Majority of new EU states block GMO approval

arcadegame2004

"Majority of new EU states block GMO approval
21.06.2004 - 09:25 CET | By Sharon Spiteri Six of the new EU states - along with six of of the 'old' member states - on Wednesday blocked a European Commission proposal to approve the import of genetically modified oilseed rape from the biotech giant Monsanto.

Cyprus, Estonia, Hungary, Malta, Lithuania and Poland, along with Austria, Denmark, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg and the UK, all voted against the authorisation for import of Monsanto’s GT 73 oil-seed rape, which was modified to resist the company's own chemical herbicide.

Four member states - Germany, Ireland, Spain and Slovenia - abstained from the vote.

"This shows that in the newly enlarged EU there is still no majority of member states willing to authorise GMOs", said Eric Gall of Greenpeace.

"The Commission should withdraw the application rather than pushing it forward to satisfy the US in the WTO case".

The US had threatened to launch a case at the World Trade Organisation in a bid to pressure Europe into reviewing its five-year unofficial ban on GMOs.

However, after the European Commission authorised Swiss company Syngenta to place Bt11 sweet corn on the market last month, US officials had stated that "the approval of a single product does not affect our WTO challenge".

Friends of the Earth Europe, also commenting on yesterday’s vote, said "This is an important result for "New Europe"."

"This vote shows that the US cannot count on the new member states to follow their policies in the area of genetically modified food. Member States have put the safety of European citizens and their environment before the financial interests of biotech giants like Monsanto and their friends in the White House".

Greenpeace said the scientific risk assessment undertaken in the Netherlands which forms the basis for this application does not guarantee the safety of the rape-seed for consumers and the environment.

The European Commission will now have to decide whether to push for a vote by EU Ministers on this matter."

Doesn't this show that the EU, in reality, is not run by "unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats", but rather that there is an effective set of checks and balances within the EU that caters for the sensitivities of nation-states, while allowing them to act together where they wish?

http://www.euobserver.com/?sid=9&aid=16662

Sand

Oh theyre still unelectable bureacrats - just because they made a popular decision doesnt change that. Mind you its not always a bad thing theyre unelectable but thats another debate.

Itll be interesting to see how this pans out. The WTO specificially allows bans on goods for enviromental reasons, but has tended to ignore these valid reasons when it actually comes to the crunch. So long as the EU bans all GMO, rather than specifically american GMO they techincally should be fine, but they will have to put some immense pressure on the the WTO to make sure they come up with the right decision. the approval of some GM foods, noted in the article, will really weaken their case as it will look like protectionism dressed up in enviromentalist clothing.

arcadegame2004

Oh theyre still unelectable bureacrats - just because they made a popular decision doesnt change that. Mind you its not always a bad thing theyre unelectable but thats another debate.

WRONG. This decision was made by the Council of Ministers, containing elected ministers from ELECTED national governments. Or would you rather national governments had no say? Either you want national-governments to have a say or you don't. Which is it?

Sand

I want national governments to have no say. i want the European level polices to be dictated by the a legislature that has a European mandate from the people of Europe. Otherwise, the only say, is as you, the minister ( who was elected as a TD but no as the representive for this deal ) , of an elected government. Perhaps not wholly without mandate, but not much of a check or a balance against the national governments such as say, France, weilding too much power.

DadaKopf

21.06.2004 - 09:25 CET | By Sharon Spiteri

I'm quite impressed that the singer from Texas apparently wrote this article!

sceptre

That'd be Sharleen rather than Sharon:)

I'm sure there's a small part of Scotland where Spiteris are as common as Murphys supposedly are in Cork. Or at least like Ryans in south west Tipperary, apparently they breed like rabbits, though I don't know much about sexual techniques of oryclolagus cuniculus[1] meself.


[1]Yeah, I googled for it. Bite me

DadaKopf

From what I remember reading, the EU can only continue to ban GMO's if it can be proven that they are damaging to the environment and/or human health. It's something to do with something called the 'Sanitary and Phytosanitary Agreement' or something. Ironically, it's the same agreement that African countries are challenging because it places prohibitive conditions on African unprocessed food exports to be hygenic for the European market. As such, they view it as an example of Northern protectionism.

But as regards the WTO dispute, the US called a rain check on pursuing the case following the EU's challenge, and subsequent WTO victory over the Foreign Sales Corporation dispute which effectively granted corporate welfare to major American companies. The EU won - three times - so the US buckled.

This was partly dependent on the US's assumption that testing of the alleged effects of GMO's would not produce results that conclusively prove the danger of GMOs. As anyone will tell you, at best, the dangers are entirely unknown, which makes the EU's decision legally nebulous and subject to challenge by the US via a WTO dispute panel.

At the same time, we mustn't forget the enormous influence transnational corporations have on the EU Commission via fora such as the European Roundtable of Industrialists, UNICE and also the Transatlantic Business Dialogue. The Foreign Sales Corporation case made it clear that the EU Commission can act separately from TNCs when it suits their over-arching political-economic ambitions but, ultimately, decision-making is muddied by the fact that the Commissions ambitions are tied intricately into America's economy since TNC's operate in both countries. Even TNCs have a hard time working out what changes in Europe are in their best interests. Nonetheless (even though it's more difficult), the EU Commission probably wants to limit the expansion of US-patented biotechnology as much as protect the ecology.

The net result is that the Commission's motivations for this decision are at best unclear. On one hand, there's the pressure of the TNCs; on the other there is the political credibility of its members and the whole EU project. Public opinion is generally against GMOs. Then there's the pressure from the scientific community, civil society organizations and the UN (although the UN's study of GMOs was inconclusive and first gave the US impetus to pursue the case). Surely Iraq and US imperial ambitions are underlying motivations, too, as we increasingly learn that trade and biotech issues are becoming the new weapons of choice in the EU's neo-mercantilist policy with the US.

I dunno, we'll see....