I have got election fever and have mostly been feeling very cross about things, cross with the government for supporting the bank bail out and the Green Party in particular, as I was once an active member of it. Then I heard that Minister Brendan Smith had ' altered its (Ireland's) voting position and will support a number of proposals from the EU Commission aimed at authorising the placing on the market of food, food ingredients and feed containing, consisting of, or produced from genetically modified maize and cotton. Ireland will also support EU Commission proposals to introduce a tolerance for the low level presence of, as yet, unauthorised GM varieties in imports of animal feed.' The full press release is here. It points out interestingly that: 'Over 90 per cent of the protein feed for Ireland's livestock comes from soya and maize by-products imported from North and South America, practically all of which contains GM varieties sown in those countries' Not many people seem to know this .
The Green Party press release points out that, 'In Government, the Green Party ensured that Ireland abstained on this vote.' which shows I suppose that their being in government was better than nothing, but doesn't really carry the spirit of its declaration in the Renewed Programme for Government which states it 'will declare the Republic of Ireland a GM-free Zone, free from the cultivation of all GM plants,' but failing to mention that being a GM-free zone does not mean that food sold is GM free, nor that most animal feed is GM.
So much for Ireland being a GM Free Zone indeed. Our politicians are obviously bowing to be powerful lobby groups on this one. I wonder why? Will do a post on my blog about this. At least keep people informed and encourage them to grow their own plus feed their animals organic feeds.
ReplyDeleteThanks Bridget, There is huge pressure from GM seed companies, often owned by chemical comapnies to allow GM foods into europe.Fine Fail have done U-turns on this in the past. I think it is all to do with controlling the entire food chain from seed to supermarket. I wonder what else the government is doing in its last days in office.
ReplyDeleteWait till you start getting GMO alfalfa in the food chain your way.
ReplyDeletehttp://ossbank.blogspot.com/2011/03/genetically-modified-alfalfa.html