Sol Oyuela
As the world grapples with the impact of global food shortages (Six
million Ethiopian children at risk of malnutrition, May 21), the
livelihoods of 1.4 billion of the world's poorest farmers who rely on
harvesting seeds from one crop for sowing the next season is under
threat from biotech companies which are pushing to commercialise
"terminator" technology - genetic engineering that results in plants
producing sterile seeds.
The advent of these so-called suicide seeds represent an insidious
attempt to privatise plant life - and force poor families in developing
countries to buy new seeds each year from the large companies that
control the $19bn global seed market.

A global ban on terminator technology struck eight years ago is now
under threat from a powerful alliance of biotech companies and countries
with vested interests. They argue terminator technology should be
considered on a case-by-case basis, thereby undermining the blanket
moratorium. We fear the ban will once again come under pressure at this
week's UN summit on the convention on biological diversity in Bonn.

Biotech companies' claims that terminator technology will prevent
contamination between GM and non-GM crops are hotly contested, yet the
EU and, by implication, British taxpayers are contributing to the
development of the technology through a ?3.4m EU research project
investigating ways that seeds can be brought back to life with
chemicals. In the developing world, small-scale farming is how millions
of families survive. It is vital that at the Bonn summit this month the
UK government strongly supports the continuing global ban on terminator
technology.

www.checkbiotech.org