Bills

Genetically Modified Crops Management (Designated Area) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 3 December 2019.)

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL (10:02): The Greens' position on this issue is well known and I have made three contributions on this topic in recent weeks, so rather than repeat myself in relation to those previous contributions, I will confine my remarks today mostly to the task of myth busting and putting some truths and facts into this debate. That will still take some time.

During the latest push to have our genetically modified crops moratorium lifted, pro-GM advocates have made many claims, some that are true but many that are not. I will address these claims one by one. There are 15 in total.

The first claim is that segregation of genetically modified crops in the field is possible and contamination is not an issue. The truth is that segregation of GM and non-GM crops has failed in Western Australia and elsewhere. Considerable evidence was presented to that effect to a Western Australian parliamentary inquiry. I refer members to report No. 49 of the West Australian Standing Committee on Environment and Public Affairs, entitled 'Inquiry into mechanisms for compensation for economic loss to farmers in Western Australia caused by contamination by genetically modified material'.

The West Australian parliamentary inquiry acknowledged that the controversial and long-running Marsh v Baxter legal case had a chilling effect on farmers claiming compensation for economic loss resulting from contamination. As one witness pointed out:

There are serious difficulties with causation because if you have multiple sources of GM contamination, proving causation is incredibly difficult. The onus of showing that is going to fall on the GM farmer who does not have the resources that the industry has and litigation itself has an enormous chilling effect on farmers who would much rather be farming than going through costly and difficult litigation with a very well-resourced industry.

Due to the failure of segregation and the high cost of GM contamination of canola, the response has been to redefine the grain grade of non-GM so that contamination of 0.9 per cent of GM material is permitted before it loses its non-GM classification and therefore its price premium, which I will talk more about later. The average is $30 to $35 a tonne and can get to $100 a tonne in Western Australia.

Minister Whetstone's chief of staff has confirmed that this standard of 0.9 per cent GM contamination is the national and international standard; however, the point to make here is that it would not be necessary if segregation was more successful. We have heard of farmers having to secure clean GM-free canola to shandy with their own contaminated crops to get them below the 0.9 per cent contamination threshold.

In July 2019, two GM wheat varieties were discovered in a fallow field in Washington State in the USA. Neither of these varieties had ever been commercialised, but they had been evaluated in field trials in the Pacific Northwest between 1998 and 2005. In June 2018, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency reported a contamination incident in Alberta, where unapproved GM wheat was discovered.

The GM variety that was discovered had been cultivated by Monsanto in open-air field trials 15 to 20 years prior, with the nearest test plot site being over 300 kilometres away. This discovery resulted in their Japanese and Korean markets suspending their imports of Canadian wheat. So some contamination is inevitable, and the problems are real. It is long-lasting and it costs growers money.

The second claim is that there is no price premium for non-GM crops. The truth is that in places where both GM canola and non-GM canola are grown (in other words, if other variables are excluded) there is a price premium for non-GM crops. According to the state government's own data, provided in evidence to the select committee by the Chief Executive of PIRSA, Scott Ashby, non-GM canola achieves an average $30 to $35 per tonne more than GM canola in those states that allow both GM and non-GM canola to be grown.

GM advocates, on the other hand, prefer to compare South Australia's non-GM canola prices with interstate GM canola prices; however, that does not compare like with like. It does not factor in transport costs or, most importantly, the oil content of the seeds. The oil content of canola is generally lower in South Australia, so it is no surprise that, as this crop is effectively an oil seed crop, this will impact on the price that is paid. Even retired Professor Anderson's inquiry on behalf of the government found there to be a price premium. He said:

…Australia has had access to non-GM hybrid varieties that were developed partly because of the moratoria in this country. Since some of those hybrid varieties fit a no-till farming system, they have reduced the current net economic and environmental benefits of switching to a GM canola variety, as compared with the net benefits that existed back in the mid-1990s in Canada. As well, prices have been slightly lower for GM than non-GM canola varieties, yields currently are not much above the best of non-GM varieties, the technology access fee for GM seed is considered by some farmers to be high, and growers are wary of too much dependence on Roundup…

In addition to the technology access fee, the farmers of GM canola must also pay a royalty to the patent owner and are not allowed to collect the seed but instead must purchase more seed to plant for the next GM canola crop in the following year.

The third claim is that the moratorium provides no economic advantage to South Australia. Again, retired Professor Anderson's report did not even attempt to quantify the economic benefits of retaining the moratorium to keep South Australia's GM-free status. He was happy to evaluate what he saw as costs, but not the benefits. Instead, he lumped them all as 'unquantifiable'. The professor said:

One of the unquantifiable benefits of retaining the current moratorium is that it preserves the option of South Australia maintaining its GM-free status. Another is that it continues to benefit those who value that status for philosophical, ethical or spiritual reasons. Thirdly, it continues to benefit producers whose brand is enhanced by their buyers recognizing that South Australia is a GM-free zone.

In other words, all the things that might be regarded as advantages or benefits of keeping the moratorium, the good professor just said, 'Oh, well, they are unquantifiable,' and so he did not even try to count them.

This is a completely unsatisfactory response, particularly when the legislative basis for the moratorium—marketing benefits—are effectively ignored. It is this type of approach to economics that has caused many of the greatest market distortions in history. For example, in the area of climate change or pollution, the notion of externalities or costs that are borne by everyone but not by any particular legal entity has resulted in ecological collapse in many areas. It is flawed economic thinking.

The fourth claim is that the South Australia moratorium curtails research in South Australia. The truth is that research has been conducted in South Australia throughout the period of the moratorium. Genetically modified field trials approved as exemptions by the minister have been conducted through the period of the moratorium. In fact, there are currently 10 approved field crop trials in South Australia, half of which were in place prior to the Marshall Liberal government coming to office.

In the last day, the minister's office has confirmed that three new gazetted exemptions were granted in May and two more in July. These trials are being conducted by both government and private bodies and they have been accommodated within the commercial moratorium. The moratorium is not preventing research. I have a list of those trials, and they involve canola, cotton, some more canola, barley, cottonseed, wheat, barley, cotton, canola again, and Indian mustard. These are all trials that have been approved within the rules of the moratorium.

The closure of the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics at Waite is often held up as a victim of the moratorium. During debate on the GM crops moratorium regulation disallowance motion last month, minister Ridgway implied as much when he said:

It is interesting that the Centre for Plant Functional Genomics at Waite has closed. I could not believe that after the work that has gone into that. The researchers there have now left because of the former Labor government's policy.

The truth is that the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics Proprietary Limited is an Australian proprietary company that was set up in late 2002. The ACPFG was first funded through grants totalling $27 million from the Australian Research Council, the Grains Research and Development Corporation and the South Australian government, plus $30 million from the University of Adelaide, the University of Melbourne and the Victorian Department of Primary Industries, and the University of Queensland. It was given a second round of funding, to which the University of South Australia also contributed. I am informed that the third and last round of funding it received was from BASF, a multinational chemical company.

Although, according to the ASIC website, the ACPFG is still registered, the centre closed in 2017 when its funding ran out. I am told that it had not achieved the results that it had hoped to achieve, which is not unusual in this field of research, and that as a result of not achieving results it was not able to attract further private investment to enable it to continue. This centre operated in South Australia for 15 years, 13 of those during the period of the moratorium. The claims of the government members that the ACPFG closed due to the moratorium, like a lot of their other claims in this debate, are just plain wrong.

The fifth claim is that the science of genetically modified crops is settled. The truth is that much of the science on genetically modified crops and genetically modified food is hotly contested. It is not just one science but many. I do not doubt that scientists have the ability to genetically modify plants. Of course they can, which is why we are having this debate. No-one is doubting that science. But, similarly, we can accept the science behind the cloning of Dolly the sheep; we can accept nuclear science, which shows that we can undertake the process of nuclear fission; we can create heat, we can turn it into electricity; but accepting some of the science and accepting that it is a good idea are two very different things.

I accept nuclear science, but I think it is a very bad idea for South Australia to go down that path. I accept genetic science, but that does not mean we should embrace it in South Australia, because our decisions, in this place especially, must be based on a range of considerations, including social, economic and environmental, and in those spaces there is much difference of opinion. So saying that you believe in the laws of physics or the fact that the earth is round, or if you believe the science of climate change therefore you must support commercial GM crops in South Australia, is dishonest and ludicrous. Even within the various relevant fields of science there are vastly diverging opinions in the scientific literature.

One useful exercise for members to undertake is to follow the money and to look carefully at claims made by scientists employed or funded by the multinational chemical and biotechnology corporations. There is a wealth of scientific evidence and opinion out there from other scientists who are not funded by vested interests, and they need to be included in the debate as well.

The sixth claim is that genetically modified crops reduce chemical use and greenhouse emissions, in particular due to their enabling of no-till farming. The truth is that the development of no-till farming has been an important innovation that will reduce the impact of agriculture on climate change; however, those innovations are not the exclusive domain of GM crops. In fact, these traits were developed through conventional agricultural breeding, as even retired Professor Anderson conceded in his report to the government.

The primary attribute of the only GM crop being considered for South Australia—Roundup Ready GM canola—is that it is herbicide tolerant, specifically to the herbicide glyphosate. The costs and benefits of glyphosate are hotly contested, and many jurisdictions are ending their love affair with this chemical. I will come back to that later.

