By JCPRESS
Producers and consumers in local brought a case to the Niigata district court Takada branch on June 24 over the field experiment of the genetically modified ( GM) rice plant that the Hokuriku research center had been scheduling in Joetsu City, Niigata Prefecture, for the discontinuance of the cultivation experiment.
Niigata Prefecture is eminent production ground of rice in Japan . This prefecture has been initiating the rice farming culture of Japan since the great antiquity.
However, the defendant, a quasi government agency " Hokuriku Research Center of
National Agricultural Research Center" forced planting rice of GM rice plant in the experiment field with a strong backup of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry on June 29.
The Center is explaining, "Because the court had not put out the instruction of the discontinuance of the cultivation experiment by questioning the day before, we executed planting rice according to schedule".
Farmers and consumers are emphasizing, "The Hokuriku Center is not securing the safety of the experiment" and "The risk of the experiment on the producer and the consumer is large. There is not a necessity of the experiment either".
Because the environmental impact by GM crops is not clarified, the introduction of the precautionary principle is requested internationally.
Producers and consumers criticized severely to forcing the cultivation experiment by the Hokuriku Center , saying that "The Center forced the experiment disregarding an international request".
The Center planted GM rice plant that built in the gene of "Mustard" in the rice field in the isolation experiment place.
This GM rice plant has the resistance power in a peculiar ill to the rice plant.
Japan Consumer Press July 1, 2005 No.713 , online published : July 12, 2005