A first victory for ETH, after the procedure had been restarted. In its re-examination of the permit process in spring 2003 for controlled wheat trials proposed by the ETH plant researcher Christof Sautter the Federal Supreme Court identified serious defects of proceedings . The Swiss Agency for the Environment, Forests and Landscape (BUWAL) has now given the go-ahead for the newly submitted updated trial – with strict safety conditions.

Continuing doubt on the signification of the trial

"We still have misgivings on the quality of the experiment", admits BUWAL director Philippe Roch right at the start of a media conference last Thursday in Berne. The 1,600 GM plants on the trial plot contain the gene kp4, which regulates the expression of the KP4 protein. This should help the wheat to withstand an attack of corn blight. In its decree BUWAL says: "The incomplete characterisation of the plants and the lack of verification methods to show the presence of the KP4 protein diminish the potential knowledge to be gained".

In his address Roch referred to the bearing of the Swiss Ethics Committee on Non-human Gene Technology (ECNH). Due to the commission's persistent scepticism on the conception of the trial and the existing results from greenhouse trials, it unanimously recommended that the proposal be rejected. "It isn't BUWAL's job to judge the the whole purpose of the trial but possible risks," says Roch.

The specialist Federal Commission for Biosecurity supports the trial with a majority. For its part BUWAL estimates the risk of outbreeding by pollination to be low if the trial unfolds in the expected manner, because of the small surface area of the trial, and therefore deems the trial acceptable.

"Research must continue to be possible"

Decisive for BUWAL's concession for the trial is that in the meantime there is more clarity in the genetic technology debate. On the one hand, this is political as Roch explains. "During the parliamentary sessions on Gen-Lex members expressed the will that the spreading of antibiotic resistant genes – such as those present in the ETH wheat – should be accepted for research purposes until the end of 2008. As an executive authority BUWAL has to respect this.”

Explaining the decision to the media: BUWAL director, Philippe Roch (second from right); to his left, Hans Hosbach, head of the section Biotechnology at BUWAL; right Andrea Raps, biologist at BUWAL; far left BUWAL media spokesman, Adrian Aeschlimann. large

At the same time the head of BUWAL wants the concession to be seen as a signal to research that "such experiments are possible in Switzerland". Despite this decision Roch says that the commercialisation of genetically modified plants lies in the distant future.

Knocking on open doors

Furthermore, according to Roch, the security measures governing the trial have been stepped up. However, a closer examination of the measures now called for by BUWAL are not that new. Most were already included in the concession granted in December 2002. The consultative support group of five that had to be systematically provided with all information on the trial and that included representatives from BUWAL, the Canton of Zurich, the Community of Lindau, and other experts, already existed. ETH Zurich is also represented in this group in the person of the geobotanist, Angelika Hilbeck.

Protective tents to shield the surroundings during the pollination phase of the wheat, the subsequent examination of remaining genetically modified organisms in the ground, a coat of protecting plants , as well as the rigorous surveillance of the trial plot – 24 hours per day during the pollination phase – are all matters of course for Christof Sautter. Indeed he proposed some of these security measures himself. "There are a few new details. For example, that the ground has to be inspected over a period of two years instead of one after the conclusion of the trial. Or that the radius around the plants that must be inventoried is now 500 instead of 250 metres. But here, I only have to account for wheat, not other plants," notes Sautter. BUWAL has been knocking on an open door as far as he is concerned, he adds.

Politically influenced decision

How strongly the decision had been influenced by political considerations, was a question addressed to Philippe Roch."There was political pressure," admits the head of BUWAL, who, after the BUWAL rejection of the in November 2001, was confronted with harsh critique and calls for his resignation. But nobody had attempted to influence him personally. "Now calls for my resignation will probably come from the left-green factions," he adds laconically.