FLASH: Anti-GM activist group issues a correction with an apology.

http://www.gmfreeireland.org/ Accessed 4 August 2007

Gmfreeireland.org would like to correct a claim previously made that Shane Morris made "fraudulent scientific claims". Gmfreeireland.org acknowledges such a claim has no legal basis and would like to point out that:

- No findings of fraud were ever made by the British Food Journal in regards to the claims in the publication in question.

- The paper in question remains published as a valid piece of scholarly research.

- The academic award for the paper remains valid.

- A letter of explanation on the matter was published in the British Food Journal 2006 Vol 108, Issue

This GM-Free Ireland correction refers to GM-Free Ireland's letter:
(Accessed 4 Aug 2007)

The health risks of GM foods

Letter sent to the Editor of the Irish Times, 29 June 2007

Madam,

Shane Morris's attack on Jeffrey Smith's book Genetic Roulette - The Documented Health Risks of Genetically Modified Foods (Letters, June 29th) employs the "shoot the messenger" strategy favoured by agri-biotech industry spin doctors who are no longer able to deny the growing scientific evidence which links GM food and animal feed to deaths and disease in laboratory animals, livestock and the human population.

Morris and his biotech colleage and mentor Doug Powell (a well-known GM industry lobbyist) have co-authored a number of pro-GMO papers, one of which received the GM Watch Propaganda Lab Award 2006 for its [XXXXXXXXXX *] scientific claims, triggering a controversy reported by New Scientist magazine.

Morris wrote his letter in response to the Kildare-based farmer Nick Cullen (Letters, June 28th), who critiqued your newspaper's coverage of the briefing on Food Safety and GMOs which I recently organised with Kathy Sinnott MEP at the EU Parliament Office in Dublin ("Sargent says GMO-free pledge is a 'huge step'", June 16th).

As Nick Cullen rightly pointed out, that article avoided any reference to the peer-reviewed scientific papers presented at the briefing, including those summarised in Genetic Roulette, but quoted instead from statements from the floor by the Chairman of the Irish Times Trust, Prof David McConnell, who attempted to portray Trevor Sargent [Ireland's new Minister of State for Agriculture and Food] – and anyone else who disagrees with his views on GMOs – as scientifically illiterate.

In the interests of transparency, your article should have mentioned that Prof McConnell's Smurfit School of Genetics at TCD is part-funded by the agribiotech industry, and that he is also the Co-Chair of EAGLES (European Action on Global Life Sciences), a biotech industry lobby group which promotes GM food and crops in the developing countries.

Our new government's aim to keep the whole island of Ireland free of GM crops and livestock will help our food and farm sectors retain access to the EU market for safe food, which increasingly prohibits or restricts the use of any food (including meat and dairy produce) containing or derived from genetically modified ingredients.

Our media should not encourage us to abandon this long-term competitive advantage because of vested interests.

GM foods and farming present a variety of extremely serious health, agronomic, environmental, legal, economic and food security risks. Please provide some more balanced coverage of these issues in the Irish Times!

Yours etc

Michael O'Callaghan
Co-ordinator, GM-free Ireland Network

Which refers in turn to:

Agronomic and consumer considerations for Bt and conventional sweet-corn, was co-authored by D.A. Powell, K. Blaine, S. Morris and J. Wilson, and was published in the British Food Journal, Volume 105 Number 10, 2003, pp. 700-713.

ThePowell et al. (2003) paper was awarded the British Food Journal's Award for Excellence for Most Outstanding Paper in 2004.