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Written question asked by Michael Meacher (Labour) on Wednesday, 3 December 2003, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 9 December 2003. It was answered by Elliot Morley (Labour) on Tuesday, 9 December 2003 on behalf of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Dept for Environment Food and Rural Affairs

Question
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, on what basis the herbicide regime for use on GM maize was chosen for the farm-scale trials; what role Aventis (now Bayer) had in its choice; what international research was conducted to establish whether this was a commercially realistic regime to control weeds; and what research she has conducted on whether farmers in other countries use more aggressive herbicide mixes; what arrangements were made to ensure that farmers growing the GM trial crops managed them in a commercially realistic manner; and whether they were (a) required and (b) allowed to respray if the crop was under threat from excess weeds and was unlikely to produce an optimum yield. - (Holding answer 8 December 2003).
Answer

Mr. Meacher: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (1) on what basis the herbicide regime for use on GM maize was chosen for the farm-scale trials; what role Aventis (now Bayer) had in its choice; what international research was conducted to establish whether this was a commercially realistic regime to control weeds; and what research she has conducted on whether farmers in other countries use more aggressive herbicide mixes; [142304] (2) what arrangements were made to ensure that farmers growing the GM trial crops managed them in a commercially realistic manner; and whether they were (a) required and (b) allowed to respray if the crop was under threat from excess weeds and was unlikely to produce an optimum yield. [142305] Mr. Morley: [holding answer 8 December 2003]: The herbicide regime used by farmers growing GM maize in the farm-scale trials was proposed by the product manufacturer, AgrEvo (now Bayer Crop Science). The way farmers could then use the product was further specified under the terms of the draft product label in line with the experimental approval. The draft product label gave farmers the freedom to apply more than one application of the herbicide if they required, providing it was within the specified crop growth stage limits. The experimental approval assumed use of the herbicide under UK conditions. No research was conducted on the method of use of this or any other herbicides in other countries as this was not considered necessary. The Scientific Steering Committee overseeing the farm-scale evaluations (FSEs) were content from the outset that the proposals for the use of the pesticide provided by the manufacturers and specified in the draft product label were capable of delivering cost-effective weed control under UK conditions. A full audit of herbicide use was conducted as part of the FSEs and published as part of the results (Champion et al. 2003). This paper also gives details of the number of GM maize fields that received more than one application of herbicide. In the published results it was concluded that cost-effective weed control had been achieved. This conclusion was endorsed by the steering committee and was further validated by the publishing journal through their peer-review process.

Secondary information

Type
Written question
Reference
415 c379W; 142304;142305
Session
2003-04
Subjects
Crops Genetically modified organisms Research Weedkillers Sanofi-Aventis
Link
View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk