9 Feb 2010, 1848 hrs IST

NEW DELHI, India: The government has said that it needs time to release Bt Brinjal, owing to divided opinion on the issue. Talking to the media, Environment minister Jairam Ramesh said there is no over-riding urgency to introduce Bt Brinjal in India.

The governments of states that between them produce most of the brinjal in the country West Bengal, Orissa, Bihar (the three account for 60% of the country's brinjal production), Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Uttarakhand have already stated they will not allow Bt Brinjal.

Opponents to the introduction of the genetically modified food crop are principally worried on two counts one, what happens if there is accidental cross-pollination between Bt and ordinary brinjal? Will the modified gene get into the normal brinjal? What will the consequences be?

Two, what are the long-term effects of Bt Brinjal on human health, given that long-term trials have not been held? The product is too new for that. There are as many as 2,500 natural varieties of brinjals cultivated in India. The National Gene Bank here has accessions for nearly 3,550. Many of these also have medicinal value. The opponents are also worried because Bt Brinjal will carry no label since there are no labelling laws in the country for vegetables.

Another question raised time and again is why the GEAC had kept its test reports under wraps. The chairman had said that seed developers — US firm Monsanto and Indian firm Mahyco — wanted the information kept confidential in the "research and development stages". This claim was severely critisised by global environmental group Greenpeace.

"A moratorium should be placed on the release for the time being. The regulatory system needs strengthening and proper tests need to be done independently," Pushpa Bhargava, Supreme Court appointee to the GEAC said.The only genetically modified crop cultivated commercially in India now is Bt Cotton. It has had mixed reviews, but there is such a large area under its cultivation that India is now the sixth largest country growinggenetically modified crops.

There are only 14 countries that cultivate GM food crops, according to the Centre for Sustainable Agriculture, near Hyderabad.After Bt Brinjal, there are many more genetically modified food crops awaiting GEAC approval — 25 kinds of rice, 23 kinds of tomatoes,many types of groundnut, pigeon peas, potato, mustard, sugarcane, soy and okra

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