THE ARGUMENT FOR GM CROPS

Points made by a spokesman for companies producing GM crops, including Monsanto, Bayer CropScience and Syngenta

• Developing world farmers are readily adopting GM technology. More than six million farmers worldwide in 2002 chose to grow GM crops.

• GM crops can produce more food from the same area of land. An 80 per cent increase in yields claimed for GM cotton grown in India.

• In the future, GM products could help alleviate malnourishment and illness. GM products such as "Golden Rice" are being developed that are enriched with carotenoids, which humans convert to vitamin A.

• Planting of herbicide-resistant oilseed rape and sugar beet did not result in any outcrossing or weed formation as "volunteers" during a 10-year study.

• Despite 55,000 tests looking for gene transfer of herbicide resistance from oilseed rape to supposedly compatible weeds, such as charlock, surrounding and within the UK farm-scale trials, none were observed.

• As much as 14 million kg of farm chemicals need not be used if half of the European Union's major crops (maize, oilseed rape, sugar beet and cotton) were converted to GM production.

• GM sugar beet has shown increased levels of weed and insect biomass and biodiversity, without compromising yield.

• A huge weight of evidence indicates improved yields from crops already commercialised and those being researched.

• Economic benefits are immense and growing. The Australian Bureau of Agricultural Resource Economics suggests the worldwide adoption of GM crops could boost the overall income of all regions by US$316bn (#192bn) by 2015.

• EU laws on GM have been strengthened over the decade to maintain protection of human health and the environment while maintaining a unified market for biotechnology.

Points made by a spokesman for companies producing GM crops, including Monsanto, Bayer CropScience and Syngenta