Well, I started speaking calmly while serving... "I've seen the articles you're talking about - praising the success story of GE crops and advertising their huge potential for future growth especially for countries in Asia and Africa. But let me give you some facts and figures and then we'll see if the Indians were right to prohibit the approval of GE eggplant."

Here's the figures that not many people know - that I explained to my dinner guest.

GE crops appeared in big scale 14 years ago mainly in the USA. Since then, the USA continues to be the country that cultivates most of the GE (50%) in the world. If we add Argentina (16%) and Brazil(16%) we have 3 countries cultivating 80% of the GE crops in the world.

Feeding the hungry?
Now, you can say, that Brazil and Argentina are developing countries and that helps them to feed themselves, right? Actually no, because if we look what kind of GE crops they are growing - I can assure you that these crops are soya and maize that are exported as animal feed to feed and not the hungry nations but the affluent ones. In the list of GE crops I will add cotton (cultivated in India and China) and canola (cultivated mainly in Canada). You can conclude for your self that these are not staple food crops - they are mainly used for industrial purposes.

The 1 billion hungry of this planet - a number that actually increases with the years - have not benefited from the introduction of GE crops. And according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the world currently produces enough food for everybody, but the problem is that many people do not have access to it.

Are there any benefits to farmers? The industry claims that 14 millions of farmers have embraced this technology but if you analyse this figure more precisely and compare it with the world farmers figure (ILO) you will see that 99% of the farmers in the world do not cultivate GE crops! The majority of the world food is produced by 2.6 billion farmers on small farms with less than two hectares.

Chemical reaction
The main GE crops that are in the market are mainly of two types: ones resistant to herbicides and ones resistant to animal pests. These crops are destined for large-scale production in order to tackle the problem of farmers using so many pesticides for decades - that in the end it is very complicated to tackle resistance of the pests and the weeds to the chemicals.

Perhaps you are thinking now that large-scale farmers have seen some benefits with GE crops since they would allow a reduction of the chemicals used in agriculture. But actually, there are reports from the US - based on official data from the Ministry of Agriculture - showing that GE crops have led to a severe increase in the use of pesticides. Weeds develop resistance to herbicides and force farmers to increase their use.

There are also cases where pest-resistant crops become vulnerable to other pests and in the end the farmers spray the same amount of chemicals. So you see - GE crops really don't bring benefits to the world's farmers but risk their livelihoods instead - as they become dependent on bio-tech companies for their seeds. They lose control of their own crops as big bio-tech companies attempt to monopolise global agriculture.

Control freaks
Then there's the patent issue. The majority of GE crops are owned by 4-5 big agrochemicals and one of them, Monsanto, owns 90% of them. It seems that these companies are aiming to gain the control of the food on this planet. If they were interested for the hungry - do you think they would use the patents? If they care about the farmers they would not sell their seeds in high prices, as another report from the US shows. Recent figures from the EU showing that GE maize cultivations in 2009 decreased by 11% compared to previous years because there is no market or because the seeds are more expensive that the conventional ones.

Contamination
If the industry cares about the farmers they would not let GE crops contaminate neighbouring farmers who are not intending to use them - who will lose money if their crops are found to be contaminated. There are hundreds of cases of genetic contamination of conventional or organic food and crops that the biotech industry or institutions deny responsibility for. Who pays the costs? The food producers, the supermarkets and the consumers!

That’s why I am happy that the Indian government banned the GE eggplant. If released it can spread to wild relatives. India is the center of origin of this plant and many scientists raised concerns of the possible contamination of their wild varieties. Other scientists raised concerns regarding the impacts on our health. Tests on GE eggplant safety were inadequate as the Indian Government admitted and were mainly carried out by the company itself. That’s the case with all GE crops! That’s why the most reasonable approach to these new products is the precautionary approach.

GE crops don't increase yields or protect the environment. They don't reduce chemicals. They can't resist droughts or floods or any other climatic challenges. Instead they put at risk our nature and our health as well as the farmers who grow our food for us. Governments and consumers around the world reject GE crops for these reasons.

The first comprehensive assessment of global agriculture, by 400 scientists under the UN umbrella, concluded that GE crops are not a solution got feeding the world. They also concluded that business as usual in not an option. Diverse ecological farming is the only solution to challenges facing global agriculture such as climate change.

What we should remember is: that GE crops distract from the real solutions that we need in order to face climate change and feed the growing population of this planet.

My guest and my friends asked me “what we can do?”.

Well, you can use your voice! Right now - if you live in the EU - you can write to the President of the EU Commission and call for a moratorium on GE crops.

And if you're not in the EU - you can spread this kind of info to your friends and family and every time your find a GE product in your supermarket - you can raise it with the manager in the store or later by writing a letter. All these complaints are recorded. You can use your consumer power to support food that is coming from ecological farms and avoid GE food.

Small acts can bring big changes! The more of us there are rejecting GE food - the more governments will realise they need to ban them!

--Myrto