:00:11. > :00:18.Welcome to HARDtalk. One of the great local challenges of the next
:00:19. > :00:23.half century will be feeding a human population which is set to rise
:00:24. > :00:27.beyond 9 billion. Farmers worldwide are facing an enormous productivity
:00:28. > :00:33.challenge. My guest today is Mick Mack, boss of Syngenta, one of the
:00:34. > :00:37.world's biggest agribusinesses. He sees the future of farming driven by
:00:38. > :00:45.bioscience and genetic minipill Asian. How come he faces so much
:00:46. > :01:09.mistrust and suspicion? -- manipulation.
:01:10. > :01:18.Mick Mack, welcome to HARDtalk. You work in one of the most important
:01:19. > :01:24.ASIC businesses known to man, the production of food. What you produce
:01:25. > :01:28.ends up in all of our stomachs. Therefore, you need to be trusted.
:01:29. > :01:33.Do you think your business is trusted? Well, we are actually in
:01:34. > :01:39.the research and develop and industry, and the business of making
:01:40. > :01:43.pesticides, if I can start off by just talking about what it is that
:01:44. > :01:47.we do. The business of making pesticides has been around for a
:01:48. > :01:50.long time. The company itself has been here in existence for 13
:01:51. > :01:55.years, but our history dates back to the 1750s. You were asking about
:01:56. > :01:59.whether we are trusted. We have been trusted to do what we do for a long
:02:00. > :02:04.time. That is the legacy of all of that. Sure, you are a science -based
:02:05. > :02:10.company, but my point is that what you do is an integral part of and
:02:11. > :02:14.therefore, literally, what you produce and products that come from
:02:15. > :02:18.what you produce end up in all of our stomachs, and therefore, people
:02:19. > :02:23.have to believe that you are responsible, you are safe, and that
:02:24. > :02:30.that is always your first priority. It is true that we are a regulated
:02:31. > :02:33.industry, so nothing we sell can be put on the market without the
:02:34. > :02:37.permission of the governments and the countries that we operate in.
:02:38. > :02:42.But if I can make a technical point, very little of what we do, when
:02:43. > :02:46.referring to pesticides, ends up in people's stomachs. It ends up on the
:02:47. > :02:50.soil to prevent weeds, it ends up on plans to prevent bugs. But the
:02:51. > :02:55.business of ingesting pesticides is something which is not a normal
:02:56. > :03:02.procedure. Obviously, we will debate that, exactly how the crop
:03:03. > :03:05.protection products you make work, and the impact they have within the
:03:06. > :03:10.food chain. Before we get to that, what you have not mentioned so far
:03:11. > :03:13.is seeds. Seeds are a big part of your business, and you have clearly
:03:14. > :03:17.made a strategic decision, going back many years now, to focus a lot
:03:18. > :03:20.of your R, research and development effort, on
:03:21. > :03:28.genetically-modified organisms, GMO foods. Why have you done that? Just
:03:29. > :03:36.to be clear, our seeds business is about $3.5 billion, and about
:03:37. > :03:39.$700-800 million of that is in genetically modified seeds, but we
:03:40. > :03:45.have about $2 billion in conventional seeds. But as I
:03:46. > :03:49.understand it, a lot of your R effort right now is aimed at
:03:50. > :03:55.expanding your GM business. It is, we spend about $1.5 billion each
:03:56. > :04:03.year on our R effort, and of that, a lot of that is on GM. Why
:04:04. > :04:06.are we doing that? There are a number of crops today which are
:04:07. > :04:11.already genetically modified, such as corn and soy beans. There is a
:04:12. > :04:15.big opportunity going forward to further technify such crops as wheat
:04:16. > :04:19.and rice, and that is a big growth opportunity for the firm. Coming
:04:20. > :04:24.back to that basic trust issue, I am sure you are better aware than I am
:04:25. > :04:28.that around the world, it is clear that publics do not trust the whole
:04:29. > :04:33.notion of genetically modified, manipulated foods. They do not want
:04:34. > :04:38.them. The latest polls in the UK showed two thirds of people have a
:04:39. > :04:45.negative perception of GM foods. So, you are not trusted. Well, the
:04:46. > :04:48.business of trust, most of the genetically modified traits are ones
:04:49. > :04:52.which are valued by farmers, because it enables the farmers to grow their
:04:53. > :04:57.plants more easily and efficiently, and in some cases at a lower cost.
