The Coordinamento Italia libera da OGM – C.I.L.O. – composed of farmers’, environmental and civil society associations – announces the closing, on 20.11.22, of the #ItaliaLiberadaOGM campaign to promote the European #IchooseGmofree petition against the deregulation of new GMOs.
No to deregulation of new GMOs
In just over six months, more than 400,000 signatures have been collected, a clear sign of the common will of Italian and European citizens to maintain the current regulation under European Directive 2001/18 and total transparency on the label for new GMOs as well.
Until November 19, you can sign the petition online at the following web pages:
- https://aiab.it/ogm-petizione-europea-contro-la-deregulation/,
- https://www.assorurale.it/2022/09/16/firma-la-petizione-europea-per-dire-no-ai-nuovi-ogm/,
- https://www.croceviaterra.it/petizione-no-ogm/,
- https://www.slowfood.it/slow-food-europe/cosa-fa-slow-food/organismi-geneticamente-modificati-ogm/petizione-nuovi-ogm/.
Why a European petition
The initiative grew out of a broad European coalition and in Italy involves the Coordinamento Italia Libera da OGM, which in recent years has repeatedly denounced and stopped attempts to deregulate the legal process for growing new GMOs at the expense of the precautionary principle and the rights of consumers and producers.
This pressure for liberalization comes from agribusiness and seed company organizations in an attempt to force European rules to circumvent legal requirements governing the release of new GMOs into the field, their traceability along supply chains, and their labeling.
GMO-free Italy
Italy, for more than 20 years, has made the choice to remain a GMO-free country, and this is one of the hallmarks of Made in Italy agribusiness. This decision, thanks in part to increasingly stringent legislation, is a key to the commercial strength and quality assurance of our food on the market.
Instead, deregulation of new GMOs would put the entire industry at risk with irreversible consequences. Therefore, the organizations’ demand is that testing remain in accredited laboratories and release remain subject to the current conditions of the 2001 EU Directive, which requires accurate risk assessment, tracking and labeling of genetically modified organisms.
New GMOs are still GMOs
That the new genome editing biotechnologies that have become established in the past decade also produce GMOs for all intents and purposes is enshrined in a July 25, 2018, ruling by the European Court of Justice. This ruling today risks being challenged and circumvented by rewriting the rules governing the industry and exempting new biotechnology from the perimeter of European law.
This would increase the risks of irreversible contamination of conventional and organic crops by new GMOs, which would undermine all the benefits of having pursued a policy that has kept our country GMO-free.
False promises
The promise of advocates of new biotechnology is that the new GMOs will allow for greater resilience of crops to climate change and enable a reduction in the use of chemicals in agriculture.
The organizations of the GMO-Free Italy Coordination, on the other hand, argue that genomeediting is not the answer to the climate crisis nor to the crisis concerning access not everywhere guaranteed to a complete and healthy diet. These are issues placed in a framework of inadequate food systems, widely recognized by the scientific community and international agencies, whose solution does not contemplate technological shortcuts but a change of approach to sustainability of global food systems, from production to distribution and consumption.
Only agroecology saves biodiversity
In the current system of rules, the placing of engineered products on the market, in addition to causing as yet largely unknown and unexplored ecological and food safety impacts, is bound to contribute to an extension of intellectual property rights over plant varieties still accessible to farmers, further accentuating the imbalances already present in agrifood systems.
Only organic farming, agroecology, and responsible choices by producers and consumers will ensure the protection of biodiversity, the effective reduction of pesticides and herbicides, and the production of healthy food in a healthy environment.
The appeal to the government
‘With this petition, we therefore call on our government, the Prime Minister and the Ministers of Agriculture, Food Sovereignty and Forestry, and Health to oppose the attempt to dismantle legislation based on the precautionary principle in order to favor agribusiness giants.
Italy must remain a GMO-free country, and consumers must have real freedom of choice and transparent information and labeling. Let’s avoid that for the gain of a few we put at risk the economic and ecological future of agriculture,’ the associations declare.
