Greenpeace Cofounder Supports Biotech
<http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-08-09.html>
AUBURN, Alabama, March 8, 2001 (ENS) - Dr. Patrick Moore, ecologist and co-
founder of the international conservation group Greenpeace, stated Tuesday
that, "the campaign of fear now being waged against genetic modification is
based largely on fantasy and a complete lack of respect for science and
logic."
Moore joined more than 3,000 scientists from around the world in signing a
Declaration in Support of Agricultural Biotechnology, sponsored by the
nonprofit AgBioWorld Foundation.
"In the balance it is clear that the real benefits of genetic modification
far outweigh the hypothetical and sometimes contrived risks claimed by its
detractors."
Moore, who is now an environmental consultant, was a founding member of
Greenpeace. He served for nine years as president of Greenpeace Canada and
seven years as a director of Greenpeace International.
Moore broke with Greenpeace in recent years, accusing the group of
abandoning science and following agendas that have little to do with saving
the Earth. Reiterating comments he made to the New Zealand Royal Commission
on Genetic Modification, Moore said, "Genetic modification can reduce the
chemical load in the environment, reduce the impact on non-target species,
and reduce the amount of land required for food crops."
"There are so many real benefits from genetic modification compared to the
largely hypothetical and contrived risks that it would be foolish to ban
genetic modification," Moore added.
Other signers of the Declaration of Scientists in Support of Agricultural
Biotechnology, available at: http://www.AgBioWorld.org, include Nobel Prize
winners Norman Borlaug, James Watson, Paul Berg, Peter Doherty and Paul
Boyer. The AgBioWorld Foundation is a project of biologist C.S. Prakash,
director of the Center for Plant Biotechnology Research at Tuskegee
University.
Prakash serves on the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural
Biotechnology Advisory Committee and also on the Advisory Committee for the
Department of Biotechnology of the Government of India.
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