The UK environment secretary is to lobby the EU to relax strict restrictions on growing GM crops for human consumption for fears of being "left behind", it emerged on Wednesday.

In a speech due to be given next week, Owen Paterson is expected to announce the government's intentions to start a new debate within Europe, with a view to opening up the possibility of GM crops being grown in the UK.

Last week the universities and science minister, David Willetts, made similar comments at the Cheltenham science festival, saying GM could make farming more "efficient" and "sustainable" and that the EU should ease restrictions on GM crops to avoid "becoming a "museum of the 20th century".

The UK government's push for the technology comes as a survey conducted by Farmers Weekly reports that UK farmers also appear to be shifting in favour of GM, with 61% now saying that they would grow the crops if it were legal to do so. One-third of those questioned said that they would be more likely to do so now than they were 12 months ago, and half a "lot more" so. One-third of farmers said that they would still not grow GM crops "under any circumstances".

Paterson has already made clear his backing for GM crops. In January he told a farming conference that GM offered "great opportunities" but that the public must be reassured of safety.

As reported in the Independent, government officials want to "start a dialogue within Europe on GM based upon the science", with Paterson said to believe that Britain should take the lead in moving the on debate from the kneejerk reaction against GM.

Commenting on the shifting opinions of farmers on GM, the National Farmers' Union director of policy, Martin Haworth, said: "a new factor which may have influenced farmers more recently is the awareness that climate change will not mean a gradual and generally benign increase in temperature but more frequent extreme weather events for which GM might prove to be one, but not the only, solution."

A 2010 European commission study reported that there is "no scientific evidence associating genetically modified organisms with higher risks for the environment or food and feed safety than conventional plants or organisms".

But the technology continues to be highly controversial with consumers. In a separate YouGov survey published today, only 21% of the public were in favour of GM, while 35% were still opposed.

Peter Melchett, policy director of the Soil Association, the trade body for organic farming, said: "UK scientists have just announced they have achieved a 30% increase in wheat yield without using GM, demonstrating the truth of what opponents of GM have been saying for 20 years, namely that there is more potential in modern non-GM crop breeding technologies than there is in GM crops.

"There is a modern alternative to GM crop breeding. It has already delivered crops with higher yields, pesticide and blight-resistance, drought tolerance, and tolerance to salinity and floods."