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GREENPEACE
EXPOSES GENETIC CONTAMINATION OF COTTON IN GREECE
10
March 2000 -
ATHENS - BRUSSELS EU
Greenpeace today exposed
large-scale genetic contamination of imported
cottonseed in Greece and demanded that Greek and
EU authorities take immediate action to stop the
planting of contaminated seed. The organisation
demonstrated in Athens in front of the ministry of
agriculture where twelve activists erected a
'statue of Frankenstein' and blew a tonne of
cotton in the air with film studio fans
symbolising the spread of genetic pollution.
"This case once again shows the difficulty of
controlling the GE contamination, and that the
authorities don’t have a clue what’s going
on," said Nikos Charalambides of Greenpeace.
"The Greek authorities have taken no action
to stop the spread of the contaminated seed even
though we informed them about our preliminary
information three weeks ago and despite the fact
that EU legislation requires them to prevent any
commercial use of unapproved GE crops."
Greenpeace took samples of cottonseed sold in
Greece and sent them to Gene Scan Laboratory in
Freiburg, Germany for analysis. Two out of seven
samples were found to be contaminated and a third
one had a strong indication of contamination. The
seed sampled originates from Mississippi and
Arizona where about 2/3 of cotton grown is GE.
"It is alarming that GE crops which have not
been tested for human consumption and contain an
antibiotic resistance gene are about to enter the
European food chain," said Charalambides.
60-70 per cent of the Greek cotton harvest is used
for the production of cotton oil and animal fodder.
Greece exports about 85,000 tonnes of cotton oil
and feed annually to Italy and Spain.
"We today also alerted the European
Commission that Greece is breaching European
legislation by allowing unauthorised GE crops to
be grown in Greece and that similar illegal
growing of GE cotton may be taking place in Spain,"
said Charalambides. "This illegal growing is
also subsidised by the EU."
The authorities must confiscate the contaminated
seed immediately because the farmers could start
the planting any day now. Furthermore the European
Commission needs to demand a guarantee from the
Member States that no GE contaminated seed is
imported to EU.
Furthermore this is not only an issue for cotton
growers. GE contaminated maize seed from Pioneer
Hi-Bred was found last year in Germany and
Switzerland."
By
www.greenpeace.org
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