Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>]

ISIS Press Release 08/09/07

USDA Proposes Further De-regulation of GMOs
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The proposed changes make the regulatory regime even more 
permissive. Prof. Joe Cummins and Dr. Mae-Wan Ho

This article was submitted to the USDA on behalf of ISIS. 
Please circulate widely to your policy-makers

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal 
and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has proposed 
changes to regulations on Introduction of Organisms and 
Products Altered or Produced Through Genetic Engineering, 
available for public comment before 11 September 2007 at: 
http://www.regulations.gov/fdmspublic/component/main. 

APHIS is seeking public comment on its draft environmental 
impact statement (DEIS) presenting alternatives in a series 
of questions. The questions and our answers are given below.

Question 1: Should APHIS continue to regulate GE 
[genetically engineered] organisms solely on the basis of 
potential risks as plant pests, or should they also be 
regulated based on other potential risks such as those for 
noxious weeds and biological control organisms? 

Answer: APHIS should more realistically take into account 
the risk of transgenic contamination of crops and weedy 
relatives of the crops. The detrimental economic impact of 
transgenic contamination as well as the toxic potential, 
especially of pharmaceutical products or transgenic 
biopolymers, must be evaluated. Crops modified with genes to 
enhance energy production may genetically contaminate food 
crops. Finally, transgenic contamination should be treated 
as any other environmental pollution. APHIS should take into 
account the strong evidence that transgenic contamination is 
unavoidable [1] (GM Contamination At 21 km and Farther. No 
Co-Existence Possible, SiS 35)

Question 2: Should a new system of risk-based permit 
categories be designed to deal with new products and new 
concerns? 

Answer: It is imperative that crops such as food crops 
modified to produce pharmaceutical proteins or crops 
destined for energy production should be evaluated by 
criteria that are different from those of food crops in 
recognition that the transgenes pose unique dangers to 
health. The same applies to 



Read the rest of this article here
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/USDAderegGMOs.php


Or read other articles on Genetic Engineering Regulation
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/GE-regulation.php


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This article can be found on the I-SIS website at
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/USDAderegGMOs.php