... - FoE tells Govt
Accra, Dec. 12, GNA - Friends of the Earth-Ghana (FoE-Ghana), an environmentally concerned organisation has called on the Government to recall all contaminated US long grain rice from the country. The FoE said in a statement issued in Accra on Tuesday that call was necessitated by the facts that confirmed the presence of the genetically modified (GM) strain of rice known as Liberty Link Rice 601 (LLRICE601) in commercial rice supplies in Ghana.

Continental Commodity Trading Company (CCTC) Limited, importers of rice from the US, has denied the contamination of some brands of American long grain rice imported into Ghana with the GM LLRICE601. On Friday the November 24, 2006, FoE-Ghana confirmed the existence of LLRICE601 contamination in six rice brands of American long grain rice in Ghana, following reports in August this year from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) that an 93unapproved=94 GM strain of rice had contaminated commercial rice supplies in the U.S. meant for export.

Samples of rice from some brands of American long grain rice in Ghana were collected by experts from Friends of the Earth-Ghana and other Friends of the Earth Groups in Africa and sent to an independent laboratory in the United States, which confirmed the presence of the GM rice strain LLRICE601.

The statement said that on the eve of November 24, 2006, the United States Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) announced that it will deregulate the GM LLRICE601.

This followed its illegal contamination of commercial rice supplies intended for export.

FoE-Ghana said the announcement in itself had sparked concerns all over the world as the approval for any GM crop required extensive testing and independent scientific review of safety to human health and the environment.

The Genetically modified rice has been engineered with a protein known as Liberty Link (LL) which allowed the plant to withstand applications of herbicide used to kill weeds.

The discovery of the contamination prompted Japan and the EU to tighten their regulation of US rice imports. Japan banned U.S. rice imports in August 2006.

Again in Europe, rice products were recalled in supermarkets in Norway, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Earlier this week, the US Federation of rice farmers recommended a plan of action to remove the contamination of LLRICE601 from the food supply chain in the U.S. The plan requests the U.S. State authorities to take specific actions to ensure that commercial rice seed supplies for the 2007 crop have tested negative for the presence of Liberty Link genetically engineered traits.

The plan also makes recommendations to all segments of the rice industry to further ensure that Liberty Link traits did not appear in the rice supply chain from 2007 forward.

The FoE-Ghana said it deemed it 'unfortunate, irresponsible and unethical' that a GM strain of rice 'has found its way onto our markets through contamination.

'We also reiterate the fact that at the time of contamination this rice strain was unapproved for human consumption. We call for this GM rice to be recalled from the country.

'We believe that the regulatory agencies should stand up to the task and undertake steps to investigate and eliminate this rice from our supplies. Furthermore no American rice should be allowed into the country without a valid GM-Free certificate', the FoE-Ghana said in the statement.

In another development, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on have said genetically engineered rice caused no identifiable concerns related to human health, food safety or the environment after tests were conducted on it. The two bodies said they were 93notified by Bayer Crop Science that the company has detected trace amounts of regulated genetically engineered (GE) rice in samples taken from grain bins containing commercial long grain rice.

A statement issued by the Public Affairs Section of the US Embassy said 93the FDA and USDA carefully reviewed all scientific data submitted by Bayer and have concluded that this genetically engineered rice causes no identifiable concerns related to human health, food safety or the environment.'

The statement was reacting to what the two bodies said that there was 'some misinformation in the local media about genetically engineered American rice.'

It said: 'There are three lines of genetically engineered rice developed by Bayer, all of which contain the same protein (Liberty Link).

'Two of the rice lines have undergone an extensive scientific review. FDA and APHIS deemed those lines safe for use in food and safe in the environment.

'They were, therefore, deregulated, which allows them to be commercially marketed. 'However, Bayer chose not to market this genetically engineered rice.