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EU regulatory system ''inconsistent with those of other countries,'' says WTO

WASHINGTON, DC – 02/10/06 – The World Trade Organization (WTO) has issued a preliminary decision in favor of the US-led challenge of the European Union (EU) moratorium on approvals of agricultural crops derived from biotechnology, also known as genetically modified (GM) foods.

At the same time, the WTO also ruled that six individual states – France, Germany, Austria, Italy, Luxembourg and Greece – broke the rules by applying their own bans on marketing and importing GMs, according to published reports.

The US – joined by Argentina and Canada in the challenge – had asserted the moratorium violates international trade rules and undermines the development and use of biotechnology.

The three governments had argued the ban was not based on scientific evidence and maintained that biotech crops are as safe to health and the environment as other crops.

All parties will now have a chance to review and comment on the preliminary ruling, which was released earlier this week to the US and EU governments and subsequently leaked to the media.

The WTO is expected to issue a final decision on the approval challenge later this year or in early 2007, a US trade official said in advance of the decision.

The loss of US agricultural sales to Europe because of the ban has amounted to "several hundred millions of dollars" annually, the official said.

The European regulatory system “is inconsistent with those used by other countries to regulate agricultural products that use science to determine a product's safety,” the official said.

Biotechnology is a "safe and beneficial technology that is improving food security and helping to reduce poverty worldwide," US Trade Representative (USTR) Rob Portman said in a statement issued soon after reports of the ruling.

In addition, biotech has proven to produce higher-yielding crops, which help farmers around the world meet challenges of harsh climates, disease and pests, and require less water and pesticides, said the USTR.

Globally, land planted with biotech crops has increased more than 50-fold since their commercialization in the mid-1990s.

More than 404.7 million hectares, or 1 billion acres, now are planted in 21 countries – including five in the EU – around the world, US Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns said in the same statement.

The dispute resolution case has two elements: a challenge of the moratorium of biotech varieties for sale or use within the EU, and a challenge of individual EU countries' bans of products already approved by the EU.

Twenty-five crops are under dispute in the case. Also at issue is the EU moratorium on accepting new varieties of biotech seed.

"For years the United States refrained from bringing a WTO case to give the EU an opportunity to lift the moratorium, as the EU assured us it would. But the EU was not able to overcome political pressures," said the USTR.

Between 1994 and 1997, the EU approved for commercial use several varieties of crops, mostly maize.

In 1997, EU member Austria banned one of those maize varieties and the EU Commission refused to challenge the action. 

Between 1997 and 2000, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, and Luxembourg followed Austria by individually imposing bans on EU-approved crops, bans that went unchallenged by the European Union.

The EU imposed its moratorium on approvals in 1998 and set no deadline for lifting it.

Between 2004 and 2005, the EU Commission began to approve a small number of new biotech crops, but some EU member states still refused to accept those crops.

The Commission proposes and administers legislation and is responsible for the implementation of EU treaties and decisions.

The US brought its challenge to the WTO in 2003. The WTO repeatedly has postponed making a preliminary decision.

By not allowing its approval system to operate, the EU has imposed "undue delays on biotech approvals, resulting in extensive delays and preventing the marketing of many crops grown in the United States," according to the USTR.

Resistance to genetically altered crops among consumers in Europe remains strong, therefore the lifting of the ban might not have a significant effect on the volume of US agricultural exports to the region.

Influenced by the EU's several-year ban, some developing countries that could benefit greatly from biotech crops have been reluctant to grow them, fearing safety alarms raised by anti-biotech groups.

The reluctance runs deep despite findings by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO), both of which have said there are no greater risks associated with biotech-derived products than with conventionally grown and processed foodstuffs.

Those countries also have feared they would not be able to export agricultural products grown from biotech seed to European markets.

Consumers safely have been eating beneficial foods that contain biotech-derived ingredients for a decade, according to the USTR.

Several sources in the agricultural sector have said they expect the EU to appeal the decision and that the unwinding of its current system is more involved than just opening up the pipelines for more GM applications.

The EU’s regulatory mechanism “is more complex than the moratorium and there are also intricate traceability and labeling regulations that complicate the process,” said one.  

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