Wednesday, October 18, 2000

Press Release

A letter to EPA, signed by Greenpeace, the Center for Food Safety and 58 others, states that by failing to perform a Biological Assessment or to obtain a Biological Opinion from other agencies, the EPA has violated federal law under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). "EPA has had its head in the sand since it learned that genetically engineered corn could be killing monarch butterflies," said Charles Margulis, Greenpeace Genetic Engineering Specialist. "There are at least 20 other endangered or threatened butterflies that could be at risk from the unexpected side effects of genetically engineered crops. But, instead of listening to scientists` warnings, EPA just burrows its head deeper." A three-day EPA meeting on the agency`s process of re-registering Bt crops starts today. The five-year registrations of the insecticidal corn and cotton varieties expire in 2001.

Today`s letter to EPA puts the agency on notice that the co-signers will take legal action if the agency continues this re-registration process without first consulting other agencies on issues relating to endangered or threatened species. Co-signers of the letter to EPA include: the Sierra Club; biologist Robert Pyle, author of Chasing Monarchs: Migrating with the Butterflies of Passage; nature writer Bill McKibben, author of The End of Nature; and Gary Paul Nabhan, science advisor to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum and author of six books and over 100 technical articles on ethnobotany, nutrition, and plant conservation.

In July 1999, Dr. Nabhan and his colleague Richard Daley wrote to EPA requesting that the agency seek a Biological Opinion from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The opinion would advise whether monarch and Karner`s Blue butterflies are placed in jeopardy by the registration and commercial planting of genetically engineered Bt corn. EPA denied the request. "The agency needs to do its homework before it allows millions of acres of genetically engineered crop varieties into the environment," said Joseph Mendelson, Legal Director of the Center for Food Safety. "We shouldn`t risk the extinction of these fragile creatures for the sake of industry profits."