A new campaign and website has been launched to persuade supermarkets to change policy. GMOAction is highlighting the irresponsibility of supermarkets in changing their policies on GM and allowing GM contamination in their animal feed.

Even by the standards of an industry that claims to be able to end hunger, prevent environmental catastrophe and bring prosperity to the developing world, it must have felt like a breathtakingly audacious move.

The House of Commons is continuing to bar genetically modified food from its restaurants and cafés, despite a drive by ministers for the technology to be more widely accepted.

Today UK environment minister Owen Paterson called for Europe to "find a way forward for GM", but with so many European countries opposed to genetically modified crops, what are his chances of changing the status quo?

DEFRA Secretary Owen Paterson’s views on genetically modified crops could set Westminster against the Scottish and Welsh Governments.

Both administrations are opposed to the technology and have taken steps to prevent it being grown in their countries.

Rothamsted Research has submitted an application to Defra to extend its current GM wheat field trial to include additional autumn-sown cadenza wheat. Rothamsted scientists believe it would be advantageous to gain further data from their experiment, in wheat planted at a different time of year and under different weather conditions with different aphid populations. This will give us additional data under a more diverse range of environmental conditions.

The next time you buy chicken or eggs from Tesco, they may come from birds fed genetically modified soya. The supermarket chain yesterday abandoned its 11-year commitment not to sell poultry reared on the controversial GM feed. The original controls were put in place to reflect the concerns of shoppers, who question the impact of GM crops on human health and the countryside.

Britain is preparing to champion genetically modified crops in Europe in an attempt to overturn entrenched resistance among many EU members, including Austria and France. Owen Paterson, the environment secretary, is drawing up plans for a key speech backing GM with the firm backing of George Osborne, the chancellor. Meanwhile, ministers from several departments are preparing to launch a new agri-tech strategy this spring that will make a strong case for the science.

Two-thirds of the British public say it is “important” that genetically modified ingredients are labelled on food, according to a survey published on Wednesday by the government’s Food Standards Agency, despite only a tiny number saying they look for GM information on labels. The findings, drawn from interviews with 1,467 people for a report by the food watchdog on GM labelling, will be a “major blow” to the government’s bid to win public acceptance for GM crops and food, anti-GM campaigners said. The environment secretary, Owen Paterson, last week told a farming conference: “we should not be afraid of making the case to the public about the potential benefits of GM.”

After years of encouraging developing countries in Africa and elsewhere to grow them, but unable to allow its own farmers to do so, the environment secretary Owen Paterson has told a major conference that GM can secure countries’ food supplies, is good for the public and can help limit climate change. [...] But despite billions of dollars spent on research by rich countries on feeding hungry people, most developing countries remain suspicious of the claims, or convinced that the benefits will go mainly to the corporations that control the seeds and chemicals needed to grow the crops. What is remarkable is not that GM crops have, after 20 years and so much money spent, now reached 19 out of more than 150 developing countries, but that most nations have managed to keep out a rapacious industry, and that only a handful of GM food commodity crops like oilseed rape, soya and maize are still grown, mainly for animals and biofuels.