Letter to the Editor - Thursday September 6, 2012

Fears confirmed

Thanks for the excellent coverage of the recent visit to Whangarei by Aussie farmers who have experienced the downside of GE contamination first hand.

Everything they said at the recent public meeting confirmed our suspicion that 'co-existence' (of GE crops, conventional and organic ones) is impossible.

None of the countries in the world who have foolishly allowed GE crops to be grown have been able to keep them separate from conventional farmers' operations. Of course this may be the aim of multinationals like Monsanto, who own the patents for certain GE crops and who oppose labelling of GE food.

The Aussie government irresponsibly lifted the moratorium on GE crops in Western Australia, promising that "GE and non-GE crops could co-exist," and hard-working farmers in that area are now paying the price.

In our view, it is unjust to ruin someone's business/ farming operation. It is unfair to allow GE into a region when you know that GE contamination will not only undermine consumer choice but take away a farmer's key markets and premiums.

It is outrageous to contaminate another farmer's seed stocks and then try and sue them for having your patented crop on their land.

Think it couldn't happen here? Townie bureaucrats in Wellington still think that 'co-existence' of GE crops and conventional crops is possible.

We're fortunate indeed that all the Northland district councils and the Auckland Council super city are aware of the poor performance of central government regulatory agencies (like MAF, who recently approved the importation of kiwifruit pollen from overseas, which turned out to be infected with the PSA virus) and have united to protect our region's biosecurity from GMOs and other unwanted incursions of new organisms.

However, the Northland Regional Council needs to do more to help the Northland territorial authorities and Auckland to keep GE experiments and releases off our patch.

Recently the NRC has given the NRC regional policy committee the authority to make decisions regarding the NRC proposed Regional Policy Statement, despite the NRC promising that all decisions regarding that important document would be made by the full council.

There is growing concern about the Regional Policy Committee chairman Ian Walker's influence on the NRC proposed RPS. Cr Walker appears to be working from a pre-determined personal position, to try and disappear the NRC's own precautionary GE policy from the NRC's new RPS.

The NRC itself proposed a precautionary GE provision, and received the largest number of submissions on any issue raised in the NRC RPS review to date supporting that proposal. And yet Cr Walker (in a region where the unique consortium of all councils, the Inter-Council Working Party on GMO Risk Evaluation and Management Options, works hard on this issue of such concern to Northland ratepayers, continues to irrationally claim that the GE issue "isn't an issue of significance for Northland."

Whatever issues are of concern to you in this region, keep your eyes peeled, as the NRC is soon to release its proposed regional policy statement document, and we will only have so many working days to make submissions.

This is the formal round of public consultation, so make it count - ask the NRC to reinstate the precautionary GE provision.

ZELKA GRAMMER AND TIM VALLINGS

Maungakaramea