Zambia Slams Door Shut on Gm Relief Food

W hen I read this week that Linford Christie had declined an invitation to stand for the presidency of UK Athletics, I thought back two years to Katharine Merry celebrating her Olympic silver medal in Sydney and replying to a question about the influence of her coach. "If I try to talk about what Linford's done for me," she said, "I'll start crying."

I thought, too, of a conversation with Christie last summer, on the closing night of the track and field competition in the Commonwealth Games. There was a big smile on his face. He had coached five athletes in the competition, and four of them had won medals, so I asked him to sum up the success of the athletes of the home nations, and what it meant for the future of the British athletics team.

"Across the team as a whole," he said, "some of the athletes who didn't get medals ran personal bests. That's what it's all about. And most of the athletes are young, so they're going to be around for a while."

His sense of pride in the whole team's performance reminded me of the days when he captained the team and turned a nothing job into something of real significance. He had been given it almo for commercial purposes.

He said the delegation ordered GM food in a US restaurant and was astonished to be told that such distinctions were not made in America, confirming the scientists' fears that once admitted into the food chain the technology was irreversible.

Yesterday's decision followed a cabinet meeting where the president gave the report to his ministers. Mundia Sikatana, the agriculture minister, said the scientific uncertainty surrounding the technology meant more tests were needed before it could be deemed safe.

"The country should thus refrain from actions that might adversely affect human and animal health as well as harm the environment," he said.

The president's hostility to GM food has been echoed by state media which has played down the risk of famine. Several warehouses storing GM maize have been looted but ministers favouring its distri bution have stayed silent, apparently intimidated after the president threatened to arrest an opposition deputy who said constituents had starved. Refusing GM food was popular with the urban elite which saw the issue as a test of national strength, while the hungry villages which wanted it lacked political muscle, one diplomat said.

Four other southern African countries facing food shortages - Mozambique, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Lesotho - have accepted GM maize only if the seeds are milled into flour. Planted seeds could cross- pollinate other crops, thus endangering biodiversity and agricultural exports to Europe.

Zambia has gone further by banning even milled seeds, arguing that eating GM maize could harm the health of Zambians for whom it was a staple, unlike Europeans and Americans who may have been eating it for seven years but only in small amounts.

"This decision is a triumph of national sovereignty. The US has been putting pressure on countries to accept the GM surpluses produced by its farmers," said Charlie Kronick, a Greenpeace spokesman. Jane Moyo, of ActionAid, said Zambia's decision should be respected - as long as it did not mean people would starve - and that the US should follow the UK by donating money rather than food which was a covert subsidy to farmers.

About 15,000 tonnes of GM maize which the UN's World Food Programme stored in Zambia will probably be given to neighbouring countries.

A WFP spokeswoman said every government had the right to accept or refuse food aid, "but such a decision will complicate the work of WFP, which may not be able to respond to all those in need of food". Only half of those targeted were reached last month.

Guy Scott, a former Zambian agriculture minister, said the government had painted itself into a corner with "overly paranoid denunciations".

"What we will see now is how many people die as a result of the disruption of the relief programme - and how the various international NGOs that have spoken approvingly of the government's action will square the body count with their various consciences."