Lord Trees (CB)

My Lords, I strongly support these regulations; I do not regret them. The UK is a leader in these technologies, and exploiting and implementing them will be an integral part of developing our biosciences expertise to help drive economic growth in the UK. But much more than that, critically, they will help us feed not only ourselves in the UK but the world, in the face of a growing population, constantly emerging disease threats and environmental challenges. I would just like to point out the rather obvious: the fruit, vegetables and crops we grow and consume now are very different from their natural progenitors and have been subject to genetic changes by humans over hundreds of years, through selective processes involving no knowledge of what other genes might be affected. We have been eating genetically modified food for years and years. Historically, the world, and especially populations in some of the poorest countries of the world, benefited from the green revolution in the decades after the Second World War, when varieties of wheat and rice in particular were improved such that many people could be fed adequately in those countries. Again, that was achieved by traditional methods. But the modern techniques enable us to make changes extremely quickly, and with incredibly sustainable and environmentally friendly means, to benefit humankind by reducing parasiticides, chemicals, fertilisers and even water—and by reducing food waste. So I find it difficult to understand why the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and our colleagues in the Green Party oppose them. I have confidence in our molecular biologists and our plant scientists—and these regulations. For these reasons, I support the Government strongly, but I urge them to press ahead with similar enabling regulations to permit precision-breeding technologies in animals. They offer, for example, the prospect of creating avian flu-resistant chickens, which would not only prevent disease in chickens but could reduce the possibility of spillover infections into humans of, for instance, the highly pathogenic avian influenza strain H5N1. Doing that has the potential to prevent the possible adaptation to human-to-human transmission. So I strongly support these regulations for plants, and I urge the Government to consider bringing similar enabling regulations for animals to this House as soon as possible.