Tasmanians demand a GE-free zone
BY BEA BREAR
HOBART — Three hundred people at a meeting here on June 1 voted almost unanimously to demand that the state government make Tasmania a genetic engineering-free zone.
Those present called on state environment minister David Llewellyn "to issue an immediate ban on all deliberate releases of genetically modified organisms into the Tasmanian environment, whether for trial or commercial purposes".
Experts in the fields of public health, genetics and viticulture highlighted the environmental and public health risks in the new technology. Professor Jamie Kirkpatrick of the University of Tasmania's school of geography and environmental sciences outlined the dangerous possibilities of gene transfers in genetically modified crops and their likely impact on public health.
Evidence reported in the London Guardian Weekly on June 1 shows that genes used to modify crops can jump the species barrier. Of major concern to scientists is that antibiotic-resistant genes used in some modified crops could cross over to bacteria, making major illnesses untreatable.
There is mounting public pressure on the state Labor government to take a much stronger stand against the federal Coalition government's recent approval of another spate of GE crop trials in Tasmania. Twelve Tasmanian councils have so far been notified that they will soon have GE crop trials at secret sites.
Industry in Tasmania has already responded to the mounting public concern over genetic engineering, moving quickly to shore up its position. One of the state's major poppy growers, which has a patented herbicide-resistant GE poppy, has threatened to pull out of the state if bans are implemented.