CA stops field-testing of genetically modified eggplants

MANILA, Philippines - The Court of Appeals (CA) has ordered the government to stop ongoing field-testing in several provinces of Bacillus thuringiensis (bt) eggplants, a genetically modified variety that produces its own pesticide.

In a 25-page decision released yesterday, the special 13th division of the appellate court granted the writ of Kalikasan petition filed by regional chapter of environmental group Greenpeace and other groups in April last year.

The court ordered the respondents – Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Department of Agriculture and University of the Philippines Los Baños Foundation Inc., UP Mindanao Foundation, Inc. and International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications-Southeast Asia Center – to “permanently cease and desist from further conducting bt talong (eggplant) field trials.”

They were also ordered “to protect, preserve, rehabilitate and restore the environment in accordance with the foregoing judgment of this Court.”

The CA cited the lack of scientific proof showing bt eggplants are safe for human consumption.

The CA stressed it violates the constitutional right to a balanced and healthful ecology – particularly the right to one’s health which should not be put at risk by a willful disturbance of the ecological balance.

“In the instant case, the field trials of bt talong involve the willful and deliberate alteration of the genetic traits of a living element of the ecosystem and the relationship of living organisms that depend on each other for survival,” the CA said.

“Consequently, the field trials of bt talong could not be declared by this Court as safe to human health and to our ecology, with full scientific certainty, being an alteration of an otherwise natural state of affairs in our ecology,” said the ruling penned by Associate Justice Isaias Dicdican.

Associate Justices Myra Garcia-Fernandez and Nina Antonio-Valenzuela concurred in the ruling.

The CA dismissed the argument of the agencies involved in the research that the trials were conducted precisely to determine the efficacy of the bt eggplants and generate necessary data.