Govt accused of ignoring bar on field trials of GM crops

While sustained public outcry and debate has led to a moratorium on commercialisation of Bt Brinjal, open air field trials of different genetically modified (GM) crops are allegedly being carried out in several states across India.

GM varieties of cotton, maize, sorghum and rice are a few crops currently under field trials against the directions of the Parliamentary sub committee on Agriculture that asked the government to bar all field trials of GM crops. The Coalition for GM Free India and Centre for Sustainable Agriculture (CSA) claim that trials are being carried on GM Cotton in Punjab, NK 603 variety of Maize in Haryana, rice and sorghum in Andhra Pradesh.  “It is a pity the Indian government is ignoring the possibility of contamination through GM crops,” said Sridhar Radhakrishnan, Convener of Coalition for GM Free India. Civil society organisations point out that the unabated use of Bt-Cotton has actually contaminated the indigenous cotton resulting in its rejection in overseas markets.

“It is unfortunate that India learnt its lessons the hard way from its tryst with Bt-Cotton and it is our poor farmers who have and continue paying with their lives. It is time the world realised that techno fixes such as GM crops cannot solve agrarian distress nor provide food security,” the Coalition added.

To further strengthen its point of view, the CSA in a paper titled Modern Agriculture and Erosion of Agro-biodiversity, released on the sidelines of the COP-MOP-6 here on Tuesday, pointed out that displacement of green revolution technologies with GM crops had wreaked on the environment.