The seventh claim is that farmers want to grow GM crops. The truth is that most farmers do not want to grow GM crops. Most farmers will not grow GM crops, even if they are given the opportunity to do so. We know from those other states that have lifted the moratorium that GM crops are not popular and are not being taken up. Even those farmers who do try it usually abandon GM crops within a short period. Grain Producers SA represents 5,800 South Australian grain growers, but their 2016 petition to the previous minister for agriculture, Leon Bignell, calling for the lifting of the moratorium, had only 221 signatures. I received an email, on 4 December this year, from two South Australian farmers, which said:

We are farmers who live on the SA/Vic border and last year watched the GM prices closely, never once did they come close to the conventional GM prices, always at least $30-$50 less.

This year I noticed there aren't any prices so I rang Graincorp and was told the demand is so low for GM canola they don't have any sites in Vic with segregations for GM! GM canola has sat in their site for 2 years unable to find buyers! The segregation costs are so high and the demand so low they aren't accepting any GM at their sites in Victoria this year.

Why do we want this if Victoria who have been growing it for years aren't growing it by choice!!

Please keep our marketing edge in SA and help keep us GM free!!

There are some fairly serious claims made there, so I asked my staff if they could contact GrainCorp, which is Australia's largest bulk grain handler. My staff did so, on 5 December, to check whether what the farmer had said to us was correct. My staff were able to confirm, over the phone with Luke Thrum, a senior manager of investor relations and corporate affairs, that the claim was basically true. GrainCorp do not offer segregation for GM canola in Victoria because of the lack of demand from farmers. He also said that they only have one site in New South Wales that offers GM canola segregation. So, across both New South Wales and Victoria, GrainCorp is only offering one segregation receival site.

If you look at the GrainCorp website, there are 43 receiving sites in Victoria, plus two ports. In New South Wales, they have 91 sites, so out of 134 sites across those two states, there is only one site that offers segregation for genetically modified canola. AWB GrainFlow is another bulk handler, which has seven sites in New South Wales and Victoria that accept canola. Only one of those accepts GM canola.

So, after 12 years of allowing GM canola in those states, there is so little interest in growing it that there are only two sites that accept it. In Western Australia, I am informed, there are only two sites that accept and segregate GM canola. This begs the question: why is the government pushing this so hard? If canola is only 2 per cent of total grain production in South Australia, and if only a tiny proportion of farmers are likely to grow GM canola, why would we risk the reputation and markets of the overwhelming majority of farmers?

To paraphrase Winston Churchill's famous speech about the RAF after the Battle of Britain, never was so much risk imposed on so many by so few for so little. A number of other farmers have written to me in recent days. I do not propose to go through all of those. I thank those farmers who have written to me. I will refer to some of the observations that were made by one farmer a little later on in this contribution. What the farmers are saying to me is countering what other farmers have said through their peak bodies to the government, and that is that they do not want the moratorium lifted. They do not want to grow GM crops; they do not see any benefits in it.

I will go on to the eighth claim now. This is a claim that genetically modified crops tackle drought and climate change. The Minister for Primary Industries, Mr Tim Whetstone, in his media release dated 5 November this year headed, 'State government willing to back GM select committee recommendations', said:

South Australian farmers should have the same choices to use new and improved crop varieties to tackle drought and climate change as farmers enjoy in our neighbouring states.

The truth is that there are no GM crops available that tackle drought and climate change. The only GM crops that are approved and commercially available in Australia are, first of all, cotton, where the trait is insect resistance and herbicide tolerance; canola, which we are mainly talking about here, where the modified trait is herbicide tolerance; and safflower, which is in relation to its acid composition—and that is, I should say, approved overwhelmingly for the industrial oil market, not for human consumption. The only other two GM crops are carnations and roses, both of which have genetically modified colour.

I would like to know where these new and improved crop varieties are that will tackle drought and climate change that farmers are supposedly enjoying in neighbouring states. Where are these crops? There are four GM crop plants currently approved for limited and controlled release, which means they are approved for field trials. Only two of those are being trialled for drought tolerance, those being chickpeas and wheat.

Listed on the website of the Office of the Gene Technology Regulator are another 16 crop plant varieties that have been surrendered or withdrawn, indicating that they failed at the field trial stage. This is an extremely low success rate for genetically modified drought tolerant crop plants. Extremely low success rate might be understating it. Zero success rate is probably a better response.

Until a plant gets through field trials and is approved to be commercially available, it is an experimental crop only and it is not able to be planted in farmers' fields. It would be foolish to end a moratorium on the promise of GM drought tolerant crops that are not yet available and that, given the failure rate, may never be available.

Let's imagine now for a minute that against all the odds drought tolerant GM wheat does pass field trials and is approved for commercial release. What might happen if that was allowed to be grown in South Australia alongside our non-GM wheat? What will happen is that it will immediately come under a trade embargo. Although varieties of GM wheat have been available for years, it has never been commercially grown anywhere in the world, and any escapes of GM wheat varieties from old trial sites overseas need to be quickly eradicated.

I referred before to a recent example, from a few months back, in July this year, when two GM wheat varieties were discovered in a fallow field in Washington state in the US. Neither of these varieties had ever been commercialised, but they had been evaluated in field trials in the Pacific Northwest between 1998 and 2005. So, 14 years after the trials ended, they are still causing contamination. Once this was discovered, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service of the United States Department of Agriculture immediately set about destroying the entire unplanted field just to ensure that all the plants were destroyed.

The US have now had to develop new testing kits for their trading partners in South Korea and Japan so that they can test for these varieties in addition to the other GM varieties that they test for. Why have they done that? The reason is: no markets want GM wheat. That is because wheat is eaten by people on a daily basis—it is in bread, cakes, pasta—and it is labelled in many countries. When Canadian farmers asked their markets whether they would accept GM wheat from Canada, they found that the international customers who buy 82 per cent of Canada's wheat crop said that they will stop buying it if Canada introduces GM wheat.

These customers have been clear: they will stop buying all wheat from us, GM and non-GM alike. This market loss issue applies to all GM wheat, not just RR wheat. That is a report by the National Farmers Union to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, 2003. It is worth noting that, at the time of the report, Canadian farmers grew GM canola in significant amounts, but they recognised the importance of listening to their customers—in other words, the market—and they did not want to risk losing the non-GM market by allowing GM wheat to be grown in their country.

Just last year, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency released information about a contamination incident in Alberta. I referred to that briefly before. That was where unapproved GM wheat was discovered. The GM variety that was discovered had been cultivated by Monsanto in open-air trials 15 to 20 years previously, with the nearest test plot site being over 300 kilometres from where the contamination incident was discovered. The Canadian National Farmers Union issued a media release in response to this in June 2008, entitled 'GM wheat contamination incident a reminder of need for better regulation'. In the release, they said:

This incident is a reminder of the serious risk to market access and potential devastation of farmers' incomes that have been put in motion by the CFIA (Canadian Food Inspection Agency) when it allowed field-testing of genetically engineered crops. Back in 2004, the National Farmers Union called for an end to secret, open-air field tests of genetically engineered crops in Canada. Since 2000, the [National Farmers Union] has maintained that companies that are promoting genetically engineered crops such as Monsanto (now Bayer) must be held responsible for losses incurred by farmers as a result of contamination incidents.

As an aside, the Greens wholeheartedly agree with this. We introduced a right to damages bill—we have done that four times in this chamber since 2007—that would have done exactly that: ensure that the patent owner of the GM crop that caused contamination is responsible for losses incurred by farmers. If we go back to the Canadian National Farmers Union and the GM wheat contamination incident last year, five days after that previous media release I referred to, they issued another one stating:

The recent discovery in southern Alberta of genetically modified wheat plants with Monsanto's glyphosate resistance trait has renewed concern about the risk of GMO contamination to Canada’s wheat. Japan and Korea have suspended imports of Canadian wheat pending their own investigation of the situation.

The National Farmers Union (NFU) has called for the elimination of open-air testing of genetically modified crops since 2001. The potential impact on farmers' livelihoods and the Canadian economy that would occur if contamination resulted in permanently closed markets is an unacceptable risk.

Canada is much further down the GM road than Australia, so the concern expressed by their farmers union of the risk to export markets from GM contamination comes from a couple of decades of experience and is something that South Australia should heed.

The wheat industry in Australia is worth $7.1 billion per year as a five-year average, and the value of wheat exported from Australia is about $5 billion per year. If the GM wheat that is being trialled in Australia passes its field trials, if it becomes approved for commercial release and is introduced into Australia, it would risk important markets in an industry that, as I have said, is worth $5 billion a year on an export basis alone. The Greens, along with many others, know that this is not worth the risk.

The ninth claim is that solutions to climate change and drought lie in GM technology. The truth is that, if we refer to a 2014 publication entitled, 'GMO Myths and Truths: An evidence-based examination of the claims made for the safety and efficacy of genetically modified crops and foods,' a publication by Dr John Fagan PhD, Michael Antoniou PhD and Claire Robinson MPhil, they say:

Climate change is often used as a reason to claim that we need GM crops. But the evidence suggests that the solutions to climate change do not lie in GM. This is because tolerance to extreme weather conditions such as drought and flooding—and resistance to the pests and diseases that often accompany them—are complex traits. That means they are the product of many genes working together in ways we do not yet fully understand. Such complex genetic traits cannot be delivered through GM.

Where a GM crop is claimed to possess complex traits, they have generally been achieved through conventional breeding, not GM. After the complex trait is developed through conventional breeding, simple GM traits such as pest resistance or herbicide tolerance are added to the conventionally bred crop to represent the 'inventive step' necessary to enable the GMO developer company to patent it.

