Articles

French President François Hollande will face judicial problems over the ban on the cultivation of genetically modified plants, and this has widespread implications for science-based risk assessment in the EU, argue Marcel Kuntz, John Davison and Agnès E. Ricroch. [...] If this new French ban on MON810 cultivation is again overturned by judicial authorities, it remains to be seen whether the Hollande government will also produce its own ”parallel science” to prolong the ban.

The food and fruit industries have to be vigilant against a banned variety of genetically modified papaya coming into the EU from Thailand, say experts. The warning comes after a 'wave' of genetically modified papaya was rejected by European Union Border Controls in June.

The revised GMO expert panel at the European Food Safety Authority still has a majority of experts in favour of using genetically engineered plants in agriculture. Testbiotech estimates that eleven of the twenty panel members have links to industry or are known as proponents of the controversial technology. [...] Patrick Du Jardin, for instance, is associated with the Public Research and Regulation Initiative, which is lobbying to lower standards of risk assessment and labelling, something that was not mentioned in his Declaration of Interest at EFSA.

The European Food Safety Authority EFSA has for the first time given a positive opinion on the cultivation of genetically engineered soy in the EU. [...] The applicant, US company Monsanto, wants to sell its seeds for herbicide tolerant Roundup Ready soy to European farmers. Currently, the genetically engineered soy can be imported but not grown. But as a new legal dossier prepared on behalf of Testbiotech shows, the authorisation as planned would violate existing EU law because residues remaining in the plants from spraying with the herbicide were not taken into account during risk assessment. Furthermore, EFSA does not foresee monitoring possible health effects from these residues although required to do so by EU law.

Last week Hungary’s parliament approved unanimously a new regulation that will restrict the genetically modified crops allowed in Hungary, which are currently authorised by the European Union. The ministry of rural development welcomed the law, which maximises chances of the country remaining GMO-free. The new regulations will place a strict limit on genetically modified crops in Hungary which are currently authorised by the European Union, as well as potential future GMOs, the ministry said. The law will enable farmers, local communities, local councils and regions to practice their autonomous rights more effectively while backing grassroots initiatives to establish GMO-free regions.

“GMO Myths and Truths” [...] presents a large body of peer-reviewed scientific and other authoritative evidence of the hazards to health and the environment posed by genetically engineered crops and organisms. Unusually, the initiative for the report came not from campaigners but from two genetic engineers who believe there are good scientific reasons to be wary of GM foods and crops. One of the report’s authors, Dr Michael Antoniou of King’s College London School of Medicine in the UK, uses genetic engineering for medical applications but warns against its use in developing crops for human food and animal feed.

European ministers, who met on Friday in Brussels to discuss a series of compromise measures on licensing of genetically modified crops in the bloc, have failed to reach an agreement over GM policy going forward. The compromise measures were put forward by current EU presidents Denmark after debates on GM licensing ground to a halt in 2010. Whilst some governments in Europe are pro-GM, many influential agricultural powers, notably France and Italy, are staunchly opposed to the system, citing moral and environmental concerns. [...] In all, 10 member states vetoed the Danish proposals, including Britain, Germany, Spain and France. The states which chose not to support the compromise measures claimed, as had environmental campaigners, that they gave a lack of certainty over legal protection for states seeking to ban GM crops or that they risked upsetting the EU internal market.

Russia needs to clear the way for imports of genetically modified food and feed, particularly from the US to ease Russia’s accession to the World Trade Organisation [...] according to Alexander Baranov, the President of the National Association for Genetic Security [...] since 2007 products containing 0.9% of GMO ingredients must be specially marked. [...] “In the US products containing GMO are considering safe for humans and are not subject to labeling, as well as in Brazil and Argentina. In Japan, they applied the appropriate labeling if they contain 5% or more of the GMO components”- Gennady Ivanov, head of the Department of sanitary supervision of food hygiene under Rospotrebnadzor, pointed out.

Genetically modified rapeseed was found to be spreading along railway tracks and in a port in the cantons of Basel Country and Basel City. Volunteers from Greenpeace collected the samples and sent them to local authorities. Cantonal laboratories have a mandate from the Federal Environment Office to monitor this risk, as growing GMOs outside labs is illegal in Switzerland.

five million Brazilian farmers are now locked in a legal feud with US biotech giant Monsanto, the GM soy seed manufacturer, and are refusing to pay crop royalties. [...] “Monsanto gets paid when it sell the seeds. The law gives producers the right to multiply the seeds they buy and nowhere in the world is there a requirement to pay (again). Producers are in effect paying a private tax on production,” said lawyer Jane Berwanger. In April, a judge in the southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul, Giovanni Conti, ruled in favor of the producers and ordered Monsanto to return royalties paid since 2004 or a minimum of $2 billion.