Pending Decision On GM Maize In Mexico Under Fire

The ETC Group has issued a warning that “agribusiness giants Monsanto, DuPont and Dow are plotting the boldest coup of a global food crop in history,” as they have applied to the Mexican government for the planting of transgenic maize on 2,500,000 hectares, approximately the size of El Salvador.

In a press release, ETC Group says the Mexico’s Union of Concerned Scientists has called on the Mexican government to stop the processing of applications for open-field release of genetically modified maize in Mexico. The ETC Group appeals to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization and the UN Convention on Biological Diversity to take action.

At stake is the risk to the “thousands of peasant varieties of maize making Mexico the global repository of maize genetic diversity” by the introduction of GM maize. Moreover, says the release, “farmers growing maize may become unwitting patent infringers, guilty of using ‘patented genes’ and may be forced to pay royalties to the patent owners, as has already happened in hundreds of cases in North America.”