While the resulting crop is often claimed as a GM success, this is untrue. It is a success of conventional breeding with added GM traits. The GM traits do not contribute to the agronomic performance of the crop but make the crop the property of the GMO company and (in the case of herbicide tolerance) keep farmers dependent on chemical inputs sold by the same company.

The 10^th claim made is that the government's independent review by retired Professor Kym Anderson is independent and therefore its findings are all valid. This claim has been strongly contested by many, including Dr John Paull, an environmental scientist at the School of Land and Food at the University of Tasmania.

He submitted a review of Professor Anderson's review. Paull's work was entitled, 'A Review of the Independent Review of the South Australian GM Food Crop Moratorium and 14 Alternative Findings'. He provided that to the government during its consultation back in March this year. In his 19-page review he documented 14 findings. His first finding was as follows:

Finding 1: The independent review is not independent at all. The independent review is written by a vocal and long-term advocate of GMOs and GM-crops, and in addition it contains errors of fact from the outset (see Finding 2) and it should be disregarded in its entirety.

Dr Paull cited at least four previous publications between 2001 and 2004 by Kym Anderson, where his opinions on GM crops were evident. Because I appreciate the seriousness of a claim when you are suggesting that something is not independent, I need to put a bit more information on the record. I will just read the abstract of Dr John Paull's report from March 2019. He says:

The present review of the 'Independent Review of the South Australian GM Food Crop Moratorium' (Anderson, 2019) reveals that the so-called independent review is not independent at all and thus it falls at the first hurdle. Kym Anderson is a long term vocal advocate of genetically modified crops and has expressed such views regularly over the past two decades. The Independent Review was commissioned by the South Australian Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development. There were 216 public submissions, of these, 78% [or 168] were for retaining the existing Moratorium, 18% [or 39 submissions] were for scrapping the Moratorium, and 4% [or 8 people] were undecided. 100% of the food available in Australian supermarkets is GM-free which mirrors the sentiments of Australian consumers, which are against GM-food; and Australian supermarkets are all aware of such sentiments. South Australia (SA) has a 'clean and green' image. This image serves SA well for food production, trade, tourism, education and migration. GMOs would damage SA's clean and green and smart image and can thereby be economically detrimental to the state. The Independent Review proposes that GM canola is the sole candidate for uptake were the GM Moratorium to be scrapped. The GM canolas (Round-up ready…) proposed for SA are herbicide-dependent crops relying on regimes of multiple toxic herbicide applications. Glyphosate is a carcinogen and triazine is banned in Europe. These are chemicals that are dangerous to the health and wellbeing of animals, including humans, and the environment, and prescribing their use can be expected to increase SA's health costs and future environmental clean-up costs. GM agriculture is an example of privatising the profits and socialising the costs. Australia is the world leader in organic agriculture and accounts for 51% of the world's certified organic hectares, and, of this, South Australia is the leading organic state in Australia accounting for 40% of Australia's certified organic hectares (and 20% of the world's certified organic hectares). Organic produce sells at a price premium—usually in the range of 10% and 110% (compared to non-organic). This contrasts with GM canola which sells at a price penalty of 7%. These price premiums and price penalties reflect market sentiment—what the market wants and what the market does not want. The GM Moratorium has a social licence and is serving SA well and should be maintained on economic and social grounds. The Independent Review should be rejected.

Claim No. 11 I have referred to before: that the majority of submissions to the Anderson independent inquiry supported lifting of the GM moratorium. As I said, there were 216 public submissions and 78 per cent were for retaining the moratorium.

The 12^th claim—and again it comes out of what Dr John Paull wrote—is that there is a market for GM foods. The truth is there is no demand for genetically modified foods. In a 2017 study by international consultants and analysts GfK, which stands for Growth from Knowledge, they surveyed 23,000 consumers in 17 countries. Nearly half of the consumers reported that 'free from GMO ingredients' are very or extremely important factors when deciding which food or beverage product to eat or drink, with Chinese participants ranked at 60 per cent. Dr Paull states:

As a consequence, there are economic price penalties for GM crops and for growing what consumers do not want.

Claim 13 is that GM crops are good for the South Australian agriculture industry. The truth is that GM crops threaten the organic agriculture industry. As I said, organic agriculture in Australia is a growing sector: it is growing at 22 per cent per annum. South Australia leads the country in organic agriculture: 40 per cent of Australia's certified organic hectares is located in South Australia. This is a great agricultural and economic success story. Allowing GMOs to put organics at risk for the sake of something that global consumers do not want would be economically stupid, given that there is a price premium for organic produce and an economic penalty for GMO produce.

The 14^th claim is that farmers have complete control over how they grow their GM crops. The truth is that when farmers choose to grow GM canola they enter into a contract with the patent owner which they must strictly adhere to. Under the 'Roundup Ready canola grower license and stewardship agreement' that farmers are required to sign, the farmers do not own the seed that they purchase, they do not control how they manage their crop and they cannot save the seeds for the following year's planting.

The farmers of GM canola are told when Roundup must be sprayed. For example, one condition is that the first spray is when the plant has between two and six leaves. I do not propose to go into a full, detailed analysis of the merits or otherwise of glyphosate, but I will just remind members that glyphosate is banned in many countries. It is widely suspected to be linked to cancer and was formally declared to be a known carcinogen by the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment.

Glyphosate does not stay on the farm. It contaminates water, air, soil, plants and animals. It is ingested by adults and children via various routes, including via food and beverages. Far from being a benign miracle chemical, glyphosate has serious questions to answer. But the users (the growers) of Roundup Ready canola do not just require glyphosate, they also require the use of another herbicide, which is Spray.Seed 250, and they need to use that in between crops. I am told that most farmers do not do it because it causes nosebleeds.

What is Spray.Seed 250? Spray.Seed 250 is a non-selective contact herbicide that is used for weed control prior to sowing broadacre crops. It is produced by Syngenta. It contains diquat and paraquat, and it comes with a warning that it is toxic and can cause death. In fact, there was a tragic case, a very sad case, of a Queensland man who died in 2012 when he was filling his pressure backpack pump spray with paraquat, and the backpack unit cracked. Some chemical sprayed over him and onto his face. You only have to ingest a very small amount of it to be deadly—and he died. It has also been linked to Parkinson's disease, with Parkinson's Australia saying that there is growing evidence about its harmful effects.

Paraquat has been banned in 32 countries. It has been banned in Europe for over a decade. Last month, it was reported that Thailand is also planning to ban it, along with glyphosate, which has already been banned in Vietnam and Austria. Diquat approval in the European Union was withdrawn in July 2018, so it is now banned as well. I can understand why farmers do not want to use this product. Instead, many farmers spray the Roundup Ready formula again, which in turn impacts on the growing problem of glyphosate resistance amongst weeds. It is similar to the problem of antibiotic resistance in medicine.

The 15^th claim is that the Greens' 2007 bill, which entrenched the moratorium in legislation, was rushed through parliament in the last week of the year before the election. The truth is that the Genetically Modified Crops Management Regulations (Postponement of Expiry) Bill 2017 was introduced into the Legislative Council on 18 October 2017. One month later—on 15 November 2017—it was debated and passed in this house. It was then introduced into the House of Assembly, on 16 November 2017 and listed on their Notice Paper for two weeks before it was debated and passed on 28 November 2017. That is a time frame of six weeks, so the claim of rushing that bill through in the last sitting week is absolute rubbish. Compared with the present bill, which we did not even see until last week, the progress of the 2017 bill was entirely within the established protocols of both chambers of this parliament.

I now put one question for the minister to respond to in the second reading. I appreciate the briefing that we had from minister Whetstone's chief of staff, but one question that was not answered satisfactorily was whether the Marshall Liberal government, including any member of the government and/or PIRSA or SARDI, had any discussions about or received any offers of funding for plant breeding research from any agrochemical companies or any related crop science organisations that they fund? That is the question. As I said before, we are keen to follow the money. I want to know whether any discussion has been held or has any offer been made?

In the answer that was provided, the question was reframed as: 'Has PIRSA/SARDI received any offer to undertake research and development of GM varieties if the GM moratorium is lifted on the South Australian mainland?' PIRSA has advised the answer is no. That was not the question I asked. I would like the minister to answer the question I did ask.

Just by way of conclusion, we heard on radio this morning the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Peter Malinauskas, talking about the bill and the Labor Party's position on it. He was speaking with Ali Clarke and David Bevan just before 9 o'clock this morning on ABC radio Adelaide. The Leader of the Opposition was suggesting that we need more time to allow regions, other than Kangaroo Island, to consider whether they want to remain GM free.

Whilst the Greens' position is clear that we believe the moratorium should apply to the whole state, we appreciate that postponing the final decision until amendments can be drafted is the second best option. So if the bill is not defeated today at the second reading, we will support any motion to further adjourn debate until next year to enable the consultation referred to by the Leader of the Opposition to take place.

Finally, I would like to thank everyone who has written to me in relation to this issue. There are many dozens of people in recent days especially who have emailed and phoned. They have provided advice and information, all of which I think adds value to the debate that we are having. I would particularly like to thank Judy Carman, whom I have referred to before in previous debates, as well as Julie Newman, a farmer who has provided a great deal of information. I have not put all of it on the public record, but my contribution today, together with the contributions I have made previously, cover most of the issues that she raised.

