Hawaiian genetically modified papayas have been found at a farmer's plantation in Kanchanaburi province, a study revealed yesterday. Piyasak Chaumpluk, from Chulalongkorn University's Department of Botany, who conducted the study, said the papaya in Kanchanaburi would be sent to a local fresh market, a supermarket in a department store and for export to other countries.
He presented his findings to a seminar entitled "2012 Food Security Assembly" organised by BioThai Foundation, the Sustainable Agriculture Foundation, and Alternative Agriculture Network.
Piyasak collected 319 samples of plants that may be genetically modified (GMO). Of this number, some 27 samples were cotton, 74 samples were papaya, 108 samples were rice, 105 samples were maize. The rest were chilli, tomato, and yellow bean.
According to his laboratory study, 29 samples of Hawaiian papaya in Kanchanaburi were found to the tainted with GMO and nine samples of cotton were also contaminated with GMO in Kanchanaburi and Sukhothai provinces.
Three years ago, Piyasak had found GMO contamination in maize for animal feed and cotton.
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