A group of UK farmers recently visited Spain where 137,000 acres of GM maize (about 11% of the country’s total) are grown in order to see the benefits for themselves.

The delegates were impressed with Spain’s commonsense attitude to GM crops. There had been no legal problems during four years of cultivation, with sensible rules for buffer zones. Cultivation of both GM and non-GM crops has coexisted without a two-tier marker developing.

One of the UK farmers who had earlier participated in a GM sugar beet trial in Norfolk said that the technology of using BT-maize avoided corn borer damage as well as saving two applications of insecticide. He was frustrated at being unable to use these new methods in sugar beet cultivation and so compete better in the world market.

Source:

UK growers study Spain’s GM record. Farmers Weekly (28 October 2005) (http://www.fwi.co.uk/Articles/2005/10/31/90438/UK+growers+study+Spain's+GM+record.htm)

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