Rice-A-Phony

China, Europe experiencing illegal GM crop introductions

Two delicious scandals are brewing over the illegal introduction of genetically modified crops -- rice in China and corn in Europe -- onto the open market. In China, Greenpeacers sounded the GM alarm after buying bags of an "anti-pest" variety of rice, sending them to biotech labs, and finding that some of the grains were genetically altered and thus illegal for sale in the country. Greenpeace has accused a group of "rogue scientists" of selling experimental varieties of GM rice in the province of Hubei. Meanwhile, British ports have begun refusing all imports of U.S. corn following an allegation that American farmers have been illegally exporting GM corn as animal feed to Europe for the past four years. The port-blocking move was prompted by the European Commission, which forced action on the issue after officials on both sides of the Atlantic tried to keep the scandal hush-hush.