Why organics should give GM a go

When my brother came home for Christmas last year I asked him to bring a large tub of yoghurt.

It is not that you can't buy yoghurt in Toowoomba, but the best yoghurt in Australia is surely Mungalli Creek yoghurt sold at Rusty's Market in Cairns.  It's organic, of course, and so creamy and smooth but with a unique acidic tang that screams Far North Queensland.

There is nothing like it in the supermarkets.  Organic food can be so delicate and delicious.  It is also expensive with organic produce often selling for many times the price of the conventional equivalent.

During his recent visit to the United States much was made of the Prince Charles' affair, not with Camilla, but organic food.  With rock star, Sting, he launched an international "Food for Life" campaign to promote organic farming.

Organic production has grown substantially in the past 10 years in the US and elsewhere, at the same time genetically modified (GM) crops have been commercially introduced and widely grown (now to 81 million hectares worldwide).  GM foods tend to be cheap because they are designed to be low input while high yielding.

Organic growers have campaigned against the introduction of GM canola into Australia and advocated the introduction of a "strict liability" regime for GM crops.  Scott Kinnear, representing many organic growers has objected to a 0.9 percent level of legal contamination for GM canola, seeking zero tolerance.  But interestingly, organic products are allowed a five percent non-organic tolerance.

In other words a product can contain five per cent non-organic ingredient and still be labeled organic.

The organic industry has established these standards for very pragmatic reasons:  There must be tolerance of a level of contamination;  there will be inevitably some mixing of different products.

However, it seems inconsistent that organic can be only 95 percent pure, but a 0.9 percent contamination with GM material is considered by the same industry to be unacceptable.  According to a recent study by consultants, ACIL Tasman, it would be difficult for the organic industry to claim damages under "strict liability" on the basis that GM crops are "hazardous and inherently dangerous" because that would involve the courts over turning the decision of the Office of the Gene Technology Regulator, which for example, has ruled that GM canola is as safe as conventional varieties.

There is a place for organics, but there is also a place for other production systems, so I reckon organic farmers should give GM a fair go.

The ACIL Tasman "Managing genetically modified crops in Australia" can be downloaded from the Avcare website at www.avcare.org.au.

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