"Late yesterday, European member states agreed unanimously to a proposal demanding that all shipments from the US are certified free of an illegal genetically modified (GM) maize - a de facto ban on the import of US maize-based animal feeds."
Europeans to Toughen Rules on Animal Feed From US
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/13/business/worldbusiness/13syngenta.html
EU Eyes Certification of US GMO Feed
Reuters
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/30339/story.htm
"EU countries have now given the European Commission the green light to introduce strict restrictions on US imports. The Commission must act quickly to protect the public from this unlicensed and untested genetically modified crop." - Adrian Bebb, Friends of the Earth
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EU MOVES TO RESTRICT US MAIZE IMPORTS
FOE calls for industry to pay the costs
FRIENDS OF THE EARTH PRESS RELEASE
For immediate release: WEDNESDAY 13 APRIL 2005
Contact:
Adrian Bebb, Friends of the Earth Europe - mobile 00 49 (0)1609 490 1163
Brussels, 13 April 2005 -The European Commission should immediately halt all imports of maize from the United States, said Friends of the Earth today.
Late yesterday, European member states agreed unanimously to a proposal demanding that all shipments from the US are certified free of an illegal genetically modified (GM) maize - a de facto ban on the import of US maize-based animal feeds. The Commission is likely to make the decision in the coming days. (1)
The agrochemical firm Syngenta admitted three weeks ago that it had sold unlicensed GM seeds to US farmers for four years. Syngenta has since refused to make public the information needed for governments to test food and feed imports for the illegal GM maize.
Whilst Friends of the Earth is backing the EU proposal, it is urging the European Commission to go further and:
* Immediately halt all shipments of imported US maize food and feed products unless they can be certified as not containing the illegal GM maize;
* Insist that Syngenta sets up a compensation fund to pay for the testing of maize products worldwide;
* Urgently review the EU's monitoring system to guarantee public protection from unapproved GM products.
The incident was first made public through an article in Nature on 22 March (2). Between 2001 and 2004 Syngenta sold several hundred tonnes of a GM maize seed, called Bt10, to US farmers, mistaking it for another GM maize, Bt11. Unlike the Bt11 maize, Bt10 has not been approved for human consumption anywhere in the world. It has been estimated that around 1000 tonnes of the illegal GM maize entered the European food chain and was even planted at test sites in Spain and France.
Syngenta claimed that the Bt10 maize was "physically identical" to Bt11, a view initially endorsed by governments and the European Commission. Friends of the Earth disagreed, pointing out that the unapproved GMO also contained a controversial antibiotic resistance gene, which confers resistance to an important group of antibiotics. Syngenta finally admitted that this was indeed the case (3).
Adrian Bebb, GM campaigner for Friends of the Earth said: "EU countries have now given the European Commission the green light to introduce strict restrictions on US imports. The Commission must act quickly to protect the public from this unlicensed and untested genetically modified crop."
"The failure of Syngenta to provide the basic information needed to test for their contamination is a disgrace. The Commission must insist that this
secrecy ends and Syngenta sets up a fund to pay for testing. The polluter must pay, not the public."
"The inability of the biotechnology industry to control its own products makes a complete mockery of the EU's monitoring systems. The European Commission must order an immediate review to ensure that the public is never again exposed to unapproved genetically modified foods."
Contact: Adrian Bebb, + 49 1609 490 1163 (mobile)
(1) Member states met in the Standing Committee on the Food Chain and Animal Health
(2) The original Nature article can be found at:
http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050321/full/nature03570.html
(3) Bt 10 contains the amp gene, which confers resistance to the ampicillin family of antibiotics. In recent guidance, the European Food Safety Authority stated that GMOs containing this gene should not be approved for cultivation and their use restricted to field trials.