Rebel, Rebel Rebel. What part of me in this forum has said that you cannot convince me that GM is safe? Time and time again have you said that you cannot convince me and yet I have said if you follow the guidelines of human testing, with supervision of these tests then you would be able to prove to me that GM is safe. But you have not even mentioned any human testing. See my posting of 11/12/05 and see again what I have asked. The problem with human testing is that we don’t only eat one food which has been tested on all of the tests of GM. We eat a variety and how do we know that the variety of GM foods combined is safe? You will be dabbling in the unknown combination of changed DNA and doesn’t that even scare you at all? GM hasn’t been tested enough in any of your tests that you have told me to look up. You give me inadequate tests done on individual animals which are not human and not even close to human like pigs (or maybe I missed that test). Stop saying that I cannot be convinced because that is not true. Your challenge is to convince me and so far as I’ve seen, you have not even come close. Instead you have actually confirmed my fears about lack of adequate testing.

And Agronomist, of course it matters if someone is speaking on behalf of Monsanto. Monsanto has a habit of changing the rules to meet their own wants which is money orientated. How do the farmers know how much Monsanto is going to charge them under royalties as there are no fixed % or $ amount that is signed. If this goes ahead, there is a possibility that Monsanto will have all the power in the world to change the world’s farmers to making different countries farmers broke. Do I trust Monsanto? No, as their track record is not good.

Also it seems obvious to me that you GM’ers are actually bullying non-gm farmer.

Ms Newman:

You have continued to misrepresent my comments on red corn and organics, so I invite you to read them again. I am very happy to discuss coexistence and defend my views on that; it is not a good use of time for any of us for me to be rebutting what I didn’t even say.

The original article in the Wall Street also stated:

“In Europe, authorities have begun approving GM strains to be sold there….. North of Barcelona in Spain … a trio of farmers took a late afternoon break recently to argue in favor of biotech. …. Joaquim Paretas said his farm would be doomed without it. He plants a strain of biotech corn that defends itself against an insect known as the corn borer, a
bug that burrows inside a corn plant, making it hard to combat with traditional
insecticide. …Traditional strains of corn, Mr. Paretas says, are weakened by the bugs and are often destroyed by high winds that sweep over the region late in the growing
season.….. Mr. Paretas says ….. he'll work out agreements with his non-GM neighbors to stagger their planting seasons.”

At the url you quoted, http://www.biotechknowledge.com/biotech/knowcenter.nsf/0/2BE8AA76EDA77C75862570BB0017A951?OpenDocument , I wrote “The most obvious steps include isolation by a few hundred meters, or planting his corn so that it flowered asynchronously from the GM corn (the latter has been understood by Mr. Paretas as discussed at the end of the article). This problem is not a lot different than growers with contracts for blue corn must deal with every year in North America, long before GM crops. It has always been the burden of those seeking to produce and market for some price advantage to take steps to protect that advantage.”

The red corn is a new product seeking price advantage, and the offended farmer found yellow corn in it. Even conventional and organic corn would have had the same “contamination” effect, . The grower had not protected against this, even though other farmers, such as Paretas, know how to do this and expressed willingness to cooperate with their neighbors

Ms Newman:
Continuing against the word limits of this site, if you were to grow a new high value, high purity specialist canola crop, would it be your neighbors’ burden to keep their pollen from your farm?

That is what you are arguing if you defend the red corn farmer. It was not just organic, but red organic that was his premium line.

Ms Newman, this is what you wrote involving me on 19 December, deleting the urls: “Individuals such as Prakash (author of Agbioworld) are known for misleading pro-GM statements or Rick Rousch. Companies these people represent are also known as paid PR promotions for GM. Hudson Institute. How much are they being paid by the GM companies?”

I am glad to read that you “did not mention (that I was) representing a company”, but what you actually wrote is at least as confusing. I’ll assume for now that your note was just imprecisely written.

To Is it really safe?

I don’t care how you spell my name. It’s only fair to ask that those who write significant criticisms of me to get it right so that I can become aware of, find and respond to the critiques where appropriate. Otherwise, it is just whispers behind your back.

What difference does it make whether I am American or African? I have replied to criticisms made of me at this site. In any case, I am an Australian citizen.

I thank Rebel for replying to you about your mis-statements about AgBioView and Agronomist

More questions for Julie NonGMFarmer Newman:

I am not part of the “pro-GM sector” so can’t answer for them, but your conditions leave me confused. Perhaps most importantly, can I ask if you will undertake here to never grow a GM crop?

What are “the ridiculous costs, liabilities and inconveniences proposed”?

What is your “legal definition of non-GM”?

What do you mean by “No GM contamination can be accepted if a "user fee" is to be charged on contaminated produce”? Surely you are not implying that companies will charge if someone has 0.5% or even 10% GM content in their crop? Is this a reference to the legally disproved claims of Percy Schmeiser?

