independent Research and Information on Genetic Engineering, is often quoted for disapproving the use of GMOs in the environment. Whereas a number of us do think that GMOs could be a useful tool for studying genes and their role, and producing interesting substances in a closed environment, agricultural GMOs seem to us to be poorly controlled and essentially at the service of an intensive type of agriculture that uses pesticides, while taking hostage more respectful types of agriculture for the environment, human health and society in general. Furthermore, the present promises have more to do with advertising than with science, and most of the time, they are not kept. Finally the question of experimenting in open fields must be raised. Such experiments must be, in our view, secondary to experiments in greenhouses and with the specific genetic characterizations that are missing most of the time. They need to be supervised by scientists and not only by industrials, which is the case for most. In short, such experiments ought to be conducted in a sealed-up environment, especially in relation to insects. We have many reasons to think that the present assessment rules on the risk of GMOs for human health and the environment, both from an objective and predictive point of view, are not properly implemented. The Scientific Council of CRIIGEN is composed of independent experts and not of activists www.crii-gen.org |
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Last Updated ( Sunday, 25 April 2010 )
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The Effects of GMOs on Human Health are Poorly Evaluated |
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Written by HH
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Sunday, 25 April 2010 |
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CRIIGEN is exposing the importing of a GMO Maize, poorly assessed in terms of human health. On 26 October, the European Commission has decided to authorize the importing of the Monsanto Roundup-tolerant GMO Maize NK 603 for human consumption and it is likely to contain Roundup. Eleven Member States out of twenty-five seemingly approved the decision last summer, including France. And yet, for example for France, the decision was based on the advice of the Commission of Biomolecular Engineering (CGB). During the proceedings, as much as fifty significant differences were observed in the health of rats consuming this GMO over a period of 13 weeks, according to the company applying for the commercialization authorizations and conducting the above experiment. However, such differences have been deemed “without toxicological meaning” by an expert who is the only person to have had the dossier in his hands, except for the President of the said Commission who sent this opinion in a great rush during the holiday in August and who only informed CGB in September. Such simplified procedures could lead to ratify misinterpretations and to underestimate the effects described in the dossiers. But similar misinterpretations could also well have taken place at a European level, where the decision procedures of scientists remain unclear. Monsanto published a paper in a scientific journal, claiming there were no problems involved, but without stating the actual levels of the Roundup contained in the GMO maize that may cause health problems in the medium- and long-term. CRIIGEN, an independent committee of counter expertise and debate on genetic engineering, encountered great difficulty in making public the proceedings that were covered by industrial and government secrecy (Le Monde, 23/4/2004). We had to appeal to the French Commission for the Access to Administrative Documents. Actually, it turns out with such issues that it is in fact the level of requirement for accuracy or the level of laxity of a handful of scientists which will decide on the interpretation of tests conducted by the same company which makes the release of this GMO maize both profitable and possible. It is high time to put into practice the highest scientific and honesty standards along with the ethical requirements and counter-expertise necessary for what is going to be one of the major transformations of the world: using genetic engineering makes it possible nowadays to artificially modify the genetic inheritance of the living beings that surround us. Such potentialities ought to be reserved for improving the living conditions of humans after deep reflection on the consequences, rather than serve mere immediate commercial interests. |
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Last Updated ( Sunday, 25 April 2010 )
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