MEPs dilute proposed regime for granting GM crop licences

Date: 28/01/1999

By Renée Cordes

MEPS are seeking to water down proposed new EU rules for reviewing the safety of products containing genetically modified organisms once they are on the market.

The European Commission has called for licences granted to GM crop manufacturers to be reviewed every seven years in the light of the latest scientific evidence to ensure that they do not pose any risk either to public health or the environment.

The proposal is contained in a package of measures drawn up by Environment Commissioner Ritt Bjerregaard to amend a 1990 EU directive, commonly known as 90/220, which sets out rules for approving the deliberate release of GMOs into the environment.

But the European Parliament's environment committee has called for the proposed "time-limited consent" to be abandoned in cases where the authorities are satisfied that there is no cause for concern. In others, it says the authorisation should be reviewed after 12 years rather than seven.

However, MEPs are also seeking to introduce tough new measures to ensure companies are held responsible for the safety of the products they sell, insisting they should bear both civil and criminal liability for GM products which cause damage to human health or the environment.

"What I want is a working proposal that gives the industry a degree of certainty, that guarantees the protection of public health and the protection of the environment," said British Socialist MEP David Bowe, the committee's rapporteur on the issue. "We are getting close to a workable proposal."

The committee's recommendations, which will be voted on by the full Parliament next month, have prompted a mixed response from the biotechnology industry.

Lobby group Europabio agrees that the sector must be regulated, but argues that the Commission's proposal to review product licences every seven years would impose unnecessary and costly burdens on one of Europe's fastest-growing industries.

Spokesman Paul Muys welcomed the environment committee's moves to relax the proposed restrictions. "From our point of view, there seems to be progress. It seems to go in the direction we want," he said, claiming that a seven-year limit would do "incalculable harm" to European agriculture and plant breeding. He also pointed out that the Commission's proposals included provisions for reviewing particular products or procedures if new facts emerge which suggested there might be cause for concern.

But the industry fears that its costs could escalate rapidly if the full Parliament approves the proposed liability clause. It questions why the biotechnology sector should be singled out for special treatment when the Commission is already working on proposals to tackle the general question of environmental liability across the whole of industry.

Environmental campaigners have welcomed the move to make companies liable for any damage they cause.

But they expressed dismay at the committee's decision to support a relaxation of the monitoring rules. "The monitoring without the time limit is useless," said Thomas Schweiger of Greenpeace International's European unit. "There has to be a time limit and very clear mechanisms for withdrawing consent in case of a problem."

Altogether, environment committee members tabled 188 amendments to Bjerregaard's proposal. One of those accepted demanded a certification system for GMOs already on the market to ensure they could be traced in case of any problems. Another called on the Commission and member states to take action if problems arose.

The outcome of the 11 February vote at the Parliament's plenary session in Strasbourg is far from certain, with Bowe's aides saying this week that they were only "relatively hopeful" that the report's recommendations would be approved.

It is also far from clear whether, if the full Parliament endorses the line taken by the environment committee, EU governments would support its approach when they meet in March, given the deep divisions between member states over the issue.