- WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A
coalition of environmental groups and consumer advocates sued the U.S.
Agriculture Department in federal court on Wednesday to try to halt the
experimental planting of biotech crops engineered to make medicine.
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- Environmentalists, consumer advocates and food industry
groups have urged the USDA to impose stricter regulations on pharmaceutical
crops, fearing the unapproved plants could accidentally slip into the food
supply.
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- Biotech companies like Dow Chemical Co. and Monsanto
Co. have experimented with corn, soybeans, tobacco, rice and sugar crops
as a cheaper way to mass-produce medicines to treat a range of human ailments.
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- The coalition, which includes Friends of the Earth and
the Center for Food Safety, accused the USDA of allowing the experimental
crops to be planted in open fields without assessing the risk to other
crops, wildlife and humans.
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- The lawsuit was filed in a federal district court in
Hawaii, one of the top producing states of pharmaceutical crops.
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- "The existing regulatory system merely assumes that
growing these crops is harmless, even in places where they can contaminate
the environment and get into the food supply," said Joseph Mendelson,
legal director for Center for Food Safety.
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- A USDA spokesman would not comment on the lawsuit.
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- The biotech industry said USDA's regulatory system was
effective.
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- "This lawsuit can only serve to impede the potential
medical benefits of the technology," said Lisa Dry, a spokeswoman
for the Biotechnology Industry Organization.
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- Before field-testing pharmaceutical crops, biotech companies
must obtain a USDA permit that sets strict planting requirements to minimize
environmental risks. This includes planting experimental crops at certain
distances away from other crops and cleaning farm equipment.
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- A Monsanto spokesman said the company has decided to
shut down its plant-made pharmaceuticals program to cut costs and focus
its resources on its seeds and biotechnology businesses. The St. Louis-based
company said it expects to complete the process by the end of the year.
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- In March, the USDA imposed tougher rules on planting
industrial and pharmaceutical crops after a Texas biotech firm was accused
of accidentally contaminating other crops. Privately held ProdiGene Inc.
last year agreed to pay about $3 million to settle the matter.
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