On February 2 the European Union (EU) rejected an application from Bayer CropScience to grow genetically modified (GM) canola in Europe. The application had been pending since 1996, the same year GM canola was first grown commercially in Canada.
I read the final report and found that the issue was "a loss of biodiversity" as demonstrated in farm-scale evaluation trials in the UK. This was attributed to "better weed control". In fact, there was a "3-fold lower weed biomass and a 5-fold lower (weed) seed rain" compared with conventionally managed canola.
I was dumbfounded, because the GM canola was being rejected for the very reason it had been developed -- better weed control.
The history of crop cultivation in Europe dates back 2,000 years. Many crop weeds are now considered native and valued by conservationists as habitat for insects that are fodder for farmland birds. The same weeds are a production cost.
If the UK trials had shown the GM canola system did not give improved weed control, no doubt the technology would have been rejected on the basis that it failed in its key objective. The trials showed cultivation of GM canola provided superior weed control and GM canola was rejected because of the fewer weeds which was interpreted as "a loss of biodiversity". Clearly the GM companies are in a no-win situation in Europe.
Weeds are estimated to cost Australian agriculture in excess of $4 billion each year. Because weeds are such a significant cost, herbicide tolerance is the most sought after trait in GM crops and makes up three quarters of total GM plantings worldwide.
In contrast to the EU determination, the Australian federal government recently approved the planting of GM canola on the basis that it is no more harmful to human health or the environment than conventional canola varieties. However, moratoriums introduced by the NSW and Victorian governments prevent commercial plantings. Over the next few months the NSW government must decide whether it will approve large scale farm trials.
The trials are to test the potential for "co-existence" between GM and non-GM canola. Yet successful GM industries including Canadian canola and Australia cotton, while growing a percentage of both GM and non-GM plants, do not segregate the final product because their major export markets are not prepared to pay the additional costs.
We are at a cross roads in Australia, we can either go-the-way of Canada and accept GM canola, or we follow Europe and reject the technology.
The implications are significant. European agriculture is heavily subsidised and is increasingly as much about the provision of "environmental services" as it is about food production. In contrast Canada has embraced GM technology and is now the major world exporter.
Seventy-five per cent of Canadian product is genetically modified. Japan and China are Canada's two main export markets.
Australia currently consumes and exports vegetable oil from both conventional and GM cotton seed but only from conventional canola. Interestingly the Europeans have approved the importation of GM canola seed for consumption (i.e. they will eat GM, but not grow GM).
Further, the documentation supporting the decision to reject GM canola indicated a key herbicide currently used to control weeds in conventional canola in Australia will be phased out in Europe by April 2005 because of environmental concerns.
If we reject GM canola we will be denying Australian canola growers the production efficiencies their competitors -- Canadian canola growers and Australian cotton growers -- enjoy in new GM varieties.
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