GM FOOD

AWARE groups picket U Save supermarkets over GM food
1 September 2003

	Ben Aspinall, pictured here with girlfriend Jenny, will lead the protest.
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Protesters from the Agricultural Watchdog and Research Group (AWARE), are to picket U Save supermarkets tomorrow in a protest against GM products.

The AWARE Group is an independent body created specifically to monitor issues of environmental concern and will tomorrow voice their concerns outside several local supermarkets who stock GM food.

Led by AWARE's northern divisional spokesman Ben Aspinall, their first target will be U Save, who are not only well known for offering a wide range of low cost produce, but also GM products. Aspinall said, " These products have had their very genetic make-up tampered with. What are the long term effects of this tampering? Put quite simply, we don't know. Yet in this very town you only have to go as far as the local U Save to see these products being sold. We are determined to picket any shop that caries GM products. We want to highlight the dangers of GM foods and encourage potential customers to reconsider buying them".

However, local scientists have accused Aspinall and his group of scaremongering and distortion of the facts. One such scientist, lab technician Andrea Brownlow, has accused Aspinall's arguments of being "ill-informed, highly exaggerated and often inaccurate".

The protest begins tomorrow and, in the AWARE camp, hopes are high that public opinion can be swayed by their somewhat forceful arguments.