2. Media bias outside of politics: A study on the reporting of GM foods in Europe
2.13 Limitations and future research
Given the language and cultural differences across European countries which also result in country-specific interpretations of newspaper articles, a more robust method of translation of the articles may be explored in the future. Further, television and internet offer increasingly interesting media for analyzing media bias, and these should be examined in further research in this area. Some additional steps might also be explored to strengthen the idea that there is a negative coverage in the media regarding the launch of new technologies. In particular, if one could show that there are structural dimensions driving this negative feeling and identify the structural reasons, those results would support the findings of this chapter. This is what is studied in the following two chapters.
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68 Appendix 2.1. Examples of Original Language and Translated Articles
1. Negative Content (Kommersant, Russia) 10 опасных для природы изобретений Most of the technologies that facilitate a person's life, ruin the environment
# Text edited
Genetically modified organisms
Genetically modified organisms have been obtained by American scientists in the early 1980's. In 1988, the United States were first planting of transgenic crops. Now crops with modified genes occupy in the world, more than 100 million ha. Meanwhile, the issue of security products with GMOs is still open. Some scientists claim that they can cause mutations that lead to allergies and diseases of internal organs.
Source: http://www.kommersant.ru/doc.aspx?fromsearch=c9648bf0-4f8b-484a-b0aa-c9e769fe7b13&docsid=1370675
2. Negative Content (Daily Mirror, UK)
GM salmon that grows twice normal rate set to get approval for eating
A monster salmon designed to grow at twice the normal rate is set to become the first genetically modified animal approved for eating.
Food regulators in the States are considering whether the product, called AquAdvantage salmon, is fit to eat and safe for the environment.
They have signed off five of the seven criteria.
The fish contains a growth hormone that would make it ready for sale in 18 months rather than the usual three years. But the fish would need EU approval to make it into British supermarkets.
AquaBounty, the Massachusetts company behind the fish, insists it is safe and is hoping for approval within months. Chief executive Ronald Stotish said the fish would be no bigger than normal, simply grown in half the time. He said: "You don't get salmon the size of the Hindenburg. You get to those target weights in a shorter time."
AquaBounty would sell fish eggs to fish farms. They would be bred sterile to prevent them getting into the wild and breeding with native salmon.
But Peter Melchett, policy director of the Soil Association, said: "Once you have bombarded an animal with other genes, the DNA is unstable, and there is no guarantee these fish will remain sterile.
"It poses far too great a risk to wild salmon.
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"A fish that grows so quickly is also likely to lose some of the nutritional benefits.
There is no such thing as a free salmon lunch and we will pay the price."
Even if given the green light, it would take two or three years to hit the supermarkets.
The EU has approved only two GM products since 1998 - a potato engineered for starch production and an insect-resistant maize.
Source: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/06/28/it-s-one-big-leap-for-gm-salmon-115875-22366105/
3. Positive Content (La Repubblica, Italy) Prodotto un riso ogm più ricco di vitamina A
ROMA - è nato "Golden Rice 2", una nuova pianta di riso geneticamente modificata ricca di vitamina A, che potrebbe battere la carenza di questo nutriente che affligge nel mondo oltre 250 milioni di persone. La nuova versione del Golden Rice contiene una quantità 20 volte maggiore di pro-vitamina A (beta carotene) della precedente versione e potrebbe garantire la metà del fabbisogno giornaliero dei bambini di questa importantissima vitamina, ha riferito sulla rivista Nature Biotechnology un consorzio di ricercatori americani e britannici.
Fonte: http://ricerca.repubblica.it/repubblica/archivio/repubblica/2005/03/30/prodotto-un-riso-ogm-piu-ricco-di.html
Translated Text
GM rice produced a more rich in vitamin A
ROME - was born "Golden Rice 2, a new genetically modified rice plant rich in vitamin A, which could beat the lack of this nutrient in the world that affects over 250 million people. The new version of Golden Rice contains 20 times more pro-vitamin A (beta carotene) than the previous version and could provide half the daily requirement of children of this important vitamin, reported in the journal Nature Biotechnology a consortium of American researchers and British.
Source:http://ricerca.repubblica.it/repubblica/archivio/repubblica/2005/03/30/prodotto-un-riso-ogm-piu-ricco-di.html
4. Neutral Content (Le Monde, France)
L'UE s'attaque à l'embargo français sur les OGM
Paris et l'autorité européenne chargée de la sécurité alimentaire ont croisé le fer, sauvegarde contre son utilisation en France.
"Aucune preuve scientifique, en termes de risques pour la santé humaine ou animale ou pour l'environnement, n'a été fournie pour justifier l'invocation d'une clause de sauvegarde," explique l'AESA. La Commission européenne doit désormais étudier la position de l'AESA. Ensuite, elle ordonnera très probablement à la France de lever son embargo, estiment des sources diplomatiques.
Mais Paris a immédiatement répliqué en annonçant qu'il maintenait sa position. Le ministère de l'écologie a fait savoir dans un communiqué que la France allait se défendre devant le Conseil des ministres européen. La clause de sauvegarde européenne permet d'interdire provisoirement la culture ou la vente d'un organisme génétiquement modifié autorisé dans l'UE, en invoquant un risque pour la santé ou l'environnement. Les Etats membres utilisant cette clause doivent présenter à Bruxelles des éléments scientifiques "nouveaux" pour la justifier. Le MON810 n'a pas été semé en 2008 et reste interdit en France.