What if GM varieties become so popular that 90% of the canola crop is GM. Would you still require that all burdens for containment are on the GM growers?

Here are other questions not yet answered.

Do you accept that Spain, Portugal, France and Germany now grow GM corn, and feed large quantities of GM corn and soy to their livestock? That Japan imports large quantities of GM from Canada and the US?

Will you keep using TT canola if atrazine resistance is found in annual ryegrass on your property?

Where is this significant premium and demand for non-GM soy, and what is your source of information for that, especially for oil?

Who and where are there paying customers wanting guarantees that there is no GM canola present? Do you or any other members of NCF sell to such customers now? How big are these markets for Australia in terms of dollar value or a percentage of the Australian crop?

After 9 years and hundreds of millions of ha planted, has there been one farmer sue another for so-called contamination?

Other than for Starlink (where the pay-outs exceeded US $110 million), how many cases have there been of farmers suing any one else?

Other than Starlink, how many cases, and for how much money, have there been any documented claims of losses to GM “contamination” from farmers anywhere in the world?

On Bullying Behaviours. Asking tough questions does not compare with threatening lawsuits (actually done twice already by Julie) and threatening vandalism and future lawsuits, as Julie has done on this site.

For Julie NonGMFarmer Newman:

My friends in the cotton industry are reporting record yields per ha in an industry that is now more than 80% GM.

In 2004’s ” Co-existence in North American agriculture, Brookes & Barfoot argue there have been no significant economic or commercial problems (www.pgeconomics.co.uk) at least in part because farmers talk things out ahead of time, despite more organic farms and relatively smaller farms than we have in Australia. Can’t we do the same?

Can you explain to us why the current legal system in Australia cannot protect non-GM farmers? All you need to do is to be able to show financial harm.

If you really believe all those claims from Greenpeace and NGIN that you have put up on your website about the hazards of Roundup, do you still use Roundup or other glyphosate products on your farm?

In government, most research proposals are funded in a competitive process of some kind, not due to lobbying. Isn’t that a good practice?

Do you believe that all sources on the web or elsewhere are equally expert, whatever their qualifications?

Why would CSIRO bother to submit data to government for the pea project, when the proposal to release would be so obviously be rejected? Isn’t self-assessment by researchers acceptable?

This may come as a surprise to some of you, but pesticide companies very often drop new products late the development stages, after 10 of millions have been spent, when they find unfavorable data.

No one can find any difference at all between canola oils from conventional and GM crops. There is no DNA or protein left. What would you even look for in a feeding trial?

Is-it-really-safe: There is a standard line among GM critics that they are not opposed to the technology but then set criteria for testing that could not be met even for milk much less peanuts or conventional wheat. I’m not fooled

Agronomist, lets look at some of your deliberate misinterpretations that "are either totally untrue or bear little resemblance to reality."

The high Canadian canola carryover can be referenced from any market report.
Toepfer International - Market Review Mar05 "Ending stocks are therefore expected to increase to just under 1.5mln tons. This is an increase of 240% from the year before…" It explains that exports dropped from 7.7mlntons to only 3.4mln tons. Price problems: As mentioned, Australian Graincorp announced recently a US$30/tonne premium over Canadian canada sold to China this year. WA's Grainpool latest weekly comment mentioned a "steep decline in Canadian values."

The “Golden Rice” statement was in reference to what I was told by the breeder of Golden Rice before the trials and I mentioned I was happy to be updated.

I said there is no set contamination level that triggers a deduction of Monsanto’s royalties. As mentioned, framers want risk management to ensure that a positive test (as low as 0.5%) does not trigger a royalty deduction.

Argentina: “yield 5%-10% less...", This was a direct referenced quote. The scientific reason given for this is glyphosate has an adverse effect on legume inoculant.

d/DavidTribe: Ask Judy Carmen directly the questions you want her to answer.

Chinese cotton subsidies www.v-farm.com/new/A12479/Cotton References include the International-Cotton-Advisory-Committee(2000),Valderrama(1999),Goreux(2003)

Rick, I’m glad you explained further. Do you however think it is fair that the existing non-GM industry must take the steps required to prevent contamination of their crops by the “newcomer” of GM crops?

Rebel, legal letters are reminders that there is a limit to public bullying. Why should I accept slander?

It’s no point spraying a chemical if it does not kill the weeds you want killed. I have no problem with glyphosate, the article concerned clearly explains that any chemical has risk, it is a defence of atrazine which is a target by pro-GM activists.

The Federal government paper on liability http://www.affa.gov.au/content/output.cfm?ObjectID=397E43B7-58BA-4111-BDE46C8AB2961114 explains how farmers can try to take legal action, but there is little chance that we can win.

The ACCC has confirmed “non-GM” = zero GM contamination.

Costs http://www.non-gm-farmers.com/news_details.asp?ID=355
Liabilities http://www.non-gm-farmers.com/news_details.asp?ID=368