:04:58. > :04:59.Consumers do not directly benefit normally, beyond the indirect
:05:00. > :05:05.benefit they get from lower food costs. Whether you are talking about
:05:06. > :05:09.the United States, Brazil, Argentina or Europe, the business of asking
:05:10. > :05:14.them, how are you with GM foods, is something they have never really had
:05:15. > :05:17.to accept because it does not bring them direct benefit, but that does
:05:18. > :05:21.not mean they are not benefiting indirectly. So you would argue that
:05:22. > :05:25.the lack of trust, the apprehension, is born out of ignorance? I would
:05:26. > :05:30.not call consumers ignorant. Let's not forget that here in Europe,
:05:31. > :05:34.where it is widely held that the Europeans are not for GM, the fact
:05:35. > :05:40.is, it has never been brought to them in part because farmers have
:05:41. > :05:46.never really needed GM technology. In the European Union today, the
:05:47. > :05:52.really big crop is wheat and the really big Pharma problem in wheat
:05:53. > :05:57.is disease, fungus, on wheat. There is no genetically modified straight
:05:58. > :06:01.for that. By contrast, in the United States, where corn and soy bean are
:06:02. > :06:03.the really big crops, we have technology which directly helps
:06:04. > :06:09.growers, so it is really different. So, regional differentiation is, and
:06:10. > :06:12.also, your ambitions differ in different parts of the world. But on
:06:13. > :06:17.the basic question, there are advocates of GM food, and I am
:06:18. > :06:22.thinking of Mark Lynas, who used to be strongly against it, but now
:06:23. > :06:25.campaigns in favour of it, he told me quite explicitly, the scientific
:06:26. > :06:29.debate over the safety of GM is over, there is no longer a debate,
:06:30. > :06:35.it is so absolutely clearly proven to be safe. Is that your position?
:06:36. > :06:39.Well, I recall the debate that you had with Mark Lynas on that point. I
:06:40. > :06:43.do not think anything that I could say to you today is going to put an
:06:44. > :06:46.exclamation point on all of the people who would be against it, to
:06:47. > :06:53.say, look, there has not been enough science done, it has not gone into
:06:54. > :06:58.testing, and the question as to whether it is born out of... There
:06:59. > :07:02.are still plenty of people who say there has not been enough science
:07:03. > :07:05.done on it. What we do know is this, that of all of the available science
:07:06. > :07:09.done by government agencies, there is no link between GM food and
:07:10. > :07:15.anything having to do with human health. On that point about the
:07:16. > :07:21.timescale, do you accept the proposition of the geneticist in
:07:22. > :07:25.Canada, David Suzuki, who has done a lot of work on this, who says, we
:07:26. > :07:28.have no idea of the long-term consequences of these genetic
:07:29. > :07:33.manipulations, and basically, unwittingly, we are part of a mass
:07:34. > :07:38.experiment. Do you understand and accept the logic of that? I
:07:39. > :07:42.understand that, we always come back to the business of not being able to
:07:43. > :07:48.prove a negative. The fact of the matter is, this technology was
:07:49. > :07:51.introduced on a widespread basis in the 1990s, and here we are a
:07:52. > :07:56.generation later, and there is still no credible evidence that says there
:07:57. > :08:00.is a problem, or that we should be even exploring it further. One
:08:01. > :08:06.reason there might be to doubt the credibility of the assurances of its
:08:07. > :08:09.safety is that other elements of the GM proposition look a bit more shaky
:08:10. > :08:12.than they did. This technology has been around for the best part of two
:08:13. > :08:17.decades. Some of the claims that were made about the degree it was
:08:18. > :08:19.going to boost yields, the degree it was going to remove the need for
:08:20. > :08:26.pesticides and herbicides to be used in the future, those claims have
:08:27. > :08:29.proven to be unfounded. I think the claims at that time were
:08:30. > :08:33.exaggerated, I agree with you. Was your company involved in that
:08:34. > :08:39.exaggeration? We were not, no. In the 1990s, we came out, the very
:08:40. > :08:46.first trait we introduced was a Bt trait, for corn. At that time, the
:08:47. > :08:51.European corn borer in the United States was not controlled at all. It
:08:52. > :08:56.had only modest control on Bt. So, one thing which was well claimed
:08:57. > :09:01.was... By the way, this European corn borer was referred to at the
:09:02. > :09:05.time as the billion-dollar bug. Bt in corn went a long way to
:09:06. > :09:08.controlling an insect which could not be controlled with pesticides.
