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"Dear friends, Below is a press release from the Government that explains new controls on genetically engineered organisms as a result of the work of the Green Party in the last three years. Our cooperation agreement with the Government required the Government to work with us to improve the ability of non-GE growers to remain so if a GE organism is ever authorised for release. The Green Party remains absolutely committed to a GE Free New Zealand as the only way to protect both our economic 'clean green' brand and our environment. However, since the current law does allow for either conditional or general release of GE, we needed to tighten the controls to protect all non-GE growers. We have done his. Cabinet has agreed that the location of any releases will be posted on a public website; and new regulations have been promulgated requiring any applicants for release to give details of the measures they will adopt to achieve segregation and traceability. Cabinet has also agreed to reconsider liability after the Cartagena agreement is further advanced. Officials have been asked to come back by 1 December with advice on changes to the HSNO Act to make the segregation and traceability requirements mandatory - something that cannot occur without legislation. It took some effort to convince the Government to make these changes, but we thank them for eventually agreeing. We hope they will never need to be used, but we believe it is safer to have them in place. Sincerely Jeanette http://beehive.govt.nz/ Go to http://www.greens.org.nz/ for details | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||