GMO-free news from Greece

2011-05-18 | permalink

Greeks mobilise to protect endangered seeds and reject GE crops

The remote valley of Mesohori in northeastern Greece seems an unusual choice for a stand against genetically modified crop conglomerates who are knocking on Europe’s door. Yet thousands of organic farming advocates seeking to bar so-called ”Frankenstein” foods from the continent made the journey here to help raise awareness about dangers to seed diversity.
The event was an annual seed exchange festival organised by the Peliti alternative community, a Mesohori-based non-government organisation working to preserve Greece’s vegetal wealth against an encroaching global economy.

2009-05-29 | permalink

Greece extends ban on US biotech corn seeds

Greece extended its ban on a genetically modified strain of corn seed developed by U.S. biotech giant Monsanto Co. for another two years, the Agriculture Ministry said Wednesday. The ban on importing and cultivating MON810 has also been expanded to include 100 types of the seed - up from 70 last year, the ministry said in a statement.

2008-04-28 | permalink

Griechenland verlängert Verbot des MON 810

Honig Honig, der Pollen des MON810-Maises enthält, ist nicht verkehrsfähig. (Photo: Infodienst)

Griechenland ist eines der Länder, wo der gentechnisch veränderte Mais der Linie MON 810, der in diesen Tag in Deutschland ausgebracht wird, verboten ist. Und das wird auch in den nächsten 2 Jahren so bleiben. Letzte Woche wurde das griechische Verbot verlängert und auf 70 Mais-Sorten ausgeweitet. Der griechische Agrarminister Alexandros Kondos begründete das Verbot mit möglichen gesundheitlichen Risiken sowie mit der Bedrohung für die Imkerei. In Griechenland werden ca. 16% des europäischen Honigs hergestellt.

2008-04-28 | permalink

Greece extends ban on Monsanto Co. biotech maize seeds for another 2 years

Greece on Wednesday renewed its ban on genetically modified maize produced by U.S. biotech giant Monsanto Co., expanding it to include 70 types of seed. [...] ”The new decision ... is based on the same solid scientific and legal basis (as the last one), but includes new scientific data and findings,” Kondos said. ”These data concern a potential threat to human health and to the beekeeping industry.” [...] Greece has some 27,000 beekeepers and accounts for an estimated 16 percent of European Union honey production.

2007-06-27 | permalink

Greece extends ban for MON810 GE maize for two years

Greece on Tuesday extended for two more years a ban on genetically modified maize seed developed by U.S. biotech giant Monsanto. A decision also expanded the sale-and-cultivation ban from 31 to 51 varieties of the MON810 seed type, Deputy Agriculture Minister Alexandros Kondos said.

2007-05-07 | permalink

Greece continues to ban GM corn for planting

Just last week, Deputy Minister of Agriculture Mr. A. Kontos signed a new revision of a January 2006 ministerial decree that prohibits commercialization and usage of GMO hybrid corn seed varieties of the MON 810 series in Greece. This revision raised the number of banned varieties from 31 to 47. The continuing GOG justification for the ban is that these hybrids pose a risk to the environment and to domestic conventional varieties. The research to support these contentions is unknown. Greece has yet to implement any coexistence legislation.

2006-11-08 | permalink

Dispute boils over GM rice

The Hellenic Food Authority (EFET) said yesterday that it has taken all the necessary steps to prevent the sale of illegally imported modified rice in Greece but admitted it has limited power to pull harmful food items off supermarket shelves. The authority’s president was responding to accusations from environmentalists Greenpeace that the food watchdog is failing to do its job after large amounts of the illegal US rice were found being sold by a large supermarket chain.