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Dept for Environment Food and Rural Affairs

Answer

Andrew George: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much her Department has spent in each year since 1995 on the promotion of (a) genetically-modified and (b) organic produce. [121654] Mr. Morley: [holding answer 25 June 2003]: No money has been spent by my Department on the promotion of genetically modified produce or on the promotion of organic produce. However, aid has been made available to farmers converting to organic farming (and from 5 June 2003 aid has been made available to existing organic farmers also). The Department also funds a programme of R&D on organic production. And advice for farmers considering organic farming is provided by the Organic Conversion Information Service (OCIS) which is funded by Defra. Spending on these since financial year 1994-95 is detailed in the following table but data for spending on OCIS before financial year 1999-2000 are not readily available. _________________________________________________________________________________________________. Financial year Aid to organic farmers (£) R&D (£) OCIS (£) 1994-95 27,000 1,058,000 1-- 1995-95 261,000 931,000 1-- 1996-97 374,000 1,116,000 1-- 1997-98 571,000 908,000 1-- 1998-99 1,026,000 1,491,000 1-- 1999-2000 12,469,000 2,035,000 788,000 2000-01 11,397,000 2,207,000 601,000 2001-02 10,910,000 2,193,000 327,000 2002-03 12,567,000 1,791,000 301,000 _________________________________________________________________________________________________. 1 Not readily available

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

121654; 408 c397W

Session

2002-03

Subjects

Expenditure Genetically modified organisms Food Publicity Organic food

Contains statistics

Yes

Link

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