Genetically modified plants are now being landed from ports around Japan and spreading to other parts of the country. Seeds spilled during transportation have germinated and grown. Genetically modified rapeseed is being imported not only from the ports of Kashima in Ibaraki Prefecture and Nagoya in Aichi Prefecture, but also from Chiba in Chiba Prefecture, Yokohama in Kanagawa Prefecture, Shimizu in Shizuoka Prefecture, Yokkaichi in Mie Prefecture, Kobe in Hyogo Prefecture, Mizushima in Okayama Prefecture, Uno in Okayama Prefecture, and Hakata in Fukuoka Prefecture.

Oilseed rape pollen can be dispersed over long distances by the wind. If oilseed rape bears fruit and wild birds eat it, it can be carried even farther inland. Is there really no chance of hybridization with Japanese oilseed rape? Although Monsanto has stated that there will be no hybridization with Japanese oilseed rape, I cannot help but feel a certain amount of concern.

Japan imports about 2 million tons of rapeseed annually as a raw material for rapeseed oil and other products. The largest import partner is Canada. It accounts for about 85% of imports. Canada is the world's largest producer of genetically modified rapeseed. Mr. Percy, the Canadian oilseed rape grower we told you about yesterday, has had the oilseed rape he has been breeding contaminated by genetically modified oilseed rape.

Most of the rapeseed arriving at Japanese ports is stored in storage facilities set up at the wharf and processed at nearby oil refineries and livestock feed mills. Besides that, they are also taken out of the port by truck to outside processing plants. Rape seed is only about 1 mm in diameter. They are so small that it is assumed that they spilled out of the back of the truck during transportation.

For now, native GM rapeseed is limited to the vicinity of port docks, storage facilities, and roads in the harbor.

In Yokkaichi, Mie Prefecture, genetically modified rapeseed was growing, flowering, and bearing fruit wild around an oil refinery located outside the Yokkaichi Port site. Because of the large amount of money and labor involved in such research, it is difficult to conduct large-scale surveys.

It is not only rape. At the wharf of Shimizu Port in Shizuoka Prefecture, soybeans resistant to Monsanto's flagship product, Roundup herbicide, were growing wild in the grass beside the road.

In Mexico, the country of origin of corn, government regulation is lagging and there is no GMO labeling system. GMO seeds have been rapidly contaminated by GMO corn imported from the U.S. for food and livestock feed, and about 10% of wild and native seeds have been contaminated by GMO corn. Even now that the cultivation of GMO corn has been banned, it has become almost impossible to restore the original conditions.

Genetically modified seeds do not only carry herbicide resistance genes. For development, fragments of genes from many different organisms are pieced together. How can we be sure that there are no mutations or other unexpected effects?

Both animals and plants share a common ancestor 4 billion years ago. There are far more things that cannot be explained as to why they underwent such a complex evolutionary process and gave rise to so many individuals. To artificially manipulate the genes that are at the root of this far-flung lineage of life is, in my opinion, an act akin to blasphemy against life.

( to be continued)