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Open Letter on GM Crops from International Scientists to HM Government

From scientists from around the world

The Right Honorable Tony Blair MP
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
London SW1A 2AS

CC: The Right Honorable Margaret Beckett MP
DEFRA, Nobel House, 17 Smith Square, London SW1P 3JR

The Right Honorable Patricia Hewitt MP
DTI, 1 Victoria Street, London SW1H 0ET

Mr Nigel Griffiths MP
DTI, 1 Victoria Street, London SW1H 0ET

You recently received a letter from a number of our esteemed colleagues (Professor Derek Burke and others) in the United Kingdom. We felt obligated to write you to offer our support to them and the sentiments they expressed in their recent correspondence.

The United Kingdom has always enjoyed a preeminent place in the world of science, and in the biological sciences in particular. From Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and natural selection to the Nobel Prize winning work at Cambridge University on the elucidation of the structure of DNA by Frances Crick, James Watson, Maurice Wilkins and Rosalind Franklin, the UK has always been the home of cutting edge biological research. It is distressing to us to see the impacts (as expressed in Professor Burke's letter) that anti-science efforts in the UK have had on the development of excellent basic research into new technologies as well as those engaged in it.

The treatment of the FSE results is just the latest example of how over-simplification and rhetoric can undermine rigorous scientific assessments. The FSEs were an extremely detailed look at the impact that weed management regimes in GM and non-GM crops may have on certain invertebrate and plant species. The summary conclusion that certain GM crops were "harmful to wildlife" is an inaccurate and misleading oversimplification of the extensive FSE database. In fact, the added flexibility of GM weed management systems provided a number of significant benefits in the crops studied. The broader environmental impacts of GM crops (reduced pesticide use, more environmentally desirable herbicide choices, positive effect on species diversity, such as beneficial insects in Bt crops, etc.) were cited in the FSE publications but were not reported in the summary documents and press coverage. Most importantly, GM crops have permitted the adoption of sustainable agricultural practices, such as no till agriculture, that has been documented to promote bird and animal habitats.

We have been able to see firsthand the positive impact that biotechnology is contributing to conventional agricultural practices in many parts of the world. GM crops are providing farmers with cost-effective means of controlling pests while using less pesticides and reducing the impact of agriculture in the face of increasing environmental pressures. We urge you not to lose sight of these broader impacts (some of which were cited in the FSE publications) when making the decision on how to move forward with GM technologies in the UK. Developing countries, such as India and China have undertaken research and are rapidly exploiting the economic and environmental opportunities from the adoption of GM crops. Future traits that are in development hold much promise to extend the benefits of biotechnology to provide preventative health benefits, tolerances to stresses and the use of plants as efficient environmentally friendly production systems.

It is indeed unfortunate that our UK colleagues reached such a point where they felt they had to write and express their dissatisfaction with the agricultural biotechnology research environment in the UK. We write to you to acknowledge the great contributions that the UK scientific community has made to the advancement of science and to the development of new leading-edge technologies, and to express our hope that your government can help to restore the luster by ensuring that decision-making is based on science-based policies that foster the development of demonstrated safe technologies with significant environmental and economic benefits in the UK.

Yours sincerely,