BