HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0271.269 2012-2014 June 28, 2013
Honorable Council Members,
We support Bill 79. We are residents of Hilo and as family members are naturally very concerned
about the health and welfare of our family and our community. We have done a little research on
GMO crop production and want to bring the following to your attention.
Many intelligent and concerned citizens around the world have publicized caution in regard to GMO
experimentation. The following is a short list: 1. In the Cartegena Biosafety Protocol negotiated in
Montreal in January 2000, more than 130 governments pledged to implement the precautionary
principle and to ensure that biosafety legislations at the national and international levels take
precedence over trade and financial agreements. Here in Hawaii we would like you council members
to also implement precautionary principles. Do not allow experimention on this island. GMO
experimentation must be done in an environment in which GMO products will not affect other
normal natural crops because cross pollination contaminates non-GMO crops. 2. A university-based
survey of 8200 field trials of the most widely grown GM crops, herbicide-tolerant soya beans,
revealed that they yielded 6.7% less and required two to five times more herbicides than non-GMO
varieties. This has been confirmed by a more recent study in the university of Nebraska. Other
problems that have been identified regarding GMO crop production are erratic performance, disease
susceptibility, fruit abortion and poor economic returns to farmers. 3. Christian Aid, a major charity
working with the Third World, concluded that GM crops will cause unemployment, exacerbate Third
World debt, threaten sustainable farming systems and damage the environment. Christian Aid
wrote, "...We believe GM technology will destroy the diversity, the local knowledge and the
sustainable agricultural systems that our farmers have developed for millennia...and undermine our
capacity to feed ourselves." Hawaii has a deep heritage based on the land. We want this heritage
to be maintained. We want small farmers to be encouraged and protected.
Thank you for considering these points.
Sincerely, ,,
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Sravan Doug"rty p
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Lalita Dougherty / t•)
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