Mixed signals

The GM Science Review, published this week, supports the view we have consistently taken, that more field testing is needed before they can be cleared for commercial production.

One scientist on the panel resigned on the grounds that the Review had been hijacked by scientists working for the biotech industry. If a team allegedly so well disposed towards GM can conclude that GM crops could pose a threat to plants and wildlife, no amount of spin-doctoring is likely to change public attitudes.

By refusing to give their recommendations until after the results of the four-year-long field trials are published in September, the scientists have effectively passed the buck. This will pose a severe problem for Downing Street.

American farmers, who have invested heavily in GM crops for export, stand to lose billions of dollars as a consequence of European misgivings. Washington is putting intense pressure on Tony Blair to give commercial GM planting the go-ahead.

Yet the British public is itself so fearful of GM foods that supermarkets are loath to stock them and farmers consequently have even less incentive to grow GM crops commercially.

This further supports the case for farm-scale evaluation tests on GM crops to be extended to incorporate environmental issues such as soil ecology and the health of bird populations which the current trials do not assess.