TN farmers destroy GE trial fields, threaten more ‘destruction’

On November 10, more than 200 farmers descended on a trial field in Ramanathapuram village, about 20 km from Coimbatore, uprooting the crops in a GE rice field, accusing the company of conducting experiments in violation of guidelines. The protest came barely two weeks after agitating farmers burnt down a GE basmati rice trial field in Karnal, Haryana.

“Genetically engineered seeds were detrimental to sustainable agriculture and food security and harmful to people and the environment. We will intensify our agitations to prevent GM and GE seeds from being used in the state,” Duraimanickam told reporters here.

The Ramanathapuram experiment is one of the many field trials for Kharif 2006 for “untested’’ variety of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) rice being carried out in the country. In 2005, such field trials were conducted in Karnataka, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh. In 2006, trials are on in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.

Opposing GE crops in the state, farmers, belonging to the Tamil Nadu Green Movement and Tamil Nadu Organic Farming Movement uprooted the crops in the trial fields set up by Mahyco near Coimbatore, and put up a banner saying the plot was a GE rice field trial location. They also planted Bio-Hazard signposts to demarcate the 20-acre trial field stretch. The trial, according to the protestors, have been going on for some months “stealthily.’’

Tamil Nadu Farmers Association president K Chellamuthu said the company would not be allowed to step into Tamil Nadu. Chellamuthu accused the company of selling Bt cotton seeds “promising fancy profits,’’ resulting in farmers’ suicides in Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.

“They just want to destroy the traditional varieties of seeds and promote the sale of hybrid varieties developed by foreign companies,’’ he said, claiming that nothing else could be cultivated in the fields where such hybrid varieties had been grown. “We will not allow a Vidarbha to happen in Tamil Nadu,’’ said Chellamuthu.

He demanded that the Coimbatore District Collector, who heads the committee for monitoring field trials of genetically engineered crops, look into the issue of “blatant violation’’ of guidelines by Mahyco. The GE crops, he alleged, had “toxins right from the root to the tip’’ and were primarily meant to prevent insects from damaging them rather than for increasing yield.

Neeraj Mittal, Coimbatore District Collector told The Indian Express, that Mahyco, which was conducting the trials in the district, had been granted permission by the Department of Biotechnology of the Union Ministry of Science and Technology. “The trials are going on in controlled conditions with the mandatory buffers around the trial fields. All sorts of precautions are being taken. As far as my knowledge goes on the subject, there are no risks at all.’’ The company representatives had filed a police complaint regarding the destruction by farmers on the trial field, he said.

Soon after the November 10 Coimbatore agitation, the state government sent its agriculture secretary Surjit K Choudhary to inquire into the matter.