www.checkbiotech.org ; www.czu.cz ; www.raupp.info

Today, the Austrian Presidency will initiate a Council discussion about the
scientific safety assessment of biotech crops as well as the EU decision
making procedure for approving such crops which have received positive
safety assessments from Europe's own independent scientific body, March 9,
2006.

In 2002, all Member States together established the European Food Safety
Authority (EFSA) and agreed that this institution "should be an independent
scientific source of advice, information and risk communication in order to
improve consumer confidence" [1].

Since its formation in 2002, EFSA has met its objective to provide
scientific advice on all matters with a direct or indirect impact on food
and feed safety. EuropaBio believes EFSA must not be distracted from
fulfilling its original objectives by individual Member States that are
diametrically opposed to biotech crops because of what can only logically be
seen as short term political decision making. Furthermore, the same Member
States are undermining an institution which they themselves established,
risking undermining public confidence in a science based safety assessment
and in science itself in their bid to deny access to this technology across
all of Europe.

Less than three years ago, the European Union agreed the most comprehensive
and the strictest approval process for biotech crops in the world, not to
mention probably the most lengthy. This process was agreed by all Member
States, the European Commission and the European Parliament. In particular,
individual Member States, the same as who are undermining EFSA and the role
of independent scientific advice in GMO approvals, have called into question
a process known as 'comitology', but only where this process applies to
biotech crops. Comitology applies to many other areas of EU decision making
that fall within safety and risk management, such as pharmaceuticals, food
and chemicals. To attack this process when only related to the approval of
biotech crops demonstrates that these Member States will try every possible
means to circumvent the rules to block the approval of safe new GMO
products.

Biotech crops are increasingly being grown all over the world, including in
five EU countries (Czech Rep, France, Germany, Portugal & Spain). The
evidence is that European countries and public opinion are increasingly less
negative and more open to biotech crops. Yet a small minority of Member
States are effectively trying to block the growth in acceptance of biotech
crops in Europe and deny European consumers and farmers the choice to use
labelled, safe products. Because these Member States are unable to do this
through the current system, they have resorted to challenging not only EFSA
and its independent scientific assessment but they are also calling into
question a key decision-making process in the European Union. It is
unacceptable that individual Member States opposed to biotech crops for
non-scientific reasons, should be allowed to dictate to the rest.

Key Facts


All Member States in agreement with the European Commission and the European
Parliament established the current regulatory system for the approval and
labelling of GMO products in Europe.


Ten years of growing GM crops and eating GM foods. GM technologies are not
new and GM crops have been grown around the world commercially for 10 years.
They have been consumed for over 10 years with not one single recorded
negative health incident.


On the contrary: improved yields and increased food security have been
attained while cutting the use of spraying, minimising the soil erosion that
conventional weed control methods entail, and reducing carbon emissions
through reduced reliance on fuel-intensive crop maintenance.


In a study by PG Economics [2] published last October farmers using the
technology increased their income by US$27 billion during the period 1996 to
2004 with significant, additional environmental benefits delivered; the
accumulative economic benefits during the nine years to developing countries
($15 billion), exceeded benefits to industrial countries ($12 billion).


In 2005 there was an 11% increase in the global cultivation of GM crops.
Last year, some 8.5 million farmers planted 90 million hectares of biotech
crops in some 21 countries, up from 17 countries in 2004, and the number of
farmers growing these crops increased by 250,000. For comparisons sake,
there were 97 million hectares of arable land in the EU in 2003 - last years
global GM crop acreage of 90 million hectares would "cover" 93% of Europe's
total arable land.[3]


Other continents are adopting GM technologies very rapidly and are therefore
beginning to gain a competitive edge on European agriculture. About 75% (and
increasing) of animal feed in Europe contains GM ingredients, much of which
is imported. The number of labelled products on sale is increasing. The
import of GM soy into Europe is increasing.


"The future competitiveness of Europe's agricultural and food processing
industries will depend on plant genomics, biotechnology and their smart
application.Europe's position is declining as a consequence of the political
inertia caused by the polarised and increasingly heated debate between
opponents and advocates."[4]


References

[1] Regulation (EC) No 178/2002 establishing the European Food Safety
Authority

[2] GM Crops: The Global Economic and Environmental Impact - The First Nine
Years 1996 - 2004. AgBioForum 8 (2&3): 187-196 (2005) (PDF 242 kb)
[www.pgeconomics.co.uk]

[3] Biotech crops continue to soar - ISAAA figures
[www.isaaa.org]

[4] European Commission, "Plants for the future", 2004

[www.europabio.org]

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