Biotech industry slams EU Council GMO ruling

1.Biotech industry slams EU Council GMO ruling
2.EuropaBio - a GM Watch profile
3.How each country voted

"EuropaBio has slammed the EU Agricultural Council's decision to uphold a Greek ban on genetically modified (GM) corn, claiming that the judgement flies in the face of EFSA advice on biotech crops." (item 1)

EFSA is the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and its opinions are required by law if any country objects to a company's application to authorize a new GMO product on EU territory. The agency, set up in 2002, conducts its assessments based on data given by the biotech companies that make the GMOs.

This means, as Italy's EU delegation has complained, that EFSA does not conduct any scientific tests to ascertain whether new GM products are safe to use, ie its judgements are wholly dependent on the data supplied by applicants like Monsanto.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5307

In the case of the Monsanto maize MON863, which failed to win EU Agricultural Council approval yesterday, Monsanto's own feeding study on rats showed the maize caused significant changes in factors such as levels of white blood cells, kidney weights and kidney structure when fed to rats.

Such studies are normally not available for wider scientific scrutiny. Monsanto only published the MON863 study after being oredered to by a German court. When independent scientists examined the Monsanto study's methodolgy they pronounced it highly suspect and its findings worthy of more thorough investigation. However, as usual, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) pronounced itself entirely satisfied with the Monsanto study.

As our second item below points out, a leaked report by the PR firm Burston Marsteller produced for EuropaBio - the biotech industry's Brussles based lobby group - warned, "All the research evidence confirms that the perception of the profit motive fatally undermines industry's credibility on these questions". (Communications Programmes for EuropaBio, Burston Marsteller, January 1997). The report encouraged EuropaBio to try and influence politicians and regulators in order that they in turn could win public trust regarding the safety of GMOs.

This is the lobbying strategy Europabio has pursued in its efforts to try and push GMOs into Europe, and that perhaps makes the frustration expressed below by the lobby group at the failure of many countries to kow tow to EFSA advice the more understandable.

As well as the European Food Safety Authority's dependence on the biotech industry for the data it can consider, EFSA's composition and decision making processes have also proven highly controversial.

For why there is such a lack of confidence in the EFSA, see:

*Throwing caution to the wind, a detailed critique of the EFSA and its work on GM foods. The report can be downloaded here: http://www.foeeurope.org/GMOs/publications/EFSAreport.pdf

*A report into the failings of the EFSA's scientific work on genetically modified foods can be downloaded at: http://eu.greenpeace.org/downloads/gmo/Bt11reportOct05.pdf

The European Public Health Alliance, the European Environmental Bureau, Eurocoop, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth have all demanded that EFSA:

* Fulfil its legal obligations to take into regard the long term safety of foods as well as the scientific uncertainties

* Review its scientific panels to make them impartial and independent from industry

* Improve its transparency and implement its own Code of good administration behaviour

Their demands can be downloaded from here: http://www.foeeurope.org/publications/2005/EFSA_stakeholders_challenge.pdf

For more on EuropaBio see item 2.
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1.Biotech industry slams EU Council GMO ruling
By Anthony Fletcher
Food Production Daily, 26 October 2005
http://www.foodproductiondaily.com/news/ng.asp?n=63460-monsanto-gmo-eu

EuropaBio has slammed the EU Agricultural Council's decision to uphold a Greek ban on genetically modified (GM) corn, claiming that the judgement flies in the face of EFSA advice on biotech crops.

The organisation, which represents Europe's bioindustry, called the council's inability to reject the Greek Government's temporary ban on Monsanto's MON 810 corn as "disappointing".

"Neither the Greek Government nor any of the authorities have provided any validated scientific evidence to support either a ban or withholding approval to use these products in food," said Simon Barber, director of the plant biotechnology unit at EuropaBio.

"Consequently it is disappointing to see the council's lack of support for the law especially as it is was council that put in place the GM rules in the first place."

The council also failed to reach agreement on decisions to approve foods and food ingredients produced from Monsanto's herbicide-resistant maize GM maize GA 21 and MON 863, a transgenic corn used for food engineered by Monsanto to resist the corn rootworm insect, despite claims that positive safety assessments had been received from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).

It is clear that Member States still need to be convinced that introducing genetically modified ingredients into food production is acceptable. From 1998 to 2004 the EU imposed a ban on approving any new GM crops.

Tough new rules on GM ingredient food labelling imposed last year have since cleared a way to end the ban, with a couple of new approvals already passed into the Official Journal.

But as this latest council decision shows, the EU remains significantly divided on this issue. The Commission has, to date, asked EU members over ten times to vote on authorising a GMO food or feed product. But in the large majority of cases, there was no agreement or simple deadlock.

EuropaBio, the European Association for Bioindustries which has 50 direct global members and 25 national biotechnology associations representing 1,500 enterprises, will continue to lobby for GM approval.

The organisation has had some victories. Earlier this month for example, the Upper Austria Region failed to win its case at the EU Court of First Instance on the region's draft law to ban planting GMOs.

And it is also worth noting that under an obscure facet of the law known as the 'comitology procedure', Brussels can actually push through Mon 863 and GA21 through to law because the council has failed to reach a majority decision.
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2.EuropaBio - European Association for Bioindustries

EuropaBio, the European Association for Bioindustries, is 'the voice of the European biotech industry'. It is made up of some 600 companies, ranging from the largest biotechnology companies in Europe (including the European offices of US companies like Monsanto) to national biotech federations representing small and medium-sized enterprises.

Members include all of the major European multinationals with significant biotechnology interests, such as Bayer, Novartis, Monsanto Europe, Nestlé, Novo Nordisk, RhÃ´ne-Poulenc, and Unilever.

