Research Centre of the EU Commission: Regional differences in gene technology policy lead to problems in the agriculture market

(14.7.2009) More and more genetically modified plants are entering the market world-wide. In Europe, in contrast, approvals are stagnating. A report by the ‘Joint Research Centre’ of the EU Commission perceives in this lack of coordination a problem for the global agricultural trade.

Due to varying legal requirements, and also because of divergent political evaluations of genetically modified (GM) products, GM plants are not approved world-wide at the same time. This ‘asynchronous approval practice’ leads to growing problems in the agricultural trade world-wide, according to the report from the EU Joint Research Centre (JRC).

Some states, as well as the European Union, legislate that unapproved GM plants fundamentally are not allowed to enter the country as an import, even in the case that their cultivation is approved in their country of origin and that the plants are classified there as safe. Even the smallest traces of such unapproved GM plants result in the agricultural deliveries in question being refused entry at the border. Many times in the past, this EU policy of ‘zero tolerance’ has led to import bans that primarily have affected animal feed.

The JRC report postulates that the problems resulting from asynchronous GMO policy will increase. Currently, approximately thirty different GMO plants (Events) are in commercial use and JRC scientists expect an increase in this number to 120 by the year 2015. Additionally, in some countries hybrids from two different GM plants (‘stacked genes’) are regarded as new GM plants that must be submitted to their own approval procedure. In other countries, such hybrids are tolerated if both original lines have been approved..

If the EU retains its policy of ‘zero tolerance’ for unapproved GM plants, it may become increasingly difficult on the world market to obtain agricultural products that are free from admixtures of any kind of the numerous GM plants that are cultivated in other countries but unapproved in the EU. The JRC report estimates that the price for such products will rise significantly. The EU is dependent on the import of animal feed.

A report by the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) also projects a marked rise globally in the commercial use of genetically modified plants. By 2015, GM varieties are expected to represent as much as 76 per cent of global soy production. In the case of cotton, this figure is expected to be 45 per cent and for maize and rapeseed 20 per cent. The OECD report predicts that for beans, peanuts, barley, potatoes, rice and sunflowers, herbicide-tolerant or insect-resistant GM varieties may be market-ready by 2015. In the case of other domesticated plants such as wheat, apples, rice or tomatoes, the development of new varieties with modified product quality or agronomic traits is seen to be so advanced that a market entry would appear to be possible from 2015.

See also on GMO-Compass:

• Genetically modified plants: the EU regulatory process
• GMO Compass database: plants

Further information:

• Joint Research Centre (JRC), The global pipeline of new GM crops: implications of asynchronous approval for international trade
• OECD, The Bioeconomy to 2030: designing a policy agenda