Genetic engineering pamphlets in New Zealand supermarkets are part of a multi-national "global disinformation campaign", Green Party Co-Leader Jeanette Fitzsimons said today.

The light-green coloured brochures, headed GM Foods - Answers to Your Questions, have been published by the Grocery Industry Council.

"The paper purports to be unbiased but uses language of the United States-based food and chemical giant Monsanto," Ms Fitzsimons said. " It is full of half-truths and carries only one side of the genetic engineering debate. If supermarkets stock it, they should include pamphlets which present the other side."

Questions such as who profits from the technology, who is testing the products and how the consumer can avoid genetically engineered foods are not answered in the brochure, she said.

The pamphlet's foreword is written by Royal Society of New Zealand president Professor Sir John Scott, who has been one of this country's main advocates of genetic engineering.

"Last year in the middle of New Zealand's first genetic engineering hearings in Wellington his society hosted a pro-genetic engineering seminar in conjunction with the United States embassy," she said. "The public presentation, at which American pro-genetic engineering lobbyist Sylvia B Rowe was speaking, was part-funded by Monsanto."

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