Corporate profit trumps common sense in Brazil -- New Internationalist

Corporate profit trumps common sense in Brazil -- New Internationalist: 







On 9 April, corporate profit trumped common sense when the Brazilian Technical Commission on Biosafety (CTNBio) approved a request by FuturaGene to commercially produce genetically engineered (GE) eucalyptus trees in Brazil – the first such approval anywhere in the world.

But Winnie Overbeek, the Brazil-based Co-ordinator of World Rainforest Movement, was not surprised. ‘Over the years, CTNBio has made many decisions in favour of releasing GMO crops in Brazil, ignoring protests, and disregarding Brazil’s constitutional mandate for precaution,’ she says.

In fact, the day before the CTNBio decision, the Brazilian Forum to Combat Agrotoxins, an agency co-ordinated by Brazil’s Public Ministry, warned that CTNBio has repeatedly violated the National Brazilian Policy of Biosafety.

CTNBio not only ignored Brazilian law, however; they also violated the UN Convention on Biological Diversity’s 2008 decision on GE trees, which calls for detailed risk assessments and the Precautionary Approach with regard to GE trees. Brazil is a signatory to the CBD but seems content to ignore their obligations – ironic, since the head of the CBD is also Brazilian.

CTNBio member Paulo Paes de Andrade argues that ‘release of this GM tree is solely a Brazilian question and no other country or group of countries has the right to interfere in our decision’.

Brazil's mighty eucalyptus is under threat.
Mark Hillary under a Creative Commons Licence