INTERVIEW -GM beet is ``green,'' sugar official says
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By Peter Blackburn
LONDON, Nov 11 (Reuters) - British farmers should highlight the
potential environmental benefits, rather than financial profits,
from growing genetically modified (GM) sugar beet, a leading
sugar official said on Wednesday.
In Britain and Europe, where public confidence in food safety has
been shattered by BSE and other public health scares, GM sugar
beet and other crops face fierce consumer scepticism.
But in the U.S., herbicide-tolerant sugar beet is expected to
appear on the domestic market next year.
"Consumers don't trust governments, scientists and certainly
not farmers," said Mike Garrod, Secretary of the Paris-based
World Association of Beet and Cane Growers (WABCG).
"The agriculture industry got it wrong. We harped on the
economic advantages instead of the environmental benefits,"
Garrod told Reuters in a telephone interview. "Now we have
an uphill struggle to win over public opinion."
Environmental lobby groups complain that more herbicide would be
needed to control weeds but Garrod argued that the reverse would
happen.
Instead of spraying traditonal beet crops with herbicide
cocktails three or four times a year, herbicide-tolerant beet
would need only one or two doses of special brands such as
Monsanto Co's "Roundup."
Weeds could be left to grow longer and this would encourage
pests, such as aphids, away from the sugar beet. A greater
variety of plant and insect life would thrive without harming the
crop.
In future, genetically modified beet could also be developed to
control pests and diseases, Garrod added.
He played down environmentalist fears of cross-pollination
between transgenic beet and wild beet to produce
"super-weeds" swarming over the coutryside.
Garrod, a British sugar beet grower, said genetically modified
beet was essentially an accelerated form of traditional plant
breeding.
"Genetic engineering is leading us down the same path but
much more quickly," he said, adding that the U.S. was
furthest down the genetic highway with herbicide-resistant sugar
beet.
Australian cane growers were also developing disease-, pest- and
possibly herbicide-resistant varieties, he added.
As cane is a perennial crop, growers have to do their own
research and development, Garrod noted.
But beet, which is an annual crop with fresh seed bought every
year, is being developed by plant breeding and seed companies as
they can recoup their R&D costs.
If competitors use it, then British and European beet growers
will be at a disadvantage, Garrod said.
The British government last month said it would allow commercial
planting of genetically modified crops under strict controls,
although production of insect-resistant crops would be banned for
three years.
British Sugar Plc, the sole processor of home-grown sugar beet,
has said it has no intention of using genetically modified beet
to produce sugar because its customers don't want it.
But Garrod said it was unclear whether Tate and Lyle Plc, which
imports sugar cane from developing countries, was able to make
the same undertaking.
Europe was giving confused signals about genetically modified
crops, Garrod said.
Danisco A/S, which controls sugar beet production in Denmark,
Sweden and the former East Germany, sees no problem but in France
opinions are divided.
"Europe hasn't got its act together. It's in a state of
flux, it knows where it wants to go but not how to get
there," Garrod said, adding that GM technology could be
scuppered by uninformed and emotive opinion.
"We think GM seeds have environmental and economic
advantages but realise we have a public relations exercise to do.
We didn't start in the right way and are paying for it now,"
he said.