April 5, 2007

US grain groups raise pressure on Syngenta to delay GMO corn

Grain industry groups Wednesday (Apr 4) increased pressure on Switzerland-based Syngenta AG to delay commercialising a genetically modified corn variety, saying the company's plan to market it in the US before Japan approves the product endangers exports to the largest foreign corn market.

"We already are aware that Japanese buyers are developing contingency plans to purchase corn and corn products from non-US origins if Syngenta releases this seed for planting and Japanese government approval is not forthcoming prior to harvest," two US grain groups said in a prepared joint statement.

The concerns voiced Wednesday by the National Grain and Feed Association (NGFA) and the North American Export Grain Association (NAEGA), follow a public plea made to Syngenta last week by the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA).

Syngenta, as reported last week by Dow Jones Newswires, believes it can sell the biotech "Agrisure RW" corn seeds to US farmers and make sure none of the resultant crops are exported, said company spokeswoman Sarah Hull.

The Syngenta corn seeds are engineered to resist rootworms, insects that eat at plant roots and do widespread damage to US crops every year.

The NGFA and the NAEGA stressed they believe the corn is safe because it has full US approval, but do not believe it can be completely kept from mixing with corn destined for export to Japan and other countries that have not yet approved it.

"It's impossible to completely segregate this specific biotech variety from the rest of the commodity stream because of pollen drift, inadvertent commingling and human error," the presidents of the two US grains groups said.

Japan is the largest foreign market for US corn exports, NCGA spokesman Nick Weber said. The US exported 636 million bushels of corn to Japan in the 2005/06 marketing year.