Biotechnology and Food Aid

Thank you Mr. Chairman,

Mr. Ziegler,

As you know, some fourteen and a half million people are facing starvation in Southern Africa. Since the beginning of this year, my country has pledged over half a million metric tons of food to meet this crisis. The food, mostly corn, comes from our own stocks and silos and is identical to the food which Americans eat every day.

As you are also aware, some countries in Southern Africa have raised questions about the safety or environmental risk of American corn because it contains biotechnology corn. Of course, this corn complies with all United States standards for safety; standards which are the most rigorous in the world. The grain in question has been consumed by millions of Americans, Canadians, Australians, South Africans and others all over the world for years, with not one known case of any apparent ill effect.

Mr. Ziegler,

Earlier this year, the Secretary General of the United Nations requested that United Nations agencies review their policies on biotech food aid. In August, the Director General of the World Health Organization, Dr. Gro Brundtland told a meeting of African health ministers, quote: "We know, for example, that GM [genetically modified] foods are eaten by people in other regions: these foods are no less safe for people here in Africa than they are for people who eat them in other parts of the world."

Dr. Brundtland stressed that governments of Southern Africa, quote: "must consider carefully the severe and immediate consequences of limiting the food aid that is made available for the millions of people so desperately in need."

Mr. Ziegler,

In a joint UN statement of August 27, 2002, the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Health Organization and the World Food Programme concluded that, quote: "based on national information from a variety of sources and current scientific knowledge…they hold the view that the consumption of GM food now being provided as food aid in southern Africa is not likely to present human health risk. Therefore these foods may be eaten."

On August 23, the European Union reiterated that, quote: "there is no reason to believe that GM food is inherently unsafe to human health" and "that EU scientists have found the GM corn varieties that they have looked at to be as safe as their conventional counterparts."

And yet, Mr. Ziegler, on October 15 you informed the world that the scientific evidence on biotechnology is wrong; that you, and I quote, "put the views of nongovernmental organizations who say humans are at risk if they consume GM food over a period of time before that of the World Health Organization which says it is safe."

Mr. Ziegler,

In the face of imminent famine in southern Africa, with hundreds of thousands of tons of donated American corn in the region and arriving in port, you stated, and I quote again: "There is absolutely no justification to produce genetically modified food except the profit motive and the domination of the multinational corporations."

To the millions starving in southern Africa, your message was, and this is the last time I will quote you: "There is plenty of natural, normal good food in the world to nourish the double of humanity."

Mr. Ziegler,

As the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, your mandate is: "to establish cooperation with Governments, intergovernmental organizations, in particular the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, and non-governmental organizations, on the promotion and effective implementation of the right to food, and to make appropriate recommendations on the realization thereof, taking into consideration the work already done in this field throughout the United Nations system."

Instead you have called on governments to starve their people by denying them access to the only food available to them right now.

You have used your office to challenge the food offered by the American people to avert the scourge of famine and to encourage governments to deny food to their hungry citizens. By ignoring both science and the considered policies of the United Nations you bear responsibility for placing millions in greater peril.

Mr. Ziegler,

Actions have consequences, and your actions can cause people to die.

Thank you Mr. Chairman.