I will just leave members with this final point. Once the genie is out of the bottle, you cannot put it back in. If this house decides today to support the lifting of the GM crops moratorium on mainland South Australia, it will be a decision that cannot be reversed. My point is: be very careful what you wish for.

The Hon. F. PANGALLO (10:47): I rise to speak on the Genetically Modified Crops Management (Designated Area) Amendment Bill 2019. This bill is designed to remove the existing moratorium until 2025 on the South Australian mainland, except for Kangaroo Island, on genetically modified crop production and the transportation of GM products, which was first introduced in 2003 and has since been reconsidered and maintained on three occasions, in 2008, 2014 and 2017.

The commonwealth allowed the production of GM canola crops in 2003. All mainland states, apart from South Australia and the ACT, have allowed their farmers to grow GM crops. Western Australia was the last to take it up, in 2009, joining Queensland, Victoria and the Northern Territory, where there are no restrictions on GM varieties approved by the Office of the Gene Technology Regulator. There is a partial restriction in New South Wales, which only allows for cotton and canola. Our island state of Tasmania has retained its moratorium, which had expired last month, because it believes it has a market advantage in retaining its GM-free status.

The intention of the moratorium in South Australia was to observe and assess the impact of GM production where it is allowed, including economic risks and access to markets and trade, as well as to analyse the effects on both organic and conventional growers and consumers of non-GM products who might harbour concerns about health and safety.

Since the first sale of genetically modified foods began in 1994, with the unsuccessful release of a delayed ripening tomato to give it a longer shelf life, opponents of this biotechnology have made claims that these types of Frankenfoods were unsafe and a health risk to consumers. Only yesterday, I received correspondence from a constituent who runs an organic business in Adelaide, telling me that GM foods have been 'not proven to be safe' and that there was plenty of research available showing this.

This is just one of the myths or misconceptions that have been propagated about genetically engineered foods by the anti-GM movement. Around 90 per cent of the world's scientists agree that GM foods pose no greater risk to human health than conventional foods. In fact, there is not one study into GMOs that has shown otherwise. Even though this has been endorsed by credible organisations in the United States, like the American Medical Association, the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the World Health Organization, it seems about two-thirds of consumers are yet to be convinced.

While it is not possible to declare food is safe or that there have been any adverse health effects, none have been positively identified and it can at least be said that no hazard has been shown to exist. Despite evidence-based scientific studies—and there have been many because of the contentious nature of this biotechnology—showing that there is yet to be recorded any case of harm being caused, the doubters still proliferate along with pseudoscience believers.

There was a time when groups like Greenpeace and others disrupted GMO research around the world. More than 80 crop trials were destroyed by activists, including one in the Philippines on a product known as Golden Rice, which was designed to increase levels of betacarotene and to prevent vitamin A deficiency, a cause of blindness and even death in developing countries. This was valuable research that would have benefited so many; yet, 25 years of work was destroyed by ideological zealots and remains unavailable because of the opposition. In July 2011, Greenpeace protesters broke into an interstate experimental farm of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) and destroyed the entire crop of genetically modified wheat.

As an example of fake news or information that abounds, at a meeting with some constituents last week, one handed me a clipping from a True Natural Health magazine based on a report by the GMOs Revealed group. The heading was, 'Now there are Frankenstein cows! Cows that produce human milk.' The article goes on to state:

That subject line might sound like science fiction, but it's not. In China, a herd of 300 dairy cows have all been altered genetically to produce human milk. Yes, human milk!

It goes on to describe the genetic engineering to cause cows to produce an enzyme called lysozyme that is contained in greater quantities in human breast milk. It questions whether this is safe because there has been no long-term research into 'genetically modified human cows'. This is alarmist poppycock not backed by science.

On 29 March 2004, in his speech on the Genetically Modified Crops Management Bill, the late member for Fisher, the Hon. Bob Such, spoke about the perils of fearmongering. He said:

We must be careful that we do not go down a path of people with red flags in front of motor cars and railway engines and the flat earth society. The reality is that with science, even though people try to restrict it at times (and I am not against having codes of practice and proper protocols), we must be careful that we do not get to a situation where significant groups in the community, often largely through…prejudice and emotion, try to restrict the advancement of science and the increase in productivity by farmers or others.

In an excellent article in The New York Times last year, author Jane E. Brody wrote about human nature and its resistance to accept change and the fear of the unknown. She pointed out that establishing long-term safety guidelines would require decades of prohibitively expensive studies of hundreds of thousands of GMO consumers and their non-GMO counterparts. She highlighted the number of impressive benefits that have been well established and documented, like one that found that genetically engineered corn resistant to a pest, the corn ringworm, has a significantly higher yield than non-genetically modified varieties and contains lower amounts of toxins commonly produced by fungi. Allow me to quote from this article from The New York Times. She wrote:

By engineering resistance to insect damage, farmers have been able to use fewer pesticides while increasing yields, which enhances safety for farmers and the environment while lowering the cost of food and increasing its availability. Yields of corn, cotton and soybeans are said to have risen by 20 percent to 30 percent through the use of genetic engineering.

Billions of edible animals are raised in this country each year on feed containing G.M.O.s, with no evidence of harm. In fact, animal health and growth efficiency actually improved on the genetically engineered feed, according to a 2014 review in the Journal of Animal Science.

Wider adoption of genetic engineering, especially in African and Asian countries that still spurn the technology, could greatly increase the food supply in areas where climate change will increasingly require that crops can grow in dry and salty soils and tolerate temperature extremes. I continue to be distressed by the resistance to Golden Rice, a crop genetically engineered to supply more vitamin A than spinach that could prevent irreversible blindness and more than a million deaths a year.

Nonetheless, gene modification scientists are focusing increasingly on building health benefits into widely used foods. In addition to pink pineapples containing the tomato-based antioxidant lycopene, tomatoes are being engineered to contain the antioxidant-rich purple pigment from blueberries.

And people in developing countries faced with famine and malnutrition are likely to benefit from attempts to improve the protein content of food crops, as well as the amount of vitamins and minerals they provide.

This is not to say that everything done in the name of genetic engineering has a clean bill of health. Controversy abounds over the use of genetically modified seeds that produce crops like soy, corn, canola, alfalfa, cotton and sorghum that are resistant to a widely used herbicide, glyphosate, the health effects of which are still unclear.

In the latest development, resistance to a second weed killer, 2,4-D, has been combined with glyphosate resistance. Although the combination product, called Enlist Duo, was approved in 2014 by the Environmental Protection Agency, 2,4-D has been linked to an increase in non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and a number of neurological disorders, researchers reported in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.

The bottom line: Consumers concerned about the growing use of G.M.O.s in the foods they depend on might consider taking a more nuanced approach than blanket opposition. Rather than wholesale rejection, take some time to learn about how genetic engineering works and the benefits it can offer now and in the future as climate change takes an ever greater toll on food supplies. Consider supporting efforts that result in safe products that represent improvements over the original and focusing opposition on those that are less desirable.

Since 1995, 23 countries now grow GM crop varieties, with the world's total crop land growing from 0 to 13 per cent. In Australia, cotton, canola, a GM blue carnation, rose flowers and GM safflower are the only GM plants grown.

In the US, GMO crops are repeatedly and extensively tested for consumer and environmental safety. These tests are reviewed in the US by the Department of Agriculture, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration and similar organisations internationally. Tests are conducted by both industry experts and independent organisations to ensure that common GMO foods are safe to eat.

In Australia, GM products are regulated by Food Standards Australia New Zealand, which sets standards for safety, content and labelling of both domestically produced and imported goods. Every GM food or ingredient is subjected to presale assessment to ensure it is safe. In fact, every major scientific body and regulatory agency in the world has reviewed the research about GMOs and openly declared crop biotechnology and the foods currently available for sale to be safe. Despite the myths, the truth about genetically modified food is that it is entirely safe for human consumption. Still, a New York Times poll in 2013 showed that 93 per cent of Americans wanted labelling on GM food.

GMOs have contributed to reducing the real cost of food. Dr Stuart Smyth, an assistant professor with the Department of Bioresource Policy, Business and Economics at the University of Saskatchewan, explains:

Typically, GM crops are the more efficient crops, and that means that their price and costs as ingredients are less than non-GMOs.

In terms of the cost difference between GMO versus non-GMO foods, GMOs are helping to keep prices lower.

What could happen if there were no GM crops in the world and they were banned, as Greenpeace agitated for? A study by Professor Wally Tyner and his team at Purdue University in the United States showed that if all genetically modified organisms in the US were eliminated, corn yield would decline at 11 per cent on average, soybeans would lose 5 per cent of their yield and cotton would lose 18.6 per cent. With lower crop yields without GMOs, corn prices would increase as much as 28 per cent and soybeans as much as 22 per cent.

According to the study, making up for these losses would result in an increase in crop land area or clearing of 1.1 million hectares, with one-third being forest. Applying these figures globally, there would be forest loss of just under one million hectares in a worldwide GM-free scenario. That is the equivalent to half the area of Wales. Can our challenged atmosphere afford to lose that?

University of Berkeley agriculture professor David Zilberman found it would also be replicated in overseas markets with GMs. Without genetically modified crops, Professor Zilberman also found the price of food would be 5 to 10 per cent higher than it is now, particularly for meat, poultry, eggs, milk and processed food. He said, 'The poorest people will suffer the most,' adding that the cost will be borne mostly by people in developing countries, where many of these foods are already difficult to source.

