3/9/02 10:11 AM © AFP Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa vowed at the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development on Tuesday not to expose his people to genetically modifed (GM) "poisonous" food being offered to aid about 2,5-million Zambians facing starvation. "Simply because my people are hungry, that is no justification to give them poison, to give them food that is intrinsically dangerous to their health," Mwanawasa said. "We have made a decision. We have rejected GM-food. It is not a slight on donors. There is no conclusive evidence that it is safe. We wish not to use our people as guinea pigs in this experiment. Our decision is final." Asked why he was branding GM food as poison, Mwanawasa toned down his warning to say it was "potentially intrinsically dangerous". Zambia, one of six southern African countries threatened by famine over the next nine months, has refused to accept GM food. Mwanawasa said: "In the next month we expect to harvest about 15,000 metric tons of maize and we have in the country enough maize to last until December." Meanwhile, Sapa reports that Zambia is to send a team of scientists to the US to assess the safety of GM food, Mwanawasa announced on Tuesday. Last week, in a statement also issued at the summit, the UN Food and agriculture Organisation (FAO) urged Southern African countries to think carefully before rejecting donations of genetically modified food. "We should make sure before we reject it that there are scientifically valid arguments on which to base that decision," FAO director Jacques Diouf said. FAO believed on the basis of current scientific knowledge that the food being offered to Southern Africa was not likely to present a human health risk. Mwanawasa said on Tuesday that FAO and the World Health Organisation had acknowledged that they had not undertaken any formal safety assessment of GM foods. However, donors to the World Food Programme had themselves certified these foods as safe. Zambia could not understand this contradiction. "Because of our incapacity to do our own scientific analysis of these GMOs, the Zambian government has accepted the offer by the director-general of the US Agency for International Development to sponsor a visit to the US by a Zambian team of scientists to go and study these GMOs," he said. "There is a worldwide uncertainty on the use of GMOs in food, we are merely taking precautionary measures and remain open to conclusive scientific evidence that GMOs are indeed safe." In a statement issued on Tuesday, members of the African civil society grouping at the summit said they refused to be used as a "dumping ground for contaminated food". The starvation period was anticipated to begin early in 2003, so there was enough time to source uncontaminated food. ------------------------------------------------------------------ This website (www.josummit.com) is the only official website of the Johannesburg World Summit Company and is © 2002 Johannesburg World Summit Company. All rights reserved. _________________________________________________________________ MSN Photos is the easiest way to share and print your photos: http://photos.msn.com/support/worldwide.aspx ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to: [log in to unmask] ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~