§ Mr. BrakeTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many motorcycle parking spaces exist at each office or site for which his Department is responsible; and how many are secure spaces. [55261]
§ Mr. MorleyThe Department and its agencies occupies around 200 separate sites and this information is not readily available. The position at the Ministry's principal headquarters sites is as follows:
novel, including GM, foods under the EC Novel Foods Regulation, is also committed to a policy of transparency and openness. The Committee publishes the agenda, minutes and papers from its meetings and these, together with other information about GM foods, may also be found on the MAFF website on the Internet. Open meetings are held from time to time with observers from a range of invited interest groups and a brochure describing the work of the ACNFP, supplemented by a series of fact sheets, will be published shortly.
§ Ms DrownTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what research his Department has(a) commissioned and (b) evaluated into the possible long-term harmful effects of genetic organisms on (i) human health, (ii) the environment and (iii) animal health. [59215]
§ Mr. RookerThe safety of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are rigorously assessed in accordance with EC Deliberate Release Directive (90-220) and the EC Novel Foods Regulation (258-97).
MAFF has commissioned a range of research projects to underpin the safety assessments with over £lm committed to research on the safety of novel foods in 1998–99. Details are contained in the answer that I gave to the hon. Member for Lewes (Mr. Baker) on 11 February 1998, Official Report, columns 275-78. A programme of research to look at the possible risks to the agricultural environment from 317W the release of GMOs began in 1990 and over £3.5m has been committed to the programme to date. Details of completed and current projects are given in the table. In
Study Organisation End date Prokaryotic gene transfer in the photosphere of sugar beet and wheat. Institute of Virology and Environmental Microbiology, Oxford 30 September 1993 Virus interactions in transgenic raspberry and tobacco expressing the coat protein of arabis mosaic nepovirus. Institute of Virology and Environmental Microbiology, Oxford 31 December 1993 Risk assessment of genetically engineered Lactobacillus plantarum. University of Newcastle 31 December 1993 Assessment of pollen distribution from potential transgenically modified wind pollinated crops. IGER 5 January 1994 Risk assessment survey on the release of genetically modified plants. SCRI/Scottish Agricultural Science Agency 6 February 1994 Effect of releasing GEMs in soil—application of flow cytometry. Institute of Freshwater Ecology 2 April 1994 GM Rhizobium strains as tools for assessing risk of deliberate release of micro-organisms into the environment. IGER 31 October 1994 Transfer of recombinant genes from a GMO by bacteriophage from soil. University of Wales 19 December 1994 Risks associated with the use of virus tolerant or resistant plants. CSL, Harpenden/University of Leeds/PBI Cambridge 31 December 1994 Experimental monitoring of genetically manipulated bacteria using DNA probes. IACR Rothamsted 22 May 1995 Gene transfer between Brassica and Plasmodiophora. John Innes Centre 28 February 1996 Gene flow between geminiviruses and plants—an assessment of risk. Queen Mary and Westfield College, London 30 September 1996 Factors that influence plasmid conjugation between bacteria in the phytosphere of crop plants. Institute of Virology and Environmental Microbiology, Oxford 30 November 1996 Functional impact of genetically modified micro-organisms in soil. University of Surrey 31 October 1997 Factors affecting heteroencapsidation by transgenically expressed virus coat proteins. John Innes Centre 3 December 1997 Recombinant gene transfer in natural microbial populations of sugar beet rhizosphere. University of Wales 31 December 1998 Assessment of the frequency of recombination in virus-infected plants. IACR Broom's Barn 30 June 1999 The risks associated with the introduction of GM forage grasses and legumes. IGER 30 June 1999 Consequence analysis of the impact on agriculture and the environment of the release of herbicide tolerant oilseed rape. NIAB 31 May 2000 An experimental and mathematical study of the local and regional scale movement of an oilseed rape transgene. SCRI 31 August 2000 Risk assessment of transgene movement. John Innes Centre 31 August 2000