Studies overseas also showed farmers made more money with GM crops—in some cases, profits of up to 68 per cent. In Australia, there is evidence that non-GM canola receives a premium price over GM canola types available. As for export prices, when compared to Canadian GM canola, where there is no segregation of crops, Australian prices were 4 per cent higher. This is attributed to its sales to Japan of the non-GM product.

South Australia's grain prices do not attract a premium compared to interstate, despite its GM freeze. I will note here that in this bill Kangaroo Island, which has lucrative markets for its non-GM canola in Japan, remains GM exempt in order to maximise its branding, much in the same way as the non-GM island of Tasmania. Crucially—and this is a fact often overlooked by the naysayers—some GMOs are even helping save lives.

Since the 1980s, genetic engineering has been used to develop human insulin. Around five million Americans use genetically modified insulin, the demand for which would not be met without the use of GMOs. We received this email from an Eyre Peninsula farmer who wants the moratorium lifted:

My acceptance of genetically modified crops is quite personal.

My husband has been a Type 1 Diabetic for 36 years and injects Insulin 5 times per day.

For 8 or so years now, he has been prescribed an Insulin made from Genetically Modified plants/bacteria.

This new Insulin has changed our life…for the better!

When he was still injecting the animal-based [insulin], his blood glucose control was so much harder to manage. I would be forced to get up at night several times per month to bring him out of a hypo. We were doing all the food balancing properly, diet and exercise was good, but still hypos every couple of weeks.

One night I was breastfeeding our daughter and holding her in one arm while trying to give him some honey with the other arm. When he has a hypo, it's like a seizure, he doesn't remember it either and I have to manually rub honey or sugar on his gums to bring his blood sugar back to normal.

We do have a glucose injection if we need it but being that we live on a farm, 50km from any shops, doctors, ambulance and other services, we have become very adept at looking after ourselves.

With this GM based Insulin, I never have to get up to him having a Hypo anymore, he just doesn't have them. He's had 2 hypo's in 8 years and they were due to changes in some other medications. GM based Insulin has changed our life.

The technology of GM has so much potential with subjects like Insulin production. It also has great potential to reduce the amount of chemical we use on our grain crops.

The Australian cotton industry has been able to reduce their insecticide use by 90% by growing GM varieties. Their predominant insecticide was 'Endosulphan' which is now a banned chemical by the APVMA.

There is so much more to GM than saving and making money. Don’t be blindsided by the conspiracy theorists. There is no conspiracy, farmers just want progress, advancements and cleaner options.

Farmers already pay royalties for our Non-GM seed; it won't be any different if we pay for GM seed.

I urge you to give SA farmers the choice of growing GM crops.

As a farmer, I'm not sure that we would even grow GM, but I want the choice, especially with some of the trials of drought tolerant wheat underway in Argentina. These might be a game changer for dryland, non-irrigated crops like ours.

Everything in our modern world has been modified, regardless of the process that facilitated it, nothing is what it once was.

Please allow us to move into the modern agricultural world. It's not scary, it's downright exciting.

Kind Regards

Karen Baines

Farmer, Ungarra Eyre Peninsula

That is a powerful, moving personal message about another advantage of GMOs that should not be ignored. Researchers are also studying the use of monoclonal antibodies produced in GMO tobacco plants as a potential drug treatment to combat Ebola. In fact, vaccines derived from GMO techniques are already preventing diseases such as hepatitis A and B, diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis and polio. Other GMO vaccines, for which non-GMO methods have been ineffective, are also under development. These include vaccines to fight cholera, malaria and other diseases.

One of the other contentious points about the introduction of GM crops is segregation and cross-contamination with non-GM canola and intrusion onto properties growing organic produce. Let's first deal with cross-contamination of GM and non-GM, which could occur in the field, transport and processing at receiving sites. The House of Assembly Select Committee on Genetically Modified Organisms recommended the release of GM crops in South Australia be permitted only when coexistence to meet market demands for different classes of crops and products—that is, GM-free, non-GM and GM—can be guaranteed through the supply chain by stringent segregation and identity systems.

In the independent review of SA's GM moratorium, report author, Kym Anderson, said any market failure as a result of cross-contamination and subsequent losses needs to be weighed up against the net benefits of GM crops. A 2007 report on the potential impacts of GM canola production on organic farming in Australia concluded that, if GM canola was commercialised in Australia, the direct impacts on organic canola production would be negligible. It would have minimal impact on the organic livestock industry and the honey industry.

The organics market in Australia in 2017 was no more than 0.7 per cent of the value of Australia's conventional grains production and 0.3 per cent of the value of livestock fodder and feedstuffs. Organics comprise only 1 per cent of all agricultural land use globally. However, we hope to file an amendment that will give non-GM producers some legal recourse to seek compensation for any losses to their business or reputation.

The Anderson report states that a survey of growers of both GM and non-GM canola in the earliest GM seasons in New South Wales and Victoria found their worst fears relating to coexistence did not materialise, with 88 per cent of respondents saying they had not received complaints. The experience over the past decade shows GM and non-GM crops can coexist with segregation and identity preservation protocols and practice codes in place.

In a meeting with stakeholders we were assured these practices would need to be considered when selecting the first few farms to sow the Roundup Ready GM crops. There are licence and stewardship agreements, including that growers must follow best management practices, including having buffer zones, segregating seed and declaring GM loads, as required in Western Australia.

I have received emails and calls from organic producers worried that removing the moratorium will impact on their clean, green status. The proper management of organic, conventional and GM seeds is an important issue. The coexistence of multiple production methods—organic, conventional and GM—is not a new concept. Farmers have been producing different types of crops next to one another before and since GM seeds were first introduced in 1996. They work hard every day managing their farms to ensure each crop meets the appropriate marketing requirements.

Clean seeds are a concern for organic farmers before planting, as well as pollen drift from neighbouring fields during cultivation. According to one Californian farmer who grows conventional and GM seeds on his farm, organic does not equal zero presence of a GM trait. He says low-level presence of a GM trait in organic production is allowed as long as the grower has followed the organic process necessary for organic production.

There are misconceptions about cross-pollination. A plant can only pollinate a closely related plant; that is, corn with corn, but not corn with soybean. For example, if a non-browning GM Arctic apple grown in the US were to cross-pollinate with an adjoining orchard, the resulting fruit would not be affected. Many orchards, as we know, grow different types of apples, so a Fuji does not become a Gala when cross-pollination occurs. Unless a farmer has intentionally planted GM crops, cross-fertilisation or contamination by GMO has never happened to any significant degree. The only significant possibility of crossover would be the finding of GM crops in an organic farm.

The case of Marsh v Baxter in Western Australia came the closest. In late 2010, organic farmer Steve Marsh found evidence of seeds from the crop of his lifelong farmer neighbour, Michael Baxter, in his fields. Baxter was a conventional farmer who planted GMO seeds. Later, Marsh found dead canola plants blown by the wind onto his property along with eight live plants. Marsh reported the seed and plants to his local organic certification board and lost the organic certification of some 70 per cent of his 478-hectare farm. Marsh sued on the grounds that Baxter used a method of harvesting his crop that was substandard and negligent. In fact, Baxter used standard and conventional farming methods.

The Supreme Court of Western Australia ruled the organic farmer was a victim of the Australian organic industry's own self-anointed rules and cleared the conventional farmer. The judgement, which was upheld on appeal, stated that the loss of organic certification was, and I quote:

…occasioned by the erroneous application of governing NASAA Standards applicable to NASAA organic operators as regards GMOs…at the time.

In other words, Marsh's own organic standards association set unrealistic expectations of coexistence because cross-fertilisation is a fact of modern farming that long predates the introduction of GM crops.

In another lawsuit, in the US in 2012, a group of organic growers and anti-GMO groups came together to sue GM seed manufacturer Monsanto, alleging that Roundup Ready seeds and plants could be in their organic field, that they would not be able to sell their produce as organic and that they could be sued by Monsanto because of the possible use of patented GM seeds. US District Judge Naomi Buchwald dismissed the case noting that the suit was, and again I quote, the product of the plaintiff's 'transparent effort to create a controversy where none exists'.

The United States Department of Agriculture's National Organic Program (NOP) does not use the term 'contamination' in any official context. Instead, it focuses on cross-pollination or the inadvertent or non-deliberate presence of prohibited substances, including GMOs on organic farmland. The NOP notes that the mere presence of GM seeds or crops does not necessarily mean a crop will lose its organic status. Ironically, if there is any contamination going on, it is often likely to come from pest species that originated on organic crop land but spread to GMO farms that were otherwise protected from these pests.

When it comes to contamination, organic pest control methods, including pesticides, have not been effective in controlling insects, weeds and fungal pests. That point was made in the wake of the Marsh v Baxter ruling in which Baxter, the Western Australian GM farmer, believed he had a powerful case that his farm faced contamination and not his neighbour's organic property.

Seventy per cent of harvested GMO crops are fed to food-producing animals, yet a University of California study into genetic engineering and animal feed found that GMOs have never been detected in milk, meat or eggs derived from animals fed GM feed. GM crops increase productivity on existing agricultural land and protect biodiversity by sparing lands not intensively cultivated. Through enhanced adoption of conservation tillage practices, the reduction of insecticide use and the use of more environmentally benign herbicides that increase yields, GM agriculture has alleviated pressure to convert additional land into agricultural use. GMOs can increase productivity in agriculture.

