The court said it will not go into the ‘politics’ behind government’s decision to either allow or restrict field trials.
The Supreme Court Tuesday expressed disinclination to issue an interim order on moratorium on field trials of genetically modified (GM) crops.
A bench led by Justice H L Dattu said it did not want to consider a plea for an interim restraint order at this stage and would prefer to rather hear the case at length and decide it once and for all.
It is a prize from Monsanto to Monsanto, says one NGO
A selection committee chaired by M.S. Swaminathan awarding the World Food Prize for 2013 to three scientists including American multinational agricultural biotechnology corporation Monsanto’s chief technology officer, despite prevalent controversies and concerns over the technology of genetically modified organisms, has added fuel to the worldwide GMO debate.
The government has opposed suggestions to ban open-field trials of genetically modified crops, telling the Supreme Court on Friday that any such move will be detrimental to the country’s food secur
The Supreme Court Monday refused to pass an interim order restraining the Centre from going ahead with open field trials of the GM crops for the coming Rabi season.
A 10-year blanket ban on field trials of genetically modified (termed Bt) crops, proposed by an expert committee set up by the Supreme Court, has set off alarm bells, especially in the cotton sector.
A senior government official said it would be like gifting a 10-year monopoly on Bt cotton to a single company, Monsanto, and clipping the wings of upcoming competitors, such as Bayer, Dow, DuPont and Syngenta, and some public sector companies.
In the absence of any viable regulatory mechanism for gene technology, the Supr-eme Court has set up a six-member expert committee to monitor field trials on certain crops using genetically-modifie
Despite having unleashed more than 780 Bt cotton hybrids in India during the last decade, yields have turned stagnant and farmer suicides in the cotton belt are multiplying.
In fact, although Bt cotton now covers more than 90 per cent of the total cotton growing area in the country, yields in the last five years have gone up marginally from 470 kg per ha to 481 kg per ha though input costs have increased several fold, warned member NGOs of the Coalition for GM-Free India.
The Foundation for Biotechnology and Awareness (FBA) has urged the government to lift the moratorium on Bt brinjal and accept the recommendations of the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC
While the Centre on Monday said the area under Bt cotton is estimated to have expanded to 90 per cent of the total area sown under cotton in 2010-11, several non-government organisations alleged th
