Anti-borer corn seed still has a few bugs.

• Position: StarLink - Brief Article

Not again. That's what the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says about the one time it approved a biotechnology product to be grown for animal feed and industrial uses but not human food.

Research Triangle Park-based Aventis CropScience USA LP might wish EPA had just said, "Not." That's because it holds the registration for StarLink, the bioengineered corn the agency gave a partial nod to in 1998. The company's French parent, Aventis SA, is responsible for a bill that could reach $1 billion for a product that generated less than $1 million in revenues.

StarLink corn is genetically altered to carry a protein that kills corn borers. That's why EPA, which has jurisdiction over pesticides, weighed in. Problem is, the same protein that kills corn borers might trigger allergies in people.

StarLink's creator, Iowa-based Plant Genetic Systems Inc., wanted to get it on the market anyway. Roughly 80% of the nation's corn crop goes to nonfood uses. EPA said OK but imposed a long list of restrictions. Farmers would have to sign contracts to grow it only for feed and industrial use and maintain a 660-foot buffer to keep it from mixing with other corn. If the precautions didn't work, Plant Genetic, then part of German drug giant Hoechst AG, would take the blame.

Responsibility shifted after Hoechst merged with French drug maker Rhone-Poulenc SA in 1999 to form Aventis SA...