:09:09. > :09:11.So, it is true to say that there was not a big pesticide reduction. But
:09:12. > :09:17.the control of the pest was substantial. But more to the point,
:09:18. > :09:21.one of the attractions of the GM case was that it appeared to offer a
:09:22. > :09:24.way of getting away from the use of all of the chemicals which your
:09:25. > :09:28.business relies upon. But just look at one study, Washington State
:09:29. > :09:32.University found that since 1996, with more and more use of GM, the
:09:33. > :09:37.use of herbicides in the US has actually gone up 11%, at a time when
:09:38. > :09:41.more and more of the corn and soy production is GM. So, the idea that
:09:42. > :09:47.GM removes the need for the chemicals is just plain wrong? You
:09:48. > :09:55.just switched to soy bean, by the way, by the use of herbicides. In
:09:56. > :09:58.the middle of the 1990s, when the geometrically modified trait came
:09:59. > :10:02.out, farmers were forced to spray a lot of selective herbicides on to
:10:03. > :10:05.soy bean, and by going to glyphosate, they were able to change
:10:06. > :10:09.that. As glyphosate has become more and more resistant, it is true that
:10:10. > :10:12.we are having to put more and more herbicides on that. There is an
:10:13. > :10:16.element of that, absolutely true, for sure. So, could it be that when
:10:17. > :10:20.other countries around the world look at the leadership role of the
:10:21. > :10:22.United States in adopting GM technology, frankly they are not
:10:23. > :10:25.impressed by what has happened in the US, and is that why all of your
:10:26. > :10:30.big ambitions to build your GM business around the world, and yet
:10:31. > :10:32.we are seeing that some of the biggest potential markets that you
:10:33. > :10:38.operate in our actually moving in the opposite direction? Lets face
:10:39. > :10:42.it, GM is not one thing, it is many things. If you want to control a
:10:43. > :10:46.certain insect, for that to happen, it has to exist in another place.
:10:47. > :10:49.So, what is the portfolio, the arsenal of GM products that you
:10:50. > :10:55.have, and where are the crops that are grown? Today, the big crops in
:10:56. > :10:59.Asia-Pacific are such things as rice. The things which afflict Weiss
:11:00. > :11:04.are different from the things which afflicts soy beans. So, let's go to
:11:05. > :11:07.the specific country. I say, let's look at the mindset, what is
:11:08. > :11:11.happening around the world. Let's look at Mexico, where I believe they
:11:12. > :11:17.have just decided to stop growing GM maize. Peru, Bolivia, where they are
:11:18. > :11:20.moving away from GM. India, a moratorium of ten years on GM
:11:21. > :11:24.production. And China, which has just announced that it is going to
:11:25. > :11:27.be putting much more focused on traditional science and plant
:11:28. > :11:34.breeding, much less reliance on a future in GM. By the way, Mexico
:11:35. > :11:39.never went to GM for the first time in much of their white corn
:11:40. > :11:42.business. Peru has never had GM, neither has Colombia. But you have
:11:43. > :11:48.spoken about Latin America as a huge part of your business. I am saying
:11:49. > :11:52.that Brazil and Argentina, the two really big countries in Latin
:11:53. > :11:56.America, have flocked to this. If you are talking big countries and
:11:57. > :11:59.big markets, you must be worried that the Indians and the Chinese are
:12:00. > :12:03.much less interested in GM today than it seemed they would be even
:12:04. > :12:10.five years ago. First of all, I agree with you that in India, there
:12:11. > :12:13.is a big movement going on, part of it and out of concerns about
