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United Kingdom 2004:
More people try to avoid GM foods
The respected UK consumer magazine Which? conducted a study in 2002 to see if consumers wanted to eat GM food, and then carried out the same survey again in May 2004 to see if consumers opinions had changed over those two years. The main finding of the report was that, “Consumers are sending a clear message that they don’t want genetically modified food – and our latest survey shows they feel even more strongly than they did two years ago.” Interestingly, almost 70% of consumers also “want retailers and manufacturers to source animal feed from non-GM sources, so that meat and dairy products can be truly GM-free”. These findings are in line with the official public consultation organised by the British government in 2003-2004 which “revealed general unease about GM crops and food … as people learned more, their hostility deepened.”
(The report on the Which?-survey, No to GM, is available to subscribers of ‘Which? Online’, see www.which.net.)
EU-Countries 2002: Majority considers GM food risky
Eurobarometer conducted a series of surveys of public attitudes towards biotechnology and GM food in the EU-countries throughout the 1990s. A report on the last one in 2002, submitted to the EC Directorate General for Research, and applying to the then 15 member states, concluded that “a majority of Europeans do not support GM foods. These are judged not to be useful and to be risky for society. For GM crops, support is lukewarm, while they are judged to be moderately useful they are seen as almost as risky as GM foods.” Eurobarometer also reports that European public support for both GM food and GM crops declined during the period 1996-1999, but stabilized during the following three years.
(Europeans and Biotechnology in 2002, Eurobarometer 58.0, 2nd edition (March 21st 2003); can be downloaded from
http://europa.eu.int/comm/public_opinion/archives/eb/ebs_177_en.pdf.)
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