Infected by science: international attention focuses on Oaxaca after GM corn found in all-natural fields.(genetically modified)

OAXACA, Oaxaca -- It's official: genetically altered corn has taken root in the Mexican countryside and could threaten local varieties that took more than 7,000 years to develop.

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But more than two years after it appeared mysteriously tucked into mountainside cornfields in Oaxaca state, the birthplace of maize, a panel of international scientists said in mid-March they still aren't sure what transgenic maize could mean to local corn varieties if left unchecked.

The corn first appeared in late 2001, sparking global alarm that it could pose a threat to the Mexican corn gene pool, considered the world's largest store of natural corn strains.

Amanda Galvez, a scientist with the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), told researchers from around the world that, according to a government study, the presence of transgenic corn appears to have fallen off, although a lot more research is needed in order to be sure.

Galvez and other scientists were at a three-day meeting in the city of Oaxaca to discuss a draft study by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC), set up under the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta), on the impact of transgenic corn on Mexican maize.

"The tendency is toward an apparent reduction in frequency with which transgenes are found in the communities of …