:12:14. > :12:16.multinational corporations, let's not kid ourselves. Here is a place
:12:17. > :12:19.where you have got a lot of smallholder growers, who have huge
:12:20. > :12:23.amount of pressure. Unless there is stewardship of this thing, the
:12:24. > :12:26.business of controlling the multitude of insects in India is
:12:27. > :12:31.going to be difficult. The same for China. Today, it is clear that China
:12:32. > :12:35.understands GM technology. We have a research centre, a GM research
:12:36. > :12:42.centre in Beijing, and we know factually from working with the
:12:43. > :12:45.Chinese, at the Chinese Agricultural Academy, that they care great deal
:12:46. > :12:49.about this, but they want to be sure about the science. I come back to
:12:50. > :12:56.the idea of trust and perception. You talk about the benefits, and you
:12:57. > :12:59.have focused on Africa, saying you believe GM can do so much to help
:13:00. > :13:03.drug resistant crops and everything. I look at groups like the Alliance
:13:04. > :13:06.for Food Safety in Africa African Biodiversity Network, all of these
:13:07. > :13:10.groups who are dead set against seeing you expand your GM business
:13:11. > :13:15.in their continent. I was just in Africa two weeks ago. What I tell
:13:16. > :13:19.them there and what I will tell you here is that GM technology is just
:13:20. > :13:23.another tool in the tool box. It is not a silver bullet. If the world
:13:24. > :13:27.woke up tomorrow and said absolutely positively we are not go to do GM,
:13:28. > :13:30.we are still going to have to do food, we are still going to have to
:13:31. > :13:35.control pests and care a great deal about the size of the farm. I think
:13:36. > :13:41.if I had an ideal world, it would be not to table the GM discussion, but
:13:42. > :13:44.to say, there is a GM discussion, but let's also talk about the
:13:45. > :13:49.billion hectares which is being used for farming. We want that to become
:13:50. > :13:52.2 billion, or do we want to have more sustainable, intensive
:13:53. > :13:59.agriculture in the 1 billion that we use today? I will get to that in a
:14:00. > :14:02.moment, the question of intensification. Before that, one
:14:03. > :14:06.last question about GM, which brings me perhaps to the nub of the issue
:14:07. > :14:10.about your relationship with the public on this issue. In the United
:14:11. > :14:15.States, where GM crops have been grown for a long time, you and other
:14:16. > :14:23.industry members have fought tooth and nail to prevent food labelling
:14:24. > :14:27.which tells American citizens that GM foodstuffs are in any particular
:14:28. > :14:30.product. You have fought a multi million dollar campaign in
:14:31. > :14:34.California against labelling, and in Washington state and elsewhere. Why
:14:35. > :14:41.are you so frightened of the public being informed by label of the
:14:42. > :14:48.presence of GM? I am not. So why did you spend millions on a campaign to
:14:49. > :14:54.prevent it? First of all, Syngenta did not participate in that campaign
:14:55. > :14:56.in Washington. In California, the industry-wide group spent $46
:14:57. > :15:01.million. So, in effect, because you are a member of the industry... $46
:15:02. > :15:09.billion, to stop the public knowing that GM food was in their products.
:15:10. > :15:14.The food companies, which are indirectly our customers, and the
:15:15. > :15:19.farmers, where really clear in their minds eye but having state-by-state
:15:20. > :15:23.labelling regimes would be very, very counter-productive. I generally
:15:24. > :15:26.don't think that these food companies are against labelling.
