The anti-Corngate
As soon as I heard about the possible GE contamination of corn, I knew some journalists would pose the “is this a re-run of Corngate?” question. Thankfully, they have all faithfully reported approvingly the Government’s clear “no” response to that question.
Corngate was actually a much wider issue than GE. The allegations made against the Government were much more serious than “your systems have failed to detect GE contamination as they should have”. They were about a premeditated cover-up of such systematic failures. And, as everyone knows, a cover-up is a much hotter story than a stuff-up.
The Government has completely front-footed this potential GE contamination scare, and for that it deserves credit. However, if the subsequent tests do prove GE contamination at levels that should have been picked up in the testing of the seed before it came into the country, then it would be wrong for the Government to say “business as usual”, “systems all working as they should”, “ho hum”. The whole point of the testing regime before importation is to ensure that no GE contaminated seed is planted and harvested in New Zealand. If that testing regime has failed in this instance, then the lab involved in the shonky testing will need urgent evaluation and perhaps decertification.
Need I remind anyone that the whole reason why it’s so important to catch GE contamination before the seed gets planted is that, once it’s in the ground, the GE contamination can easily spread uncontainably? Kiwis have made clear over many years they want GE kept in the lab. If it’s getting out into our clean, green, purportedly GE-free fields, then we should all be worried.
However, whether that has happened in this case, we won’t know till further testing comes in. (In part, because of the ludicrous situation in which the Government isn’t allowed to see the positive GE test without the corn producer’s permission, which means we don’t even know what the contamination level detected was…) So, at the moment, it’s very much a case of wait and see.
