Between Brussels and Warsaw, a blitz is being developed to accelerate the deregulation of new GMOs (or NGTs, new genomic techniques). This attempt raises great concern for the risks to health and the environment, as well as for the harmful effects on small and medium farmers.
Below is a summary of the open letter from Greenpeace, Centro Internazionale Crocevia, European Coordination Via Campesina, IFOAM Organics Europe, Nordic Maize Breeding, POLLINIS and 200 associations, including Égalité.
The new bill on old and new GMOs
European countries are discussing a new regulation proposal of far-reaching scope, both on genetically modified organisms first generation, both those obtained from NGTs (New Genomic Techniques), or new GMOs. Which in turn can be covered by patents.
The regulatory design will increase the control of global pesticide and seed monopolists (Big 4) on agriculture, in addition to limiting the freedom of movement of genetic material for breeders and farmers. With a serious threat to peasant agriculture, which represents 94,8% of all farms in the EU.
Deregulation of new GMOs
The proposed regulation excludes new GMOs from current EU GMO legislation. In particular, it excludes most of them from safety controls, allowing their deliberate release into nature and their presence in the food chain without any assessment of the risks that this could pose to nature or human health.
The proposal excludes furthermore that most new GMOs are subjected to monitoring, after their deliberate release into the environment.
Independent scientists and national agencies French, Germany and Austria have also warned about the possible risks of new GMOs, for nature (e.g. modified interactions with pollinators) and for human health (e.g. allergenicity or toxicity).
No information on the label
The proposal will also eliminate freedom of choice for producers and citizens, because most of the new GMOs it will no longer be traceable and labelled in food.
This deregulation of new GMOs will have a significant socioeconomic impact on farmers, ranchers and other actors in the food chain, without even ensuring adequate risk assessment.
What problems for farmers and breeders
Deregulation of new GMOs will cause problems for farmers and ranchers, as explained in the attached document. These problems include:
– biopiracy with the privatization of seeds;
– the increased risk of lawsuits against farmers and ranchers by the patent industry due to patent infringement claims;
– the administrative burden due to legal uncertainty;
– the increase in production costs;
– the risk of losing one’s business;
– the reduction of seed variety (agrobiodiversity), which is instead necessary for farmers to adapt to the effects of climate change, and
– increased vulnerability to pests and diseases.
Seed exchange threatened
The proposal also represents a threat to farmers’ existing rights to save, use, reuse and exchange their own seeds (Farmers’ rights on seeds) and for small and medium breeders, and could also violate the rights of organic farmers and those who do not use GMOs.
The sustainability promises of new genetically modified plants are hypothetical, given that in the last decade very few new GMOs have reached the market. Among the new GMOs that have reached the market, there are already examples of failures of the market.
The false myth of useful GMOs
Promises of benefits for society – such as the adaptation of plants to climate change, with greater resistance to drought – have been the subject of rhetoric and research for many years, but so far without success.
On the other hand, the selection made by farmers in their fields and by small and medium-sized breeders already offers an adaptation to stresses such as drought (which is expected to increase as the climate warms) and solutions adapted to specific local conditions and agricultural systems.
Knowledge-intensive organic breeding programs, for example, offer innovative and successful varieties with more resistant crops, adapted to the specific principles and conditions of organic farming.
The pink pineapples
A product or agricultural production system cannot be declared ‘sustainable’ solely on the basis of a particular plant variety or trait (characteristic of the plant).
And especially, much of the ongoing research on GMOs it is not aimed at achieving sustainability or bringing benefits to society, but is it consumer or industrial oriented (p.3), such as pink pineapples.
Numerous unresolved issues
The undersigned organisations – representing European farmers and small and medium-sized livestock producers, the food sector and civil society – are deeply concerned about the attempts to rush an agreement in the Council and the negotiations between the Council and the Parliament, in light of the potential risks of new GMOs to human health and nature and the numerous unresolved issues on the table:
– safety and traceability,
– information to consumers, but also
– patents, identification and detection methods, seed prices, agrobiodiversity, coexistence.
The proposed compromises by the European Parliament and the Belgian and Polish Council Presidencies on patents they don’t seem in any case suitable to address the related problem (see point 1.1 of the annex).
Requests to European governments
Civil society calls therefore on national governments and European institutions to protect their farmers and breeders, as well as citizens and nature. All new GMOs must be subject to appropriate risk assessment and monitoring, identification and detection methods, as well as traceability and labelling along the food chain. Countries must be able to prohibit or restrict their cultivation on their territory.
You ask thus to stop the deregulation of new GM plants.
Marta Strinati
ATTACHMENT. JOINT STATEMENT ON THE DEREGULATION OF NEW GMOS
Professional journalist since January 1995, he has worked for newspapers (Il Messaggero, Paese Sera, La Stampa) and periodicals (NumeroUno, Il Salvagente). She is the author of journalistic surveys on food, she has published the book "Reading labels to know what we eat".
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