No GM 'magic'

Scottish farmers and the public need not share the wide-eyed enthusiasm for GM technology which surfaced at the Farming Scotland Conference, in Carnoustie (your report, 5 February).

Such uncritical reporting of biotech advocacy could lead readers into thinking the growing of GM crops in South America and elsewhere is beneficial for people and the environment, when it is neither. It is, however, very beneficial for the patent holders of the increasingly costly GM seeds.

None of the supposed GM "magic" is sustainable; it is exactly what Scottish farmers don't need and consumers don't want.

ARTHUR JARRETT

Naughton Road

Wormit