"Our environment is being used as a laboratory for widespreadexperimentation on genetically engineered organisms with profound risksthat, once released, can never be recalled," said Richard Caplan,author of a reprot for the U.S. Public Interest Research Group on GMO field trials in the US.Between 1987 and 2002 US Dep. of Agriculture authorized 15,461 field releases of genetically engineered organisms on 39,660 field test sites .Monsanto submitted the most requests (3,309), or five times the number submitted by the next most active company. Of the top 10 institutions applying to conduct field tests in 1995, seven have now merged into two companies (Monsanto and DuPont). USDA has rejected only 3.5 percent of applications for reasons such as incomplete applications or other minor paperwork errors. The percentage of field tests being conducted with introduced genes considered to be Confidential Business Information has increased nearly every year, from 0 percent in 1987 to more than 69 percent in 2002. The tests include 333 sites of genetically engineered wheat and 344 field test sites of crops engineered to produce pharmaceuticals, industrial chemicals, or other so-called biopharmaceuticals.</p><p><a href="http://pirg.org/ge/GE.asp?id2=10195&id3=ge&">Summary and download of the report</a></p><p><a href="http://www.agriculture.com/worldwide/IDS/2003-06-18T150438Z_01_N17371067_RTRIDST_0_FOOD-BIOTECH.html">Reuters: USDA lacks data - oversight of biotech crops</a>