The threat of so-called 'suicide seeds' being used in commercial agriculture has become greater following a change of policy by Monsanto, the world's largest GM seed and chemicals company.
The genetic-engineering giant made a public promise in 1999 not to commercialise 'terminator technology' - plants that are genetically modified to produce sterile seeds. Now Monsanto says it may develop the technology after all - suggesting that it would use Terminator seeds in non-food crops such as cotton, tobacco, pharmaceutical crops and grass, and does not rule out other uses in the future. (1)
In response, Greenpeace joined over 300 organisations today to demand that the current global moratorium on terminator technology is maintained, because the use of sterile seeds threatens biodiversity and could destroy the livelihoods and cultures of the 1.4 billion people who depend on farm-saved seed.
Monsanto's worrying change of policy comes to light as traditional farmers, indigenous peoples and their allies prepare to confront the biotech and seed industry in an escalating battle at the United Nations over the future of Terminator and other so-called Genetic Use Restriction Technologies.
"The world's farmers and Indigenous peoples cannot trust Monsanto," said Alejandro Argumedo from Asociacion Andes - Potato Park in Cusco, Peru. "Monsanto's broken promise is a deadly betrayal because indigenous peoples and farmers depend on seed saving for food security and self-determination."
In 2000 the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) imposed a moratorium on sterile seed technologies. But at next month's high-level meeting of the CBD in Curitiba, Brazil (20-31 March 2006) the biotechnology industry will intensify its push to undermine the six-year old de facto ban.
Monsanto's revised 'pledge' now reads: "Monsanto does not rule out the potential development and use of one of these technologies in the future. The company will continue to study the risks and benefits of this technology on a case-by-case basis."
"The world's giant agricultural corporations have a clear and simple vision that nothing should be grown without a license from Monsanto and a few other masters of sterility and reproduction," explains Benny Haerlin of Greenpeace International. "They pursue this strategy step by step or 'case by case' as they now call it. If governments at the CBD give in to Monsanto and erode the terminator moratorium we will all have to pay the bill tomorrow and the collateral damage will be the integrity and fertility of nature."
"We are particularly alarmed that Monsanto's edited pledge no longer rejects commercialisation of this dangerous technology," said Lucy Sharratt of the Ban Terminator Campaign. "We are calling on national governments to dismiss Monsanto's tactic in favour of an all-out ban on terminator technology. We invite all civil society and social movements to join with us for the battle against terminator next month in Brazil."
The Ban Terminator campaign today announces the names of over 300 organisations worldwide that are demanding a ban on terminator technology. Terminator technology was first developed by the United States Department of Agriculture and US seed company Delta & Pine Land to prevent farmers from saving and re-using harvested seed, forcing them to buy new seeds each season.
For more information contact:
Lindsay Keenan - Greenpeace International
email: lindsay.keenan@int.greenpeace.org.
Mobile: +31 646 162 029
Greenpeace UK press office - 0207 865 8255
Notes to editors:
1. Download Monsanto's new pledge on Terminator and GURTs here (Adobe PDF format). A full copy of their new and old pledges is available at www.banterminator.org.
Update, 2 March 2006
Since this press release was issued, Monsanto have changed their pledge back to its original wording.
Read more at banterminator.org