Source: http://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2008/10/31/l-ue-s-attaque-a-l-interdiction-francaise-des-ogm_1113462_3244.html
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Translated Text
The EU is addressing the French ban on GMOs
Paris and the European authority responsible for food safety have crossed swords, Friday, Oct. 31, with the backdrop of the French position on GMOs. The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) said the French ban of genetically modified maize MON810 produced by the U.S. firm Monsanto was unjustified. It responded to a request from the European Commission on the validity of the invocation at the beginning of the year, a saving clause against its use in France.
"No scientific evidence in terms of risks to human or animal health or the environment was provided to justify the invocation of a safeguard clause," EFSA says. The European Commission must now consider the position of the EFSA. Then it most likely will order France to lift its embargo, say diplomatic sources.
But Paris has immediately responded by announcing that it maintained its position.
The Department of Ecology said in a statement that France would defend itself before the European Council of Ministers. The EU safeguard clause allows provisional prohibition of the cultivation or sale of a GMO authorized in the EU, citing a risk to
5. Neutral Content (The Hindu, India) – Example of how newspapers decide the content of the news
Bt brinjal trials have GEAC approval: TNAU
‘The network project is closely monitored by agencies of the Government of India’
A day after a group of environmentalists protesting Tamilnadu Agricultural University’s (TNAU) field trials of genetically modified (GM) brinjal by storming into its research farm here, the university on Saturday said demonstrators violated TNAU’s rights and also the Government of India regulations.
The university authorities said they have lodged a police complaint. The university registrar, Dr P. Santhana Krishnan, in a statement maintained that the GM crop trials were being held by the university with approval from the Department of Biotechnology and the Genetic Engineering and Approval Committee (GEAC) with specified bio-safety norms.
‘Research is monitored’
Being a public research body, TNAU’s research on GM crops is meant to benefit farmers, consumers and the society at large. The research is being undertaken as a network project by involving many universities and research centres and is closely monitored by agencies of the Government of India, it added.
Condemning Friday’s incidents, the university said the demonstrators, claiming to be members of the Erode Organic Farmers Collective and Pasumai Thaayagam, damaged plants at the brinjal research plot .
The group was also charged with defacing the university’s name board and the display boards at the research plots, besides “misguiding” a team of media persons brought to the site with “unscientific information and wrong facts” about the GM research trials conducted by the TNAU.
Against GM crops
More than 100 activists of the Erode Organic Farmers Collective, led by its leader Mr Selvam, and members of Pasumai Thaayagam, the environmental outfit of Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK), marched to TNAU’s GM crop trial farm on Friday and staged a demonstration against the crop trials. They criticised the university for allowing itself to be converted into the “property” of Monsanto, the US life science company promoting GM crops in India. The members of these outfits alleged that once the trails were completed, it would pave way for the first GM food crop to be sold in the market whose consumption would have adverse impact on the health of human beings and animals.
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Millions to feed
TNAU maintained that the Supreme Court, which has recently allowed GM crop research to continue, has in its observation maintained that the mere fear that GM food crop could spell hazard for the biosafety/environment could not be a ground to restrict the research in a country like India which has millions to feed.
Source:http://www.thehindubusinessline.in/2008/02/24/stories/2008022450910600.htm
72 Appendix 2.2. Codes for file names
As an example of the coding system followed, let us say that we wished to code an article found in le Monde in France in October 2008. Let us assume that there are 4 newspapers selected in France and that Le Monde is no 3 in the list. Let us also assume that it is the 3rd article to be identified in Le Monde in October 2008. Then the name of the file containing this article to be saved will be:
LFR03081003.
where
L = ‘local language’ (we used L before it is translated and E after it is translated into English – we also coded L for English articles when identified and then used E when we were storing it with other translated articles)
FR = the code for the country name
03 = the publication code within France (here, Le Monde)
08 = the year (here, 2008)
10 = the month (here, October)
03 = the 3rd article which contains GM food reference and found that particular month in Le Monde newspaper.
It is to be noted that articles on ‘cloned animals’ were also included when the above search words brought up such articles, since the cloned animals in turn can be turned into meat.
Articles addressing markets outside of Europe were also included.
On the other hand, letters to the editor, comments/blogs by the readers on a given article were not taken into account since these were considered as material which did not originate in that particular newspaper.
73 Appendix 2.3. Grading of the titles and the articles for possible bias
Firstly, the title of an article was read and a score assigned for the bias. For example, the title of a specific article was read and it was scored as having a negative bias if after having read the title, the evaluator felt that title was negatively biased against GM foods; in other words, the overall message from the title was felt to leave a negative impression on the evaluator.
Thus, the articles were graded in two steps:
- First, the title of an article was scored as either 0, 1 or 2 o 0 = positively-biased
o 1 = neutral/don’t know o 2 = negatively-biased
- Secondly, the content of the article was also graded:
o 0 = positively-biased
o 2 = neutral/don’t know o 3 = negatively-biased
Thus, two grades – ‘tscore’ for the title and ‘cscore’ for the content - were entered for each article using the specific code in an Excel document.