Fischler gains upper hand in GMOs debate

Date: 29/05/1997

By Michael Mann

A SURPRISE intervention by Agriculture Commissioner Franz Fischler has torpedoed Jacques Santer's efforts to clarify swiftly EU rules on the labelling of genetically-modified foods.

A draft paper put together by officials in the secretariat-general for the Commission president last week failed to win the support of the 20 Commissioners' senior advisers.

Sources claim that a majority instead expressed support for a paper submitted at the last minute by Fischler, which called for the total segregation of genetically-modified organisms (GMOs) throughout production and processing, and compulsory labelling.

Santer's paper had been intended to set out a coherent EU line on the labelling issue, amid concern that recently adopted rules emanating from the Commission had all taken different approaches.

The 'novel food' regulation on finished food products, steered through by Industry Commissioner Martin Bangemann, requires labelling only where products are not deemed 'equivalent' to conventional ones.

Environment Commissioner Ritt Bjerregaard is pushing for changes which would require the labelling of products released into the environment which 'may contain' GMOs.

Meanwhile, Fischler's plans for much stricter controls on GMOs in animal feed have been held up within the Commission pending agreement on a single strategy.

And at the same time, food companies have been angered by the lack of regulations for semi-processed products derived from GMOs.

One senior official said the secretariat-general's paper “was a Bangemann-style document, not reflecting everyone's views”, which would not have required labelling for processed products or those not containing live GMOs, and proposed the vaguer 'may contain' type of labelling.

This approach only received wholehearted support from Bangemann himself, Trade Commissioner Sir Leon Brittan and Foreign Affairs Commissioner Hans van den Broek.

Fischler's staff claim that he received invaluable support from both Bjerregaard and Consumer Affairs Commissioner Emma Bonino, who was given responsibility for food safety in the wake of the BSE crisis.

Fischler's paper stresses that “labelling should be made compulsory throughout the chain of production”, to ensure that it is always possible to establish where GMOs are present.

Underlining the need for absolute transparency to reassure consumers, it goes much further than any previous proposals in suggesting that labelling be compulsory “even if the genetic modification is no longer detectable in highly processed products obtained from GMOs”.

All this “implies, de facto, a segregation” of GMOs from conventional products, something which has always raised concerns about potential trade disputes with the US.

But Fischler stresses that segregation has already been successfully carried out elsewhere, notably of long-life tomatoes in the US, and believes the EU would be perfectly justified under world trade rules in demanding labelling “to prevent practices which could mislead the consumer”.

Santer still hopes to submit his report by 10 June, but Fischler's intervention seems certain to hold things up.

Given the diversity of views across the Union, final agreement on an EU policy looks a long way off.