According to PG Economics, from 1996 to 2017, GMO crops are estimated to have contributed to an additional global production of 213.47 million tonnes of soybeans, 404.91 million tonnes of corn, 27.47 million tonnes of cotton lint and 11.65 million tonnes of canola. GM crops have contributed to higher yields—up to 30 per cent more in some farming areas—and can contribute to poverty reduction and food security in developing countries. GMOs can reduce soil erosion. Herbicide-tolerant crops enable more farmers to adopt conservation tillage, because they help farmers to more effectively and efficiently control weeds at lower costs.

We all recognise that we are in a climate crisis and that Australia is currently in the throes of the severest drought in living memory. Why should our farmers not be able to access biotechnology that improves their productivity and viability?

GMOs can also help conserve water. Farmers utilise many tools to conserve water, including drip irrigation systems. GMOs provide another tool that farmers can employ to help conserve water. HT crops, along with conservation tillage, aid in soil moisture retention, which can reduce the need to irrigate. GMOs can help reduce water use in another way through drought tolerance. This GM trait can help crops cope with stress and allow farmers to increase yields when periods of drought occur without supplemental water from irrigation. These benefits have been confirmed by the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications.

SA-Best has consulted and engaged extensively on this issue. We have spoken to farmers. They do not want to be left behind with this technological revolution in testing times, when agriculture in this country is being severely challenged by climate change. We have spoken to our world-renowned researchers at Adelaide University's Waite Institute, whose acclaimed work is being hamstrung by these restrictions. They are losing millions of dollars in research grants each year to researchers in other states.

We have spoken to the staunch opponents of GM, including some who also have impeccable academic credentials, who firmly believe there are enormous economic and ethical benefits in remaining GM free. We have received invaluable counsel from agronomist Sam Davies, who was our hardworking candidate in the seat of Narungga. I know that my colleague the Hon. Connie Bonaros has been torn on the issue and can see the pros as well as the cons.

My good friend and colleague in the other place Leon Bignell, the outstanding member for Mawson, is also extremely passionate about this and strongly feels South Australia will lose a huge advantage by lifting the moratorium. He puts up very convincing arguments. The same cannot be said for his leader, opposition leader Peter Malinauskas. We all woke this morning to the news that Mr Malinauskas wants to work with the government over summer to come up with a bipartisan plan. His proposal allows councils to opt in to keep their existing GM-free status if their communities want it. This is nothing more than a stalling tactic. The opposition has had ample time to come to a collective position on this crucial issue. It has not been able to, as has been well documented, so this is just a delay tactic. Also, it is just simply ludicrous and could not possibly work.

To best sum up this heated debate, I want to finish with the words of award-winning journalist, author and academic Mark Lynas, who in the beginning of the GM maelstrom in the 1990s was one of the most notorious anti-GM activists. He deliberately destroyed experimental GM crops across Europe and at one point came close to stealing the genetically cloned sheep Dolly. Mr Lynus had a Damascene experience in 2013 and recanted his beliefs and criminal actions. He has since toured developing countries in Africa and Asia, working with plant scientists who are helping farmers make full use of this breakthrough pioneering technology to improve their lives and livelihoods.

In his book, Seeds of Science: Why we got it wrong on GMOs, Lynus gives due deference to the GMO proponents, the vegans, the environmentalists, farmers, scientists and anyone working to save our damaged planet for future generations. In his closing remarks, Lynus eloquently writes:

Let's use science as the wonderful tool that it is, but let's also respect people's feelings and moral intuitions about the proper extent of human intrusion into the biosphere. Maybe now we can finally join forces to ensure that scientific innovations, in agriculture as much as anything else, are critically assessed and deployed in a way that helps the environment and improves the livelihoods of people in poorer countries too.

Above all, let us not repeat the mistakes of the past. We have already wasted 20 years fighting over a mere seed-breeding technique that—used sensibly and in the public interest—can certainly help global efforts to fight poverty and make agriculture more sustainable. Let's not waste 20 more.

When SA-Best supported the disallowance on the regulations lifting the moratorium, we were justifiably concerned that this matter was of such public importance that it needed to be properly debated in parliament. We asked the minister to introduce a bill to parliament that would give our famers who want this technology greater certainty and security, as well as protecting the interests of Kangaroo Island's non-GM farmers.

I have already flagged that we have important amendments. As I indicated, my colleague the Hon. Connie Bonaros quite rightly pointed out that current legislation fails to protect non-GM producers in the event of contamination resulting in economic loss or loss of their GM status or reputation. This amendment will enable them to exercise their legal rights, which were seemingly expunged in the existing legislation. We will also be calling for a parliamentary review in three years. SA-Best supports and commends the bill to the Legislative Council.

The Hon. J.A. DARLEY (11:27): As everyone knows, I have recently spoken on two occasions about GM crops in South Australia, and I do not intend to repeat those comments today. However, I do want to place on the record that I will be supporting the second reading of the bill.

The Hon. T.J. STEPHENS (11:28): I rise to speak on the Genetically Modified Crops Management (Designated Area) Amendment Bill. This state has a long and proud history of agriculture. Agriculture has always played a vital role in South Australia, contributing to our economy through trade and employment, as well as being the heartbeat of our regional communities.

Often, agriculture is what sustains our regional communities, and over the past year we have seen several examples of the passion that exists in our regions. Agriculture is important not only to our regions but to all of South Australia. As a state, we can be proud of the reputation of agricultural research and development by South Australian institutions; for example, the Waite Research Institute has a reputation for agricultural research that is recognised far beyond Australian shores.

As consumers and citizens of South Australia, we are all affected by the outcomes of the GM moratorium. As members know, the GM moratorium has been in place since 2004. Within the years that have since passed, the outcomes inflicted by the GM ban are now blatantly clear. The argument about the significant premiums that many thought non-GM canola would fetch has now been debunked. Instead of premium prices, the moratorium has disadvantaged farmers, costing them and, ultimately, the state.

The disadvantages have been outlined by Kym Anderson, a University of Adelaide agriculture economist, who has stated that the moratorium had cost farmers more than $33 million from 2004 to 2018. This tally will only accumulate if the moratorium continues beyond this year. To highlight how South Australia is missing out, the minister for agriculture and primary production outlined the monetary differences between states in the grain market:

In Western Australia, they returned a $60 premium over South Australia; in New South Wales, a $30 premium; and in Victoria a $10 premium.

Price differences between the states are not a coincidence but, rather, a consequence of the moratorium and South Australia's farmers' inability to utilise GM technology. To echo the topics canvassed by the minister, our farming industry should not be constrained by the ideology of a few but, rather, should have the freedom to choose to utilise tried and tested GM technology. There are many benefits of lifting the GM moratorium on the paddock as well as out of the paddock. On the land, our farmers' efforts are being restricted by the GM moratorium. They are unable to utilise the best available technology and are ultimately financially penalised.

As it currently stands, canola is a predominant GM crop. In the 15 years of South Australia's moratorium, we have seen the benefits that other states have enjoyed by growing GM canola. The benefits these states have enjoyed over South Australia are not mere instinct but, rather, evidence-based. If the science was in dispute, South Australia's 15-year exclusion has shown that those GM farms across the border are able to increase their efficiencies as well as improve the outcome. Farmers of GM crops enjoy increased yields, decreased reliance on pesticides and ultimately reduced fuel consumption. These are practically better for the farmer but also better for the environment. I believe that many in this chamber support such outcomes.

Voting for a legislative change to the GM moratorium today will highlight our state's willingness to understand our need to be adaptive. Often, people are willing to raise issues that our farmers are facing on the land but not as willing to assist by pushing for practical solutions. GM is a practical solution to some issues that farmers face. Lifting the moratorium will produce benefits beyond the paddock.

As I mentioned prior, South Australia is home to world-class agriculture research institutions. Unfortunately, they too are currently restricted by the GM moratorium, damaging the state's reputation in the industry. Millions of dollars of industry investment have been diverted interstate and overseas. The Waite Research Institute and other like research institutions are inevitably overlooked when work is undertaken due to the moratorium, such as work testing GM crops to ensure that they perform optimally in Australia's often challenging, growing climate. Restriction not only affects an institution's ability to deliver beneficial outcomes for farmers but also limits their ability to retain scientists and teach agronomy students, who are the future scientists in the field. The GM moratorium only prevents economic activity, employment and beneficial research.

There has been some discussion about the process the government has taken. The GM moratorium has been in place for 15 years and has been the centre of much debate recently. In this calendar year, an independent report was conducted, a select committee undertaken and consultation carried out. All the appropriate precursors to this legislative change were undertaken by the minister and the government and, despite the criticism, the regulation was an appropriate mechanism to lift the moratorium.

Despite the disallowance motion and the actions of the government to canvass whether the community wants it, the moratorium still exists. It is clear what the bill before us seeks to do. To ignore the time sensitivity of this debate and throw aside such an issue of state importance due to process would be to deny our farmers GM crops for another year. The Liberal government has followed an extensive process of review of the GM moratorium. Our farmers deserve the freedom to utilise GM if they see fit. I commend the minister for acting quickly to give our farmers hope that they will not miss out on another season. To borrow the words of my colleague the member for Newland, a scientist in his own right:

The farmers want it, the scientists want it and the evidence, both scientific and economic, backs it, and now as a parliament we need to do our job and get on with this, get out of the way and give our farmers the choice.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (11:34): I do not think it is an understatement to say that the issue of the GM moratorium in South Australia is vexed. In order to understand both sides of the argument, Labor has met with primary producers and their peak bodies that want to see the moratorium lifted. We have also met with concerned South Australians who want our state to remain GM-free. There are valid arguments on both sides. Due to the far-reaching consequences of lifting the moratorium, South Australian Labor, the opposition, wants to ensure that the parliamentary process to achieve an outcome is completely thorough.

