{"id":1082,"date":"2011-10-21T22:00:02","date_gmt":"2011-10-22T03:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/realfoodhouston.com\/?p=1082"},"modified":"2011-10-21T22:00:02","modified_gmt":"2011-10-22T03:00:02","slug":"biotech-industry-group-looks-for-influential-ambassadors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/2011\/10\/21\/biotech-industry-group-looks-for-influential-ambassadors\/","title":{"rendered":"Biotech Industry Group Looks for Influential ‘Ambassadors’"},"content":{"rendered":"

The UK Guardian is reporting<\/a> that\u00a0leaked\u00a0documents\u00a0indicate EuropaBio, Europe\u2019s largest biotech industry group\u2014members include Monsanto, Bayer, and other GM (genetic modification)\u00a0companies\u2014is \u201crecruiting\u00a0high-profile \u2018ambassadors\u2019 to lobby European leaders on GM policy.\u201d\u00a0 A\u00a0draft email\u00a0among the documents claims to have “have interest” from\u00a0Sir Bob Geldof; Lord Chris Patten, chancellor of Oxford University and BBC Trust chairman; David Byrne, former Irish EU commissioner and attorney general; and potentially Kofi Annan, former UN secretary general, and pro-GM science writer Mark Lynas.<\/p>\n

Apparently the intent was not to pay these ambassadors\u00a0directly (although expenses would be covered)\u00a0but to arrange\u00a0interviews with international media,\u00a0procure lucrative speaking engagements, and provide\u00a0introductions to high-level European bureaucrats to make the case for GM.\u00a0 They were\u00a0expected to sign a letter to the Financial Times promoting GM crops.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The potential ambassadors that were contacted by the Guardian denied any involvement with EuropaBio, some denied even any knowledge of the industry group.\u00a0 Christopher Flores. the author of\u00a0the draft email to the potential ambassadors,\u00a0said the documents\u00a0were confidential and that “We identified people we thought could help us reach out to a broad international audience.”<\/p>\n

The Guardian reports that\u00a0a briefing document sent to potential ambassadors included a statement that\u00a0“EuropaBio wants to distance itself from the ambassadors in order to give the industry arguments more credibility.”\u00a0 The briefing document tries to “persuade ambassadors that their position is widely shared.”\u00a0 It specifically mentions the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as “supporting and advocating the use of GM crops.”\u00a0 The briefing document also claims “zero recorded health incidents associated with GM technology and similarly no evidence of harmful environmental effects.”\u00a0 The document says that politicians are eager to use GM technology but are “constrained by a public opinion that has not changed enough.”<\/p>\n

The letter and briefing document are linked on the Guardian website.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The UK Guardian is reporting that\u00a0leaked\u00a0documents\u00a0indicate EuropaBio, Europe\u2019s largest biotech industry group\u2014members include Monsanto, Bayer, and other GM (genetic modification)\u00a0companies\u2014is \u201crecruiting\u00a0high-profile \u2018ambassadors\u2019 to lobby European leaders on GM policy.\u201d\u00a0 A\u00a0draft email\u00a0among the documents claims to have “have interest” from\u00a0Sir Bob …<\/span> Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[16,11,59,19],"tags":[26,25,405],"class_list":["post-1082","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-food-freedom","category-food-rights","category-gmos","category-real-food","tag-food-freedom-2","tag-food-rights-2","tag-gmos"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p70SEj-hs","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1082","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1082"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1082\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1086,"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1082\/revisions\/1086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1082"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1082"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realfoodhouston.com\/wp-files\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1082"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}