Keep GM food out of our fields and off our plates

Big agricultural corporations are using new genetic engineering techniques to force GM food onto our fields and plates without us knowing. They claim these new techniques do not produce genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and should be left out of the EU’s GMO regulations. They want to be able to flood the EU market with the GM food that Europeans have so far refused.

In reality, seeds produced with new GM techniques like CRISPR/Cas are fundamentally different from non-GM seeds. They are potentially unsafe for the environment and our health and have no place in nature-friendly farming. Armed with strong intellectual property rights and patents, multinationals like Bayer/Monsanto and Corteva will only use them to further entrench their control on our food production.

The EU’s highest court has ruled that the EU’s GMO regulations must be applied to organisms engineered with new GM techniques, for the sake of our environment and our health. Under EU regulations, GM organisms must undergo a strict safety evaluation, be labelled as GM, and be traceable throughout the supply chain.

Now the European Commission wants to change the law to exclude some GMOs from the EU’s GMO regulations. Echoing the corporations, it even claims that these new GMOs are needed to make EU food production “more sustainable”.

In reality, this would mean that farmers, food producers, retailers and consumers can no longer reject GM products and opt for GM-free choices, and that GM seed producers would bear no responsibility for any damage caused by their products.

Tell the European Commission it must apply the EU’s GMO regulations to all GMOs, and stop trying to sneak GM food onto our fields and plates untested and unlabelled.

Instead of weakening the EU’s GMO law, the European Commission must fix its weaknesses in the areas of risk assessment and labelling of GM food.

Join us and write your own submission to the Commission’s consultation. We have a draft ready for you.