Campaigners rejoice as GM crop trials scrapped

A leading campaign group has welcomed a decision to withdraw controversial GM crop trials which had been planned to take place only two miles from Europe’s biggest organic research centre.

Patrick Holden, director of the Soil Association, said he was delighted that it had been decided to abandon the planned herbicide-tolerant maize crop at Wolston, close to the Henry Doubleday Research Association Ryton Organic Garden, near Coventry in England.

Mr Holden said: ‘‘We are delighted. This is a great victory for common sense over contamination.

‘‘We remain implacably opposed to the trial sites programme and believe that in the long run the GM trials are a threat not just to organic farming, but also to any farmer who wants to farm free from the risk of GM contamination.

‘‘After the election we need to get down to the serious business of mapping out a non-GM and sustainable future for farming in this country.

‘‘This important decision helps everyone who wants agriculture in Britain to move forward.’’

Friends of the Earth welcomed the abandoning of the controversial GM trial site.

Peter Riley, GM campaigner at the organisation, said: ‘‘We are delighted that the Biotech industry has finally seen sense and agreed to abandon the GM trial site.

"This is the first time that the Government or biotech industry have ever listened to genuine concerns from the public.’’

A row over the planned GM maize crop blew up last week when environmental groups said they feared pollen from it could be carried by the wind or transported by birds and insects into neighbouring fields and contaminate the Ryton Organic Garden.

Dr Mark Avery, conservation director of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, said his organisation would quit from the Scientific Steering Committee of the farm scale evaluations of GM crops unless the Wolston maize trial was withdrawn.

He said the Supply Chain Initiative on Modified Agricultural Crops (Scimac) was ‘‘bungling’’ the handling of the trials and to plant the crop would have been to seek a direct conflict with organic farmers.

Dr Avery protested that such an action was not sensible and would undermine the public credibility of the research.

The maize crop which has been withdrawn had received the EU go-ahead for release, but was part of the voluntary agreement between Government and industry that ensured no commercial release of GM crops until the field scale trials are complete.

Professor Chris Pollock, chairman of the Scientific Steering Committee, last week wrote to Environment Minister Michael Meacher saying that his committee did not have the expertise to advise on distances in relation to pollination of other sites such as the Henry Doubleday Research Association Organic Garden at Ryton.