London (27th July, 2006, revised 5th August, 2006) – One news item this last week described how much of Brazil’s soya was grown on land recently cleared from the Amazonian rain forest. Major UK retailers have been persuaded to reject such soya in favour of bean grown more “ethically” (1,2).

What is it that the UK retailers have given up? It turns out that some UK retailers demand non-GM soya for their chicken feed. Where do they get it? Why, from Brazil, where the rainforest has been cleared to provide it for them (3).

But why clear the rainforest? Partly because much of Brazil’s soya crop is, of course, now GM. Brazilian farmers realised its benefits some years ago and those in the south, with easy access to Argentina where GM soya had been very much in use for years, were crossing the frontier to buy the seeds there even though cultivation in Brazil was illegal and the seed companies were deprived of normal royalty payments.

For years the Brazilian government dragged its feet in giving permission for GM soya but in the autumn of 2004 it did so – for one year. That fooled nobody so a year later they extended the permission and nobody now believes it will be revoked.

Because the GM-soya offered better returns for Brazilian farmers, more and more of them adopted it. Unfortunately for some parts of the European food chain, whose pernickety customers are said to prefer chickens given non-GM feed (though one wonders how they can tell the difference), a problem developed of where to get it. The answer was from the newly deforested areas.

Why do they source their soybeans from the north of Brazil? Because that is the only area on the planet from which they can still get non-GM soybeans. How long northern Brazil remains a source for non-GM soybeans will depend on how long it takes for plant breeders to cross the glyphosate-tolerant (GM) trait into varieties that grow in tropical conditions. Be that as it may, for the moment that is where the non-GM soya comes from.

The only market for non-GM soybeans is the UK (even our European neighbours now import and use non-segregated soybeans). So the pressure group involved faces two of its most lucrative campaigns, anti-GM and protecting the rainforest, being antagonistic to each other. As usual they have done extremely well in controlling the story and the GM angle is only just now emerging.

Now there's a how-de-do!

Sources:

1. Felicity Lawrence and John Vidal. Food giants to boycott illegal Amazon soya. The Guardian (24th July, 2006) (http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/story/0,,1827515,00.html)

2. Two-year moratorium on soybeans from deforested areas of Amazon. USDA Foreign Agricultural Service Gain Report No. BR6620 (25.7.2006) (http://www.fas.usda.gov/gainfiles/200607/146208449.pdf)

3.Kieran Cooke. Soy barons threaten Amazon rainforests and indigenous people.Irish Times (4.8.06) (http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/2006/0804/1154592770605.html)

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