EuropaBio is based in Brussals. The director of EuropaBio's Plant Biotechnology Unit (PBU) is Simon Barber. EuropaBio's Public Affairs manager is Bernd Halling.

A leaked 1997 report on communication methods produced for EuropaBio by the PR firm Burston Marsteller warned, 'All the research evidence confirms that the perception of the profit motive fatally undermines industry’s credibility on these questions'. (Communications Programmes for EuropaBio, Burston Marsteller, January 1997). The report encouraged EuropaBio to influence politicians and regulators in order that they in turn could win public trust regarding the safety of GM crops.

The primary focus of EuropaBio's lobbying is the European Union, where it seeks to shape legislation in a way that suits its members' interests. To this end it provides 'a steady flow of information about biotechnology to the European Parliament, the European Commission and the Council of Ministers.' Through its member associations,

EuropaBio also 'fosters a standing dialogue with policy makers and stakeholders at a national level'.

But while its focus is on Europe, EuropaBio has sought to use the Third World both as a means of promoting GM crops and as a means of undermining opposition. In January 2003, Bernd Halling on behalf of EuropaBio brought ten 'representatives' from developing countries to deliver their favorable perspective on biotech to the EU. The 'team' included Luke Mumba from Zambia, TJ Buthelezi from South Africa, S Reddy from the Federation of Farmers Association in India, Joceleyn Webster - executive director of AfricaBio and Margaret Karembu of the ISAAA. Among the various activities in Brussels a few members of the team were selected by EuropaBio to lobby select Members of the European Parliament. The team also visited Rome to lobby the FAO and attend a seminar arranged by the US embassy to the Holy See. While the main focus was on Brussels and Rome, 3 of the team fitted in a trip to London to give a press conference for the UK lobby group Cropgen on the 'need for biotechnology for their continent.' (See the Summary Report on the trip)

One of the main focuses of the press conference in London was the food aid crisis in Zambia, and the magazine New Scientist subsequently ran an article which was strongly critical in tone of the British Medical Association, on the basis of claims made at the press conference by the Zambian, Luke Mumba, that the BMA's caution over GM had had a big influence on the Zambian government's rejection of GM contaminated food aid.

EuropaBio's Bernd Halling has spelt out the industry's view on why the food aid issue is one that could be used to undermine its critics. According to Halling, the critics have 'built up this GMO issue to the point that it is illogical. [The famine in Africa] is the first issue that has the ability to destroy their credibility. In this case they overdid it. I want to know if they are going to accept responsibility for the people that will die as a result of the refusal of GM aid.'

Dr Chuck Benbrook - a leading US agronomist and former Executive Director of the Board on Agriculture for the US National Academy of Sciences - has pointed out that, in fact, '..there is no shortage of non-GMO foods which could be offered to Zambia by public and private donors To a large extent, this "crisis" has been manufactured (might I say, "engineered") by those looking for a new source of traction in the evolving global debate over agricultural biotechnology. To use the needs of Zambians to score "political points" on behalf of biotechnology strikes many as unethical and indeed shameless.'

Interestingly, in the light of Halling's view that the southern African food aid crisis provided a critical issue that could 'destroy' the credibility of the industry's critics, misleading e-mails were sent around this time to a leading environmental group which purported to be enquiries about their opinions on the food aid crisis from a private citizen, whereas the IP address from which they had been sent showed they originated with Monsanto Belgium (see Bernard Marantelli).
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2.EuropaBio - European Association for Bioindustries - GM Watch profile
http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=197

EuropaBio, the European Association for Bioindustries, is 'the voice of the European biotech industry'. It is made up of some 600 companies, ranging from the largest biotechnology companies in Europe (including the European offices of US companies like Monsanto) to national biotech federations representing small and medium-sized enterprises.

Members include all of the major European multinationals with significant biotechnology interests, such as Bayer, Novartis, Monsanto Europe, Nestle, Novo Nordisk, Rhone-Poulenc, and Unilever.

EuropaBio is based in Brussals. The director of EuropaBio's Plant Biotechnology Unit (PBU) is Simon Barber. EuropaBio's Public Affairs manager is Bernd Halling.

But while its focus is on Europe, EuropaBio has sought to use the Third World both as a means of promoting GM crops and as a means of undermining opposition. In January 2003, Bernd Halling on behalf of EuropaBio brought ten 'representatives' from developing countries to deliver their favorable perspective on biotech to the EU. The 'team' included Luke Mumba from Zambia, TJ Buthelezi from South Africa, S Reddy from the Federation of Farmers Association in India, Joceleyn Webster - executive director of AfricaBio and Margaret Karembu of the ISAAA. Among the varuious activities in Brussels a few members of the team were selected by EuropaBio to lobby select Members of the European Parliament. The team also visited Rome to lobby the FAO and attend a seminar arranged by the US embassy to the Holy See. While the main focus was on Brussels and Rome, 3 of the team fitted in a trip to London to give a press conference for the UK lobby group Cropgen on the 'need for biotechnology for their continent.' (See the Summary Report on the trip)

3.How each country voted

(thanks to Clare Oxborrow of FoE for these)

Here's how each country voted: Agriculture Council 24-25th October

MON863
Abstentions: Poland, Hungary, Spain
Against: Malta, Slovakia, Luxemburg, Latvia, Austria, Greece, Lithuania, Cyprus, Denmark, Slovenia, Portugal
For: 11 remaining countries (including the UK)

GA21
Abstentions: Hungary, Spain, (Slovenia?), Germany
For: Estonia, Netherlands, Ireland, Belgium, Sweden, Czech Republic, Finland, UK.
Against: 13 countries

See the Council press release:
http://ue.eu.int/ueDocs/cms_Data/docs/pressData/en/agricult/86734.pdf