BBC Monitoring International Reports | June 30, 2003
EU Environmental Affairs Commissioner Margot Wallstrom told the Italian newspaper La Stampa that President George Bush's comments on GMOs were "nonsense". She said all the USA wanted to do was sell poor countries the commercial surplus of GMOs and pointed out that Europe should soon finish fine tuning legislation for the labelling and traceability of GMOs, marking the end of the blockade by seven countries. The following is text of Maria Maggiore interview by Italian newspaper La Stampa web site on 26 June entitled "What Bush said about GMOs is just nonsense":
Brussels: Even GMOs (Genetically Modified Organisms) have ended up on the table of the US/EU summit, after the scathing attack by President (George) Bush right on the eve of the meeting with the EU leadership. "Europe wants to starve Africa with a protectionism that discourages the poor countries from producing genetically modified organisms," Bush thundered two days ago, addressing a biotech leaders' meeting in Washington. "I am astonished," commented Romano Prodi at the airport before leaving for Washington, where he was scheduled to meet the US president. "Europe has never asked the African countries to refuse GMOs," and on the contrary "every country should make its choice completely autonomously," Prodi concluded, hoping that at least the eternal dispute over genetically modified organisms would be left this time off the summit's agenda. But no matter, the fuse had already been lit. In Brussels, the counterattack came from Margot Wallstrom, the seasoned Swedish Commissioner for the Environment, who has already found herself against Bush over the Kyoto Protocol on climate. Wallstrom chilled Bush's statements with a frosty "nonsense".
(La Stampa) What is your judgement of Bush's speech at the "Biotech 2003" Conference?
(Wallstrom) It was all nonsense, There is nothing true in what the US president said.
(La Stampa) In what sense?
(Wallstrom) The United States does not want to develop local industry but rather sell the poor countries the commercial surplus of GMOs, which they can no longer sell to us. In practice, they would like to sell the discards from their stocks to the Africans.
(La Stampa) Are you sure of that?
(Wallstrom) The proof is that if they really wanted to help the developing countries produce GMOs locally, they would have contributed to research to invent plants adapted to the African climate. Instead, those seeds have not yet been found, just because of the lack of research on it.
(La Stampa) And what is Europe doing?
(Wallstrom) Our philosophy is to create the premises for developing a local industry, with traditional products, the only way to put in motion a development that is sustainable over time, instead of pouring in money or investments from the US biotech companies.
(La Stampa) But President Bush primarily attacked European protectionism and the "de facto" moratorium imposed by seven countries (including Italy), which since 1998 has prevented new GMOs from entering Europe. And now there is also the suit filed in the WTO against the moratorium.
(Wallstrom) We are only fine-tuning clear legislation for the labelling and traceability of genetically modified organisms. Then, everyone can make their choice. With the agreement reached (yesterday) (25 June) between the European Parliament and the Council, we can now hope that the last stumbling block to passage of the new regulations has been overcome. Next week will be the final vote in the European Parliament, then in the autumn the new rules on labelling GMOs should go into effect. At that point, the blockade against new organisms imposed by the seven countries should fall away, and the United States will be free, like the rest of the world, to conquer the European market.
(La Stampa) But according to them, the tolerance thresholds that you are imposing are too high for US industry, which will be forced to go elsewhere.
(Wallstrom) That is not true. At the end of long negotiations with governments and the European Parliament, we have found an acceptable compromise. An accidental GMO contamination in foods of 0.9 per cent is to be tolerated. Over that ceiling, it will be necessary to indicate the presence of GMOs. And we have accepted a transitional period of three years for reaching zero tolerance of organisms that have not yet passed the tests for entry into the EU. But the problem is a different one.
(La Stampa) What?
(Wallstrom) By these attacks, President Bush is not helping the European consumer to gain confidence regarding GMOs. On the contrary: for the moment, the demand for GMOs here remains extremely low.
Source: La Stampa web site, Turin, in Italian 26 Jun 03BBC Monitoring International Reports:
