- BRUSSELS, Belgium (Reuters)
-- Local or national governments cannot ban farmers from planting genetically
modified crops, the European Commission said Wednesday, supporting those
farmers who want to embrace the controversial technology.
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- The commission's new guidelines - part of a push to end
the five-year moratorium on GMO crops that is under attack from the United
States - spell out how crops produced from genetically modified organisms
can be grown alongside organic and conventional crops within the European
Union.
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- "It is not possible for regions or national governments
to introduce GMO-free zones," European Farm Commissioner Franz Fischler
told a news conference.
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- But while authorities cannot prohibit farmers from planting
GMO crops, regional groups of farmers were free to get together and decide
against planting GMO crops, he said.
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- Authorities cannot ban farmers from using GMO crops as
such a move would violate EU law giving farmers the freedom to choose.
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- However, Fischler said there could be an opt-out in cases
where it was impossible to limit contamination of non-GM crops due to the
variety of biotech crop being sown and the lay-out of fields.
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- "(In Austria) there is strip farming where fields
are terribly narrow...you can't have (GM) maize on a little strip co-existing
with other crops on the side."
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- The European Environmental Bureau, a non-governmental
lobby group, called on EU governments to create GMO-free zones.
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- "The right to eat GM-free food will be severely
compromised if GM crops are grown on a large scale," EEB head Mauro
Albrizio said in a statement.
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- The provincial government of Upper Austria has banned
genetically modified organisms but the European Food Safety Authority recently
said there was no justification.
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- Farmers in that region may now be able to take action.
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- "In case you are from Upper Austria you can go to
the European Court and say you disapprove of what Upper Austria is doing
and feel your rights have been violated," Fischler said.
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- The Commission will take a final decision on the Austrian
case in September, when EU farm ministers will discuss the Commission's
new guidelines, which are not legally binding.
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- The co-existence debate is seen by many in the biotech
industry as another way for GMO-sceptical countries to postpone lifting
the five-year ban on most GMO crops.
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- Biotechnology lobby Europabio welcomed the guidelines.
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- "They set out the best practices member states should
follow when growing GM crops," said a spokeswoman. "We now want
the Commission to propose the GMO content in seeds."
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- The Commission's move follows the adoption of rules to
label all GMO food and feedmeal, giving consumers the choice between GMO
and non-GMO products on supermarket shelves.
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