Sadly, this is not the case, with the Minister for Primary Industries, Tim Whetstone, first seeking to effectively overturn the Genetically Modified Crops Management Act of 2004 through regulation, without going through parliament to amend the act. Under the act, the moratorium is in place until 2025. The regulations would have overturned the objective of the act. It was naive of the Marshall government to attempt to make such significant changes through a change in mere regulation. Even though the government submitted a bill to the lower house last week, it did so with absolutely no notice and in a manner that trashed parliamentary convention. The legislation was rushed in last week, with the House of Assembly seeing the bill for the first time on the very day that it was introduced, and it was then forced to a vote.

In his contribution a few minutes ago, the Hon. Frank Pangallo rightly referred to the fact that the reason SA-Best voted against the regulatory change was that they wanted to see the issue properly debated in parliament. Labor also wants to see the issue properly debated in parliament. Rushing a bill through, introducing it on the very day that some of the members in the other place have first seen it, is not enabling proper debate in the parliament. Labor wants the parliamentary process to be respected, especially on an important issue such as this. Labor also wants to see the right thing done by the whole of the state. Labor wants to see respect for the needs of all the separate communities in South Australia.

Labor is conscious of the fact that the canola planting season begins early next year. We are also fully aware of the field trials that are being conducted on wheat and barley with the goal of enabling greater drought-resistant and frost-resistant crops, in addition to other potentially worthwhile GM attributes for wheat, barley and other crops. However, rushing ahead to lift the ban everywhere, except Kangaroo Island, is a very, very blunt approach. Labor wants to achieve the right outcome that allows broadacre farmers, particularly those who want to access GM canola technology, to get what they want but, at the same time, not do that at the expense of communities in South Australia who benefit from their GM-free status.

Labor is not disputing the science behind GM, but we do understand that there are growers, food manufacturers and others who believe that they gain a market advantage from being GM free. Labor believes that the right way to proceed is to work collaboratively over the summer break with the government, the crossbench and stakeholders to develop a mechanism that is bipartisan, or indeed multipartisan.

The Hon. Frank Pangallo also referred to participants in the GM debate needing 'a more nuanced approach'. That is exactly what the Labor opposition would like to see, and discussions over the summer break could indeed achieve that more nuanced approach. There may be a number of mechanisms that could be explored. One suggestion has been an opt-in alternative, based on particular regions: councils could potentially opt in to keep their existing GM-free status. However, that is just one option that could be explored; there may be others. There may be others that would enable the nuanced and collaborative approach, but this rush through the parliament is not enabling the opportunity for those other options to be explored. It was just last week that the minister in the other place said:

Not every farmer wants to be a GM farmer, not every farmer wants to be a non-GM farmer, but it's giving our primary sector the ability to [get] out there and be more competitive.

However, this bill is a blunt instrument that creates a win-lose situation. The Labor opposition would like to see a sensible, cooperative mechanism that will enable farmers to receive the benefits of GM crops and also protect those who are paid a premium for being GM free. This bill does not enable that and, therefore, Labor cannot support this bill today.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) (11:39): I will do this as quickly as I can and not go over old ground. I thank the Hon. Mark Parnell, the Hon. Frank Pangallo, the Hon. Clare Scriven, the Hon. John Darley and the Hon. Terry Stephens for their contributions.

I might just address quickly in the summing-up maybe not all of the 15 points the Hon. Mark Parnell raised but some of them. The issue of segregation and the whole issue around some of the opportunities that may or may not exist is interesting. I think it always comes back to the fundamental for me: it is about choice. It is about choice that farmers want to be able to make.

We look at the issue around the South Australian-Victorian border. I think a lot of people here are misguided. The Western Australian border, the Northern Territory border and a vast amount of our eastern border is desert and pastoral country where there is no cropping, but certainly there is a very active interface from, you could say, the Riverland, the River Murray, down to Mount Gambier, but probably Pinnaroo and through some parts right the way down to the border. It is an interesting discussion around segregation and when you can or cannot do it, whether GrainCorp is providing sites or not. Again, I always come back to the fact that the issue is about choice.

The honourable member, in his second point, talked about the price difference. Again, it is about choice. Farmers will not grow something they cannot make money out of. I am always amazed that the proponents opposite who talk about being opposed to GM say you can get more money for your non-GM. You probably can, but it is a choice about management tools and about management of weeds that are resistant to selected herbicides, so again I come back to that fundamental principle, that for me as a former farmer it is about choice.

The honourable member talked about how the Anderson review did not find—and his words were somewhat inaccurate—economic advantage. I would say that if we get this massive economic advantage of being GM free, why is it only Kangaroo Island that has a premium? All of South Australia should be receiving that premium, but clearly it is not.

The Hon. Leon Bignell has often said, 'We get so much more for our food and wine and all our other good products because we are GM free.' You do not get any more for prime lamb grown in Victoria than you do for prime lamb grown in South Australia. I think a litre of milk or a kilogram of butterfat is about the same price. There is always a little bit of a freight differential. For premium cheese, wine and all the other produce, there is no difference. It is a fallacy to say that we have this premium for being clean and green.

The honourable member also mentioned that the Centre for Plant Functional Genomics did not receive funding and had shut. I think that was because of the South Australian government, a policy that the former government had of not supporting GM, and the fact that the culture here was that the government of the day did not support research. Of course, in the end the funding was withdrawn.

It is interesting that it resided in the seat of Waite and the member for Waite, the Hon. Martin Hamilton-Smith, I think was the minister who opened it in 2002 and then was a minister in the government that closed it. That is an interesting phenomenon around the Centre for Plant Functional Genomics. It is about private investment, and of course if you have a government that is not interested in supporting that technology, private investment will go elsewhere.

The honourable member talked about multinational companies and farmers being beholden to them. Again, he has not been a farmer. Farmers will make decisions based on economics. Nobody holds a gun to a farmer's head. Nobody forces them to grow these crops. I come back to that fundamental about giving South Australian farmers choice.

He talked about no-till farming, and certainly no-till farming has revolutionised agriculture. It has been mostly on the back of glyphosate, and Roundup has been a particularly important part of it. My colleague in the other place, Peter Treloar, says he thinks glyphosate is the best invention since the invention of the horse. I suspect what we would see—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Who invented the horse?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: I beg your pardon—the best invention since the tractor. I do beg your pardon. I have an anecdote about horses and tractors, but I will not get distracted in this debate. I meant the tractor; I do apologise to the chamber.

It is interesting, I hear around the world that there are some concerns about glyphosate. That is why we need to be backing the scientists and the researchers. I am yet to be convinced that it is as dangerous as people say. If it is proven then that is where science will take us, to another generation of chemicals and another generation of research that will keep the productivity and feed the billions of people this world will have over the next 50 to 100 years.

The honourable member talked a little bit about drought and frost. Given the Hon. John Dawkins and I are the only two in this chamber—and the Hon. Frank Pangallo said his dad was a market gardener, but he probably would not have had too much drought in the market garden with water close by. Drought and frost are devastating; probably frost more so than drought. In drought, if it is a poor season they do not sow a crop in some areas, they say, 'Well, you miss out on income. You aren't faced with having to invest in having to plant the crop.' Certainly, frost is one of the most insidious and gut-wrenching things.

When you have grown a beautiful crop and you get a dry spell in the flowering period of the wheat crop, canola crop, peas or any of the crops, and a frost comes in, usually through the dry period, with clear skies, you have already invested hundreds of dollars per hectare to grow that crop. I know there is a little bit of research being done on it, but to me that technological advance could be a massive economic benefit to South Australia and, in fact, global cropping, but we are talking about South Australia in particular.

I think it is a bit short-sighted to say we do not have any drought or frost-tolerant work being done now. We should never ever stop looking to provide our farmers with an opportunity to jump around and avoid the damage from frost or even heat stress. In the sort of world we are in, we often have—and I saw it when I was farming and you see it now—really hot weather in September and October. You lose yield potential because plants have been under stress, and then you get some rain and cool weather, and if you had been able to maintain that yield potential then you would have had another big economic benefit. So I think you should never ever turn your back on research.

Even though the honourable member said there has been zero success, I think that is just a bit of a cop-out. I know he is a big believer in climate change and extra climate variability. We should always be looking at opportunities, and lifting the moratorium will mean that we can have our world-class researchers. The Waite Research Institute used to be one of the very top research institutes in the world for dryland farming. It has slipped somewhat in the last few years; I suspect because of this GM moratorium.

There are a couple of other points I will make. The honourable member talked about having 40 per cent of the nation's organic farmland. We probably do, but I know there is a large area outside the dog fence that is organic pastoral country, so there are no crops grown out there. Good on the farmers, the pastoralists, for trying to grow organic beef. They have a market. I think it is in northern, north-eastern South Australia, Queensland—quite a large area—but it is not an active cropping area. I am not convinced that we have 40 per cent of the organic crop-growing country. I stand to be corrected, but I suspect those figures are somewhat, on a national basis, skewed because of the large area of organic production in our pastoral areas.

