GM potatoes planted - Legal appeal system being ‘ignored by Teagasc’

by Dave M Thu Aug 30, 2012 21:18

Teagasc's non press-release acknowledging the start of the trial... as buried as their mutant spuds...

Editor: Adding contents of Teagasc's non press release here in case it disappears from their site since it was already buried deep down on their site where it was unlikely anyone could find it.

GM Update

27 August 2012

The cisgenic potatoes sown by Teagasc indoors earlier in the year have been transplanted outside into a 10 metre by 10 metre plot.

The EPA granted a license (see: http://www.epa.ie/whatwedo/licensing/gmo/fieldtrial) to Teagasc on July 27th.

After meeting the conditions of that license, the EPA gave Teagasc consent to proceed with the research.

The study has started and the goal of the 2012 planting is to conduct a series of preliminary studies on the blight response of the plants while in the field.

by RichardA Thu Aug 30, 2012 22:49

If there is a 3 month period to seek a judicial review how can it be that the spuds can be planted before this time expires? This is a ridiculous situation, there should be a legal requirement to observe such a period but the currant situation is just a farce.

by Art Thu Aug 30, 2012 23:45

It is all too late to protest now. The Vatican has already agreed to the GM technology and it is also now ok to experiment with 50% Human and 50% Animal Hybrids. We will soon have to redefine what it is to be human. They don't have to worry about protesters anymore, as the Holy population will continue to sleep walk towards oblivion. The techno singularity is looming ever closer and it is unlikely there will be much opportunity for any meaningful change. Nobody is asking why we are going there, or making any attempt to stall or even delay this outcome. Quantumanity may give some food for thought to those sufficiently interested in realities.

by Researcher Fri Aug 31, 2012 08:21

The Pope/Vatican/Holy See has NOT endorsed genetic engineering technology. That story has been doing the rounds for a couple of years now, especially on pro-GM shill sites. There is evidence however that the Vatican has been lobbied hard to adopt a pro-GM stance.

Essentially a few papal scientists attended a meeting a couple of years backs, after which they issued a statement and this was taken up as offocial Vatican support for GM technology.
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"Vatican has not endorsed genetically modified food, official says (Dec-1-2010 )

By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The Vatican did not endorse an 11-page final statement in favor of easing restrictions on and allowing more widespread use of genetically modified crops, especially in poorer nations, said a Vatican official.

"The statement is not a statement of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences because the Pontifical Academy of Sciences as such -- 80 members -- wasn't consulted about it and will not be consulted about it," Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo, the academy's chancellor, told Catholic News Service.

The statement, which was recently made public by a private science-publishing company in the Netherlands, also "has no value as the magisterium of the church," he said in an e-mail response to questions Dec. 1.

Later the same day, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, issued a similar communique, adding that the pro-GM statement "cannot be considered an official position of the Holy See."

Some news agencies had mistakenly reported that the statement represented the Vatican's endorsement of easing regulations on and promoting the use of genetically modified food crops.

The Pontifical Academy of Science's headquarters hosted a study week in May 2009 on "Transgenic Plants for Food Security in the Context of Development."

The final statement summarized the week's proceedings and recommended that genetic engineering techniques be freed from "excessive, unscientific regulation" so that modern and predictable GM technologies could be used to enhance nutrition and food production everywhere.

It called for greater cooperation among private corporations, governments and nonprofit organizations with the aim of increasing funding from governments and charities so that GM crops could be "cost-free" for poorer regions.

It also encouraged more widespread use of sustainable and sound agricultural practices to help improve the lives of the poor.

The statement said its conclusions were "drafted and endorsed by all participants of the study week," which included 33 outside experts and only seven academy members, including the academy's chancellor, Bishop Sanchez.

Bishop Sanchez told CNS that the final statement was signed by all of the participants and "therefore it is a statement that has the authority and value of the participants."

Most of the 40 participants were longtime supporters of using modified crops for boosting food production and creating new sources of energy from nonfood crops.

A number of participants have invented genetically modified foodstuffs or work for companies that sell genetically modified seeds.

There also were at least four speakers who have ties to the U.S. agribusiness giant Monsanto, which created a synthetic bovine growth hormone to boost cow milk production as well as insect- and herbicide-resistant seeds.

Bishop George Nkuo of Kumbo, Cameroon, attended the closed-door study week with the idea that he would talk about a warning by African bishops against claims that genetically modified crops would solve Africa's food crises.

A working document for the Synod of Bishops for Africa released two months before the meeting in 2009 said that using modified crops risks "ruining small landholders, abolishing traditional methods of seeding and making farmers dependent on the production companies" selling their genetically modified seeds.

Those in charge of organizing and inviting speakers for the study week were academy members Ingo Potrykus, who invented a genetic strain of rice that is rich in beta carotene; Werner Arber, a 1978 Nobel Prize winner in medicine; and Peter Raven, retired president of the Missouri Botanical Garden, which is home to the Monsanto Center and its offices, laboratories and millions of plant specimens.

"Finally, for the moment, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences is not planning another meeting on this topic," Bishop Sanchez wrote to CNS.

The academy hosted talks in 2000 and 2004 on whether genetic modification should play a role in promoting food security. After co-hosting the 2004 meeting on modified foods with the U.S. Embassy to the Vatican, the academy showed its support for the potential of modified foods when it released a statement -- based on the conference discussions -- that praised the important contributions such foods could make in fighting hunger.

However, the Vatican has never taken a formal position supporting or opposing genetically modified foods.

Pope Benedict XVI has denounced the continued scandal of hunger in the world, saying its root causes have more to do with problems of distribution and sharing than with there not being enough food in the world.

The Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, said earlier this year that it was not a coincidence that in 2009 the use of genetically modified food crops grew by 13 percent in developing countries and that GM crops covered almost half of the world's total arable land. And yet "the number of hungry people in the world has for the first time reached 1 billion people," the paper said.

END"

by Biotechisgodzilla Fri Aug 31, 2012 10:37

I'm a co Carlow native and this GM trial worries me. I don't want to see GM crops used anywhere. It's all harmless experimentation until strange diseases start showing up in the traditional crops and maybe even in the animal and human population. It's one law for them and another for the muggles , you can be sure if you violated a legal time period that you'd be brought to task.

by feudal castrato Fri Aug 31, 2012 23:24

GM is evil. Our future lies in producing good organic food.
We should not support this stupid move by teagasc

GM crops have been instrumental in a large number of poor farmer suicides in india. Many Farmers get into debt to chemical and GM seed suppliers, yields are poor, farmers can't pay, lose their land and kill themselves in shame.

Despite claims to contrary, more chemicals are needed not less, Yields are not really any better than normal and costs are higher. Soil is destroyed, biodiversity is destroyed, monocultures mean at risk of large scale loss of crops

the altered genes migrate across the same plant families. rapeseed genes can migrate to brocolli and cauliflower for instance.

Toxic effects on humans from heavy exposure to roundup are starting to be catalogued.

GM crops such as BT corn produce bt toxin in every cell of the corn. You eat the corn, you are eating BT toxin too. Same goes for other varieties of GM foods.

GM companies are corrupt and amoral. BASF and Bayer are essentially IG farben of zyklonB fame.
Monsanto produced agent orange. All V.Nasty corporations when you drill down for more info.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Farben

for more info on this topic:
http://www.gmfreeireland.org/

by John Tue Sep 04, 2012 12:01

Who the fk plants potatoes in late August? Most people would be harvesting at this time. Perhaps what they are really testing is the response of the Irish public to this planting.