THE GM THREAT TO IRISH FARMERS (1,567 words, edited
for clarity):
Good morning everybody! I would have preferred to have seen more people here today, because I believe the need to forge a good GM policy for Ireland is a very important issue. I'm Deputy President of IFA, representing 85,000 farmers in Ireland, and I'm conscious of that brief. I'm also on the board of Teagasc, which has a role to play in this as well. And last but not least, I am a farmer and have been for the last 35 years. I have also spent six years in Africa doing development work as well, so I know the developing world from that perspective.
My role as Deputy President of IFA is one of protecting and speaking for the farmers of Ireland, giving them a voice. But in order to do that you also have to listen to them, so hopefully whatever I say here today will be of assistance. It will be provoking because I'm not just going to promote you, I'm not going to say you're a great crowd and it's an easy thing and so drive on. I'm going to criticize you and I'm going to show you where I think you can make progress and where I think is a no-go area.
I think the first problem is between farmers and "the greens" ‚ you know, we are at loggerheads over live exports. So if you go around and ask farmers to support the cause, you'll find it hard to get them to understand because there is a mistrust there. For too long farming has been used as a punchbag by politicians, by governments, by everyone else, by industry. When there's a problem with water, they will blame agriculture as being responsible, and I don't know where they get some of these figures ‚ 50% of the contributing factor of water pollution is from agriculture. I know this, and yet I see County Councils firing slurry below the bridge in Bannagher. I see them going out there and taking samples in the early morning, when the gates have been turned off for five or six hours, and then they call this science. Farmers by their nature are decent upright citizens just like most of us. There are a few black sheep, but you cannot tarnish the whole industry by the same token.
I have been involved in farming politics for the past fourteen years, and I have always realized that the consumer has a mistrust of GMOs. There was a resistance there. When I was in Africa I made great friends with a lady whose daughter returned to England and got a job after college with Monsanto. Her job entailed trying to change the public perception of GMOs in England. Because Monsanto decided that England was a huge epicentre of resistance, and if you could get the English to ‚ I won't say roll over, but to change, then it would... They had a budget of twenty million. This group set out organizing conferences and trying to influence farm leaders, the government, and everybody else, and twenty million was the budget. But after a year, they found that the percentage of people who were anti-GM had actually increased. So the lesson is that Monsanto was throwing money trying to shore up a problem which was actually getting worse. And I think if you try and stuff something down people's throats then you're going to get this sort of mistrust and disbelief.
It's no wonder that Monsanto chose to try and exploit the revolution in technology that they had developed in the 1960s and 1970s ‚ which was Roundup [weedkiller]. Roundup was a Godsend to any farmer in this country, because it got rid of the plague of skutch [i.e. a weed grass ‚ ED]. That's what it was designed for. And once skutch got into a field, if you were a farmer in the forties or fifties or sixties, when you sowed your crop the skutch grass came up and, hey presto, you had no crop. So you know, it was a brilliant thing. It just wiped it out, it went right down to the roots and it wasn't very toxic as you would think. I'm not a scientist, but my reading of it is that it waxed over and stopped the plant from breathing, so therefore it died off. But Monsanto wasn't happy there, they wanted to increase their profits and they realized that now that the patent had expired and the generic stuff could be manufactured anywhere, they needed some other engine to drive their profits into the future.
I have seen multinationals in operation. I saw the abuse by Nestlé with breast milk substitutes, which caused huge problems the world over, that's really what brought me to Africa in the first place. The multinationals gave free samples when the mothers' milk dried up and so forth. The infant mortality of Third World babies who were fed on breast milk substitute was 70%, because the people there could not afford it, they could not read the instructions, and did not have potable water. It was a total disaster. I'm just painting the idea that the multinationals don't care; they sit in their plush boardrooms in leather seats and all the rest of it, but they don't give a hoot. All they care for is profits.
After producing Roundup, Monsanto then decided to go a step further. They decided to try and experiment with genetically engineering the seeds so that they could apply the Glyphosate or Roundup so that ‚ normally it would kill the plant but this engineered plant would have a resistance to the weekiller, so you could use Monsanto for the seed and for the spray as well. The last thing they did was to put in the Terminator gene which would wipe out the plant's ability to reproduce. That enslaves farmers the world over: they would have to continue buying and continue growing Monsanto's products. Certainly, in the Third World, it would be a total disaster.
I'll get back to Ireland now. With the royalties and with the frightening contract that Monsanto are putting out, the farmer has nowhere to turn: he has to pay the attorney fees, he has to pay everything, and he's put in a very precarious position.
Should Ireland be GM-free? Yes is the answer! But, I would not go so far as to ruling out research by Teagasc. On the board of Teagasc we have built three specifically new laboratories which are completely enclosed. Air can't get out and so forth, so that nothing can get out but scientists can work and think. I'm not a Luddite in this respect. I think we have got to allow science to continue and to let them experiment. But whatever happens I think the biggest problem with GMOs is that this technology has been in the wrong hands. I'm convinced of that.
I know you are obviously concerned, but what you need to advance the cause is to lose the image of being green, saving the environment, sustainable development and so forth. I am challenging you to allow some of the political parties to take ownership of the idea, whether it's Fine Gael, or Labour, or whatever. I don't give a hoot personally who takes up the idea, who claims the credit, so long as the objective is achieved and you put the ball in the back of the net. It's like a team game, playing rugby or football: we all have parts to play, but you must be conscious of not antagonizing and getting your message across.
As I mentioned before, this whole green thing is a turn-off to farmers, because they see themselves as being the custodians of the environment. I've never seen a farmer willingly destroy his land. They have the utmost respect for their water, their cattle drink it; they are working from one end of the year to the other for a very small return, but they enjoy the work, and they would do nothing to damage the environment. You would also want to be careful not to sex up the argument as a raison d'êum;tre, as a crusade. The argument stands up on its own. At the moment the majority of the people are with you. They know it and they don't want GMOs. So you've got to manage the situation so that you can get more people to buy in. That's the secret of success.
I saw one of the James Bond movies the other day and we could do with a Pierce Brosnan going out to save the world from Monsanto, who seem to be Hell-bent on stuffing this GMO technology down our throats. And I think if you had someone like Pierce who could go out there in a rocket and get into the board room it would be one of the better ways of getting the problem solved. But that's a dream.
I just want to wish your workshop well. And I want you to get the IFA's stance? Because I want you to get this clear. I'd say our stance is: No to Monsanto control. Yes to research at Teagasc in Oak Park, you know, because it's with scientists and that. And to keep GM product out. We don't need it. We certainly can't pay for it. And our customers don't want it.
Thank you ladies and gentlemen.
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