GM corporation to stop trials due to direct action
steve | 04.10.2003 01:21 | Bio-technology | Ecology | Technology
Bayer CropScience - previously known as Aventis have - has announced that they now intend to stop testing crops in this country. Just less than 2 months ago anti-GM activists at the Earth First Summer gathering decided to target the company company Bayer Crop Science. Several actions have already been carried out but this announcement comes before the campaign could properly get going.
Bayer made clear that direct action played a major role in their decision. Dr Julien Little of Bayer CropScience was cited as saying: "(...) if we are not going to get anything out of [trials on oil-seed rape] because they are wrecked there is little point so this year we will not be doing any."
Bayer had asked the government to allow vaguer descriptions of test sites so that they could not be found and trashed by activists. But the proposal has been vetoed.
Links: Full reports [1],[2],[3] a Bayer update, background info on Bayer, Stop Bayer campaign
Bayer made clear that direct action played a major role in their decision. Dr Julien Little of Bayer CropScience was cited as saying: "(...) if we are not going to get anything out of [trials on oil-seed rape] because they are wrecked there is little point so this year we will not be doing any."
Bayer had asked the government to allow vaguer descriptions of test sites so that they could not be found and trashed by activists. But the proposal has been vetoed.
Links: Full reports [1],[2],[3] a Bayer update, background info on Bayer, Stop Bayer campaign
According to the Daily Mail "the only multinational crop research centre remaining in the UK is Jealott's Hill, near Bracknell, Berkshire, which is owned by Swiss-based company Syngenta." The Mail goes on to say that "activists have prevented it from doing any field trials for two years.
And pressure against GM is continues. A caravan of cyclists and tractors is heading for an anti-GM rally in London on the Monday 13th.
Stop Bayer e-mail: contact@stopbayergm.org
steve