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european environmental bureau, friends
of the earth europe, greenpeace
brussels, 3 march 2003
co-existence of gmos and non gm
agriculture : the eu commission dodges its
responsibility
Today, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth
Europe and the European Environmental Bureau
(EEB) accused the European Commission of
dodging its responsibility, as EU legislative
initiator, on the issue of genetic
contamination in agriculture. The Commission
has been asked by several EU member States
(1) to propose strict and precise rules in
order to ensure the so-called ‘co-existence’
in agriculture. That is, to guarantee the
European farmers’ right to grow conventional
and organic crops, without incurring any
additional costs due to the cultivation of
GMOs (genetically modified organisms).
However, a yet unpublished Communication on
co-existence (2), which the Agriculture
commissioner, Franz Fischler, is going to
present on Wednesday to his colleagues, takes
the view that legislative action at Community
level should be avoided. Instead, the
Commission’s Agriculture services consider «
most suitable » the « approach based on
subsidiarity », where the Community action
would be limited to coodinating and advisory
functions. They also assume that co-existence
measures should be limited to economic
aspects of genetic contamination; therefore
its impact on health and environment is not
taken into account.
Greenpeace, Friends of The Earth Europe
and the EEB insist that only ‘hard’
legislation at EU level can give a positive
solution to the ‘co-existence’ issue, save
the purity of our seeds and ensure the
survival of uncontaminated conventional and
organic farming in Europe. With no hard
legislation in this area, genetic
contamination will soon become a ‘fait
accompli’ in EU agriculture, depriving
European consumers and farmers of the right
to choose. It will also be the end of organic
farming as we know it today. Within the
Commission, there are already plans to
establish a tolerance threshold for GMO
contamination in organic products, an attempt
that even in the USA has failed because of
the opposition of consumer organisations and
organic farmers.
Should GM crops be planted on a commercial
scale in Europe, the measures to avoid
contamination could substantially increase
the final cost of conventional and organic
products. The EU Joint Research Centre has
calculated, for instance, an increase in
costs as high as 41% for oilseed rape seed
production, and 9 % for maize production (3).
EU legislation is necessary to establish the
principle that those extra costs must be
borne by the GMO growers responsible for the
contamination. Instead, Fischler’s
Communication argues that the burden of
co-existence measures "should fall on the
economic operators (farmers, seed suppliers,
etc.) who intend to gain a benefit from the
specific cultivation model they have chosen".
This is unacceptable: according to this view,
conventional or organic farmers, who
certainly have an economic interest in
ensuring that their products remain GM-free,
would have to pay to avoid contamination
instead of the owners of the GM crops.
Since 1996, all new legislation on GMOs
has only been initiated by the Commission
under strong pressure from EU public opinion
and especially from the member States that
decided the current ‘de facto’ moratorium on
new approvals (4). It would be appalling to
see now the EU commissioners playing again
dilatory tactics to avoid fulfilling their
duty. The completion of the EU legislative
framework on GMOs requires clear and coherent
EU legislation on co-existence, to establish
who is responsible for avoiding genetic
contamination in European fields, which
measures should be implemented at this end,
who should implement them and bear their
costs, and who should ultimately be liable
for economic damage and adverse effect on
health and the environment in case
contamination occurred anyway. Strict rules
on labelling and traceability of GM food and
feed will soon become meaningless if genetic
contamination is allowed in the fields.
Greenpace, Friends of the Earth Europe and
the EEB call on the Commission and and EU
member States to propose and adopt clear and
effective legislation to protect the
agricultural assets of Europe, if they don’t
want to be held responsible for the
foreseeable consequences of genetic
contamination : environmental damage to
farmland and biodiversity, economic loss for
conventional and organic farmers, and higher
prices for the overwhelming majority of
consumers that want to keep buying and eating
non-GM food.
Note to the editor :
For further information :
Lorenzo Consoli, Greenpeace, mobile + 32 496
12 21 12
Geert Ritsema, Friends of the Earth Europe,
mobile + 31 62 900 59 08
Mauro Albrizio, EEB, mobile + 32 479 94 02
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1) Italy, France, Germany, Austria,
Luxembourg, Denmark, Belgium, Greece and
Portugal have insisted on this request during
the last EU Agriculture Councils.
2) An advanced draft of the Communication,
dated 25 February 2003, will be made
available for the public on the websites of
the three NGOs today, after midday.
3) EU Joint Research Centre, « Scenarios
for co-existence of genetically modified,
conventional and organic crops in European
agriculture », 2002.
4) France, Greece, Italy, Denmark,
Luxembourg stated their decision durinng the
Environment Council of 25 June 1999, in
Luxembourg. Austria and Belgium joined the
group in 2001.
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