I come back again to one of the comments the honourable member made about having to enter into a contract with the seed producers and how onerous it is. Again, it is about choice. Farming today is a very modern and sophisticated business. It is not people with a bit of straw in their mouth and stuck behind their ear. These people, young men and women, are very sophisticated business people who invest millions of dollars in their land and millions of dollars, potentially, in their properties and their plant and equipment.

Every year, they make judgements about what they are going to invest in and grow, and then plant their crops. I think it is somewhat belittling to say to the farming community that they will be beholden to a seed merchant or a producer, that they cannot keep the seed. They would do that because they would make a choice, a proper choice, about running their business being almost unfettered by government.

The honourable member talked about spraying Roundup on the canola between the two and six leaves, and then he went on and spoke a little bit about Spray.Seed and how it had been banned overseas in a number of countries. He talked about somebody using Spray.Seed, I think, or paraquat in a knapsack. We actually have something called, I think, ChemCert. About the time I was coming here and leaving farming you actually had to do a course—I do not recall the exact name of it—to get accreditation to be able to buy the chemicals, annual accreditation to be able to use them.

I come back to the fact that there would not be a farmer in South Australia who would put a knapsack on their back and go and spray paraquat or Spray.Seed. That is insane. The farming community are well-trained and sophisticated businesspeople who run their businesses very well, often on a very tight margin. When the honourable member talked about Spray.Seed causing nosebleeds, it does if you do not use the stuff properly, but it is important to remember that we actually have a very high quality farming community and they do not play games with chemicals such as Spray.Seed.

The honourable member talked about how his bill in 2017 was not rushed, that it was on the Notice Paper for a number of weeks. I did ask him, in the debate on the regulations, how much consultation he undertook on that bill. It was somewhat unexpected that he managed to get the numbers to have it passed in this chamber, so I suspect it was an opportune time. I know that the Hon. John Darley supported the bill and then, on the basis of a select committee that has taken place—and I thank the Hon. John Darley for his comments—he looked at the evidence and is now happy to support the lifting of the moratorium.

It is interesting that the honourable member talked about how it sat on the Notice Paper for a few weeks: I did not see any consultation at all. In this debate around GM crops here and the lifting of the moratorium, my colleague the Hon. Tim Whetstone instigated the Anderson review, we have had a long debate through a period of time, he went through the proper process when it comes to the regulations and he got Crown law advice that everything he had done was consistent. So I think is a bit disingenuous to say it has been rushed at the last minute.

Members in this chamber said, 'Bring back a bill.' We know it is important. It is timely to get the bill through the parliament so that if the moratorium is to be lifted next year farmers will have a choice. I keep coming back to having a choice. They do not have to grow it. Nobody is going to force them to grow it: it will give them choice. That is something we should all focus on—it is about choice. Why on earth would we want to burden our farmers by not having the choice? If we look at some of the comments—which I will come to shortly—around some of the proposals from the Labor Party, I just cannot comprehend why we would burden them with extra regulations.

I would like to quickly touch on the Hon. Frank Pangallo's comments. We talk about GM crops, and I did have the figures here. I think there are about 90.7 million hectares of GM soybeans grown in the world, and I know that the last time I checked about 800,000 tonnes of soy meal comes into South Australia each year. That goes into stockfeed for pigs and chickens, probably ducks and maybe even pellets for fish, so we are actually benefiting from that protein that comes in from soy meal.

I think there are about 53.6 million hectares of genetically modified corn growing, and the Hon. Frank Pangallo said that as of 2016 it was 13 per cent. I thought my records here said 12 per cent, but there was 185.1 million hectares of GM crops grown in the world. In the debate some years ago I did see there was a figure regarding how many trillion meals had been eaten, and not one person has become ill because of those trillions of meals.

I will touch quickly on the insulin story the Hon. Frank Pangallo gave us of the Baines family from Ungarra on Eyre Peninsula. That is another area: the pharmaceutical space, medical cannabis and all the research that we should embrace. This morning, the Premier launched a pharmaceutical and biotech fund that will be based in Adelaide, and this is exactly the sort of thing that fund should focus on.

I will just quickly turn my comments to the opposition. It is interesting that they have been silent and did not even speak here during the disallowance of the regulations. I then read it myself at midnight in the paper that we were going to have this opt in. It is just crazy. It is unworkable. I come back to choice and for farmers to be able to choose what they want to do.

As a hypothetical, let's just assume that you have the city council of Mount Gambler, then the District Council of Grant that covers it or goes around it, and then you have Wattle Range Council. If you say that the District Council of Grant wants to grow GM canola but Wattle Range says no, and if the same rules and regulations were in place, they are landlocked and they will have to go into Victoria to drive around it and go back out again. That is just a crazy solution. I agree entirely with the Hon. Frank Pangallo that it is designed to be just a time wasting or, if you like, delaying tactic.

For me and for the government's position, it is about giving farmers the choice to make informed decisions about what they would like to grow on their properties. Nobody is going to force them to do it, nobody will be beholden to any of these big multinational companies that members opposite think. The extra regulatory burden of local government that the opposition is proposing is just crazy.

I urge all members to support this bill and give our farmers the same choices that interstate farmers have. Even if in some states they are not growing as much as they have in other years, as the Hon. Mark Parnell said, they still have the choice. I think that is the fundamental thing, certainly from the Marshall Liberal government's point of view: we want to give farmers the choice to be able to make decisions for themselves. I was a farmer 12 years ago, John Dawkins a few years before that, the Hon. Frank Pangallo's dad was a market gardener and the Hon. Emily Bourke has farming connections on Yorke Peninsula, and I think her family are still farming, but at the end of the day there are very few of us who can say that we are actively involved in it.

We always talk about industry consultation, and that is something that the Marshall government is proud of. We talk to industry in a whole range of areas and we support what the industry wants, and I urge all members of the chamber today to support the lifting of the GM moratorium.

Bill read a second time.

Committee Stage

In committee.

Clause 1.

The CHAIR: Does any honourable member have a contribution on clause 1? The Hon. Mr Parnell.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: If there is a question to be answered, I will sit down.

The CHAIR: The Hon. Mr Parnell has the call.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: I will defer my call.

The CHAIR: You have the call; if you want to give up the call, fine.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: No, thank you. I was on my feet first, so I appreciate that that was the correct call, but if the minister has an answer to the question I posed in my second reading contribution I would like to hear it, otherwise I will restate it.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: Mr Chairman, the question as received from the honourable member was: has the Marshall Liberal government, including any member of the government and/or PIRSA or SARDI, had any discussions about or received any offers of funding for plant breeding research from any agrochemical companies or any related crop science organisations that they fund?

The answer is that I am advised that PIRSA and SARDI have had inquiries about plant breeding, including GM plant breeding; however, these inquiries have occurred before and since the consideration of relaxing the GM moratorium. Conventional plant breeding is an existing area of activity for PIRSA and SARDI.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: I thank the honourable member for his answer. It does not satisfy me entirely. Whilst those discussions might not have been in the context of this legislation, the attitude of the Liberal Party has been long known. It would not have been a surprise to those who were conducting those discussions and negotiations that this bill before us now, or some other method the government chose, would be on the agenda.

The reason I think this is an important question is that, when we look at the Western Australian situation, they dropped their moratorium 10 years ago. The then new minister for agriculture, Terry Redman, ignored advice that he got from a cross-industry report on GM canola and instead accepted Monsanto's funding for research in his state. In August 2010, as soon as the moratorium had been lifted, Monsanto paid $10½ million to acquire a nearly 20 per cent share of Intergrain. They increased that spend by $4½ million in June 2013. Not that long later, Monsanto sold out altogether, basically leaving the whole research operation in the hands of the Western Australian government and the GRDC.

The reasoning behind the question was that if these discussions are underway between the South Australian government and the well-resourced research arms of the big agrochemical companies, then the warning that I think we should take from the Western Australian experience is that the love might not last. Whilst they might make all sorts of promises about pouring money into research in South Australia, experience interstate shows that that does not necessarily last. I do not require the minister to add any extra to his answer. I am just making the point that often the carrots that are dangled do not last; they wither and turn out to be illusory.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: Very briefly, I want to refer to the comments of the Hon. Mr Ridgway where he talked about a proposal from the opposition as being unworkable and involving extraregulatory burdens. The point that has been missed is that there is an opportunity to have a nuanced discussion and a nuanced solution. The opposition would like to be able to work with the government over the summer break and work with the crossbenchers to develop a mechanism that will both allow farmers who want the benefits of GM crops to receive it, and protect those who receive a premium for being GM free. Trying to achieve that could be worked out over the break to ensure a solution that is workable and does not create extraregulatory burdens.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: I think the Hon. Tung Ngo came with me two or three years ago to look at the South Australian-Victorian border where you have growers on one side growing GM canola. The distance between the two crops would be a bit further apart than I am from the Hon. Clare Scriven—about the width of this chamber between the two crops.

As I said in my second reading summing-up, our farmers on all sides of the borders are sophisticated businesspeople. They will make judgements about growing these crops, they will also make judgements about having to manage the crops, and there is no issue with it. The border fence in some places is not particularly robust anymore, and the opportunity exists for one farmer on one side of the fence to grow a crop that is GM and on the other side of the fence to have a crop that is non-GM, and to still have the non-GM status. The government believes that what the opposition is proposing is just a delaying tactic and we certainly do not support it.

Clause passed.

Progress reported; committee to sit again.