PROTESTERS are urging City of York Council to keep the York area free from GM crops.

York and Ryedale Friends of the Earth joined 80 community groups throughout the country in a protest against commercially-grown GM crops today.

The group were asking shoppers in Parliament Street, York, to sign postcards, which call for local authorities to take an anti-GM stance. The postcards collected in today's protest will be used to create a giant GM-free collage symbolising local concern over the issue.

This will then be presented to City of York Council, which has already agreed to strive to always use GM-free food in school meals.

The postcard asks the council to make a formal submission to the Government and European Commission to prevent GM crops being grown in their area. Protester Josie Downs, who lives in Malton, said she had also contacted Ryedale councillors to encourage them to prevent GM crops being grown in their district.

She said: "We have got a couple of hundred postcards and we are quite hopeful of getting them all signed. "

Friends of the Earth said the nation-wide protest was timed to coincide with the run-up to the May local elections.

If given the go-ahead GM crops risk contaminating local food, farmland and wildlife and threaten the viability of organic food, FoE says.

Friends of the Earth GM campaigner Clare Oxborrow said: "It really is now or never if we want to stop the introduction of GM crops in this country."

Updated: 13:05 Saturday, April 12, 2003