EU law breaks deadlock on GM crops

EU politicians on Wednesday signed a new law on growing genetically modified (GM) crops in the European Union, clearing the way for new strains to be approved after years of deadlock.

One of the first crops to get European Commission endorsement is likely to be an insect-resistant maize known as 1507, whose developers DuPont and Dow Chemical have been waiting 14 years for the EU executive to authorise its cultivation in the bloc.

Widely-grown in the Americas and Asia, GM crops in Europe have divided opinion. Britain is in favour of them, while France is among the countries that opposes them.

An earlier attempt to reach a compromise on GM cultivation failed in 2012, when EU ministers were unable to agree.

The new compromise seeks to keep everyone happy by giving member states the right to ban GM crops even after they have been approved by the European Commission.

"All GM maize (corn) is banned for cultivation in France and we will not change this," French Agriculture Minister Stephane Le Foll told reporters when asked what France would do if 1507 were cleared for cultivation.

Under the old rules, member states could provisionally ban or restrict a GM crop within their territory only if they had new evidence it constituted a risk to human health or the environment, or in the case of an emergency.

So far, Monsanto's maize MON810 is the only GM crop grown in Europe, where it has been cultivated in Spain and Portugal for a decade.

The GM industry says the new law, which gives greater scope to restrict GM farming, flouts scientific evidence that it is safe, while environment campaigners say it opens the floodgates to crops they link to a decrease in biodiversity.

Vytenis Andriukaitis, the EU Commissioner for health and food safety, said the law is: "A positive step in aligning the legislation with citizens' expectations while respecting the rights of all parties."

Approval expected

After Wednesday's signing in the European Parliament in Strasbourg, the law will be published in the EU's Official Journal on Friday and enter into force 20 days later.

EU officials speaking on condition of anonymity said they expect the Commission will sometime after that go ahead with approval of 1507 maize, which the previous health Commissioner said last year he was legally obliged to approve.

In addition, some GM crops to be imported for food or animal feed, less controversial than those to be grown in Europe, are expected to get approval and Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has announced a review of the approval process.

Andriukaitis said the review would seek "a way to allow a better expression of democratically elected governments' views on the use of genetically modified organisms".

DuPont Pioneer and Dow AgroSciences said 1507 GM maize met all EU regulatory requirements and should be approved for cultivation without further delay.

Bart Staes, food safety spokesman for the Green party in the European Parliament, said risk assessments had been flawed and the Commission did not have "a carte blanche" to push ahead with a raft of new authorisations.

"As Commission President Juncker himself acknowledged, there is a need for a more fundamental reform of the EU's GMO authorisation process," he said.