:15:27. > :15:31.There's not a provision right now. Let me just quoted the words of the
:15:32. > :15:36.man who changed from being an anti-GM and pain to being on your
:15:37. > :15:40.side. He looked at the campaign, your industry in the USA, against
:15:41. > :15:44.labelling, and he said this has to be the worst PR strategy ever, an
:15:45. > :15:49.industry using every tool to stop people knowing where their own
:15:50. > :15:56.products are being used. All I can tell you is the business about
:15:57. > :15:59.having come in the United States, when you go down the avenue of
:16:00. > :16:04.California desert this way, Oregon does this way, Nevada desert this
:16:05. > :16:07.way, it would wreak havoc on the economics of the current system. I
:16:08. > :16:12.don't think the members of my industry and the food companies are
:16:13. > :16:18.completely opposed to labelling, as such, but if you do it one state at
:16:19. > :16:20.a time, it would be economic suicide. You don't think the
:16:21. > :16:24.anti-labelling campaign has been a mistake? I think the federal
:16:25. > :16:29.government hoop resides over the label, what is the nutrition, the
:16:30. > :16:33.ingredients, if the federal government wants to involve itself
:16:34. > :16:39.in saying, I want to declare GM on this, I'm not against it. Unlike
:16:40. > :16:47.most new industry, you are pro a nationwide, cross the USA, labelling
:16:48. > :16:53.saying it's a GM product. I don't believe it's the end of GM and on
:16:54. > :16:59.the label. Because GM is not a safety matter, it had no business on
:17:00. > :17:02.the label. That is how it all started for them if they took a
:17:03. > :17:05.different position in the 1990s, we would be in a different place. I
:17:06. > :17:10.don't think the presence or absence of it will be lethal to the
:17:11. > :17:15.technology. Let's lift our eyes to a wider horizon for that and your
:17:16. > :17:18.belief in intensification leading to much more productive agriculture, to
:17:19. > :17:23.feed the 9 billion this planet is going to have before very long. As
:17:24. > :17:29.part of that, you are very big in the developing world, 90 countries.
:17:30. > :17:33.In the Wall Street Journal you wrote this, of Africa, the agricultural
:17:34. > :17:40.transformation in Africa must be African owned, and African lead.
:17:41. > :17:47.What on earth, then, is your company doing pouring billions of dollars
:17:48. > :17:51.over the next ten years into Africa? To build your business and
:17:52. > :17:55.your profits? In all of the countries that we operate in, we
:17:56. > :18:02.operate in more than 90 countries, we believe that there needs to be
:18:03. > :18:06.African owned and lead but in South Africa, they are South African and
:18:07. > :18:13.in Kenya, we are Kenyan. We opened an office in Nigeria a few months
:18:14. > :18:17.ago and we will be Nigerian there. You are a multinational corporation
:18:18. > :18:21.based in Switzerland. Yes, but the business of making agriculture more
:18:22. > :18:26.productive, it's principally regulated, the industry, so when I
:18:27. > :18:28.think about where Nigeria can go, with my discussions with their
:18:29. > :18:33.ministers, they see a big opportunity in price, and I mean the
:18:34. > :18:39.Nigerians, if they have a vision of how they want to make the rice crop
:18:40. > :18:43.productive, we can help. David Spielman of the International food
:18:44. > :18:47.policy Institute in Washington says the problem is the way you operate
:18:48. > :18:54.actually militates against flourishing local suppliers. Why?
:18:55. > :18:59.Because you overseas, the chemicals, which protect the crop, and nurture
:19:00. > :19:02.it, you encourage farmers to sign onto advisory packages for which you
:19:03. > :19:07.get a fee. It's a completely dominant business that you run from
:19:08. > :19:13.selling the seeds to the harvesting of the crop. And, by doing it so
:19:14. > :19:18.efficiently, over such an international scale, you are driving
:19:19. > :19:24.out local business. I don't know him. I think that line of argument
:19:25. > :19:28.is nonsense, frankly. If you look at the productivity of agriculture
:19:29. > :19:33.today, it's a fraction of what it is in the more developed countries and
:19:34. > :19:36.its half of the world average. If these African nations want to get
:19:37. > :19:42.more productive, they'll have to use more technology. Define what you
:19:43. > :19:45.mean by counter-productive. Going back to the African argument about
:19:46. > :19:50.real agriculture efficiency and diversity, you are comparing apples
:19:51. > :19:55.and oranges for the blue can't have an American-style agricultural
:19:56. > :19:58.system in Africa. It is entirely different for them the numbers of
:19:59. > :20:03.people dependent on the land is much greater, it's not a mechanised way
:20:04. > :20:09.the USA is. And you are bringing the mentality of the USA Prairie to it.
:20:10. > :20:13.I completely disagree. I don't know where the word miracle came from. No
:20:14. > :20:20.one said anything about mechanisation. I was just in
:20:21. > :20:25.Vietnam. We go on to rice paddies, a family of four can have a perfectly
:20:26. > :20:30.prosperous farm with one third of Hector and they their field their
:20:31. > :20:35.fault, and use some of the best herbicides we have and the best
:20:36. > :20:40.insecticides. And they get it in small sachets, so it's not about
:20:41. > :20:43.getting big schemes. You can have perfectly productive agriculture on
:20:44. > :20:46.a small-scale business and this'll be the thing which needs the
:20:47. > :20:51.breakthrough in Africa. Not about getting big and getting more
:20:52. > :20:53.productive. And again, you need to be trusted by the people you're
:20:54. > :21:04.selling your products too. Are you selling, for example, a pesticide to
:21:05. > :21:07.these emerging economies, the very chemicals which are so controversial
:21:08. > :21:17.because of the impact for example upon the bee population? Sure. It's
:21:18. > :21:21.a specific active ingredient. It's one of the most modern chemistry is
:21:22. > :21:27.in the world. And it's also banned by the European Commission. Wrongly
:21:28. > :21:33.banned. In your view. I'm talking about the trust the perception
:21:34. > :21:38.issue. Here you have a chemical. You sold around the world of vast
:21:39. > :21:41.profits. The Europeans have decided it's potentially dangerous and they
:21:42. > :21:44.have banded because of its impact upon the bee population. You are
:21:45. > :21:49.telling me that's the kind of chemical you are now wanting to sell
:21:50. > :21:56.around the world? Absolutely, we are selling it with confidence and we
:21:57. > :21:59.are selling it because it works. If you read the University of Dundee
:22:00. > :22:03.research, how can it be so confident about its long-term impact on the
:22:04. > :22:10.Beeb population which is so important to the food cycle? Every
:22:11. > :22:14.study which has been done by the industry and by science, which gave
:22:15. > :22:19.us the freedom to operate and the licence... You don't have that in
:22:20. > :22:23.Europe, because we stop selling it. They took a highly theoretical study
:22:24. > :22:28.and they applied wrongly the precautionary principle and they put
:22:29. > :22:33.a two-year ban on it, which I think, we have already been supported by
:22:34. > :22:37.French farmers unions, a number of companies, and farmers, and don't
:22:38. > :22:43.forget, we have member states saying this is at a rubbish. The business
:22:44. > :22:47.about whether or not it was appropriately banned, the jury is
:22:48. > :22:54.very much out on this. We don't, for a minute believe it. Wouldn't it be
:22:55. > :22:57.wise to stop selling it until a jury gives you the OK? Absolutely not
:22:58. > :23:03.full service nothing to do profits for worst example of the
:23:04. > :23:07.precautionary principle. The chemical is used in Canada, where
:23:08. > :23:18.there are no issues and Australia where nobody issues. -- the issues.
:23:19. > :23:23.We are the largest sunflower seed company in the world. Syngenta has
:23:24. > :23:27.12,000 beehives. We put the chemical on our sunflowers and the bees are
:23:28. > :23:33.fine. I want to end with this thought. You told the New York Times
:23:34. > :23:38.four years ago, the generally held view that natural is always better,
:23:39. > :23:42.is mistaken. I don't necessarily think you're willing that particular
:23:43. > :23:49.argument. I think we have a lot more work to do. I talk to high school
:23:50. > :23:53.kids and put it to them, do you want arsenic on your vegetables? What
:23:54. > :23:58.about spraying nicotine? When you use some really clear examples, with
:23:59. > :24:02.them, which says, just because it's natural, doesn't mean it's good.
:24:03. > :24:07.People get killed from natural substances. It happens all the time,
:24:08. > :24:13.so the business of taking a manufactured substance, typically
:24:14. > :24:17.born of what occurs in nature to begin with, and perfecting it is
:24:18. > :24:18.something laudable. We have to lend their but thank you very much for
:24:19. > :24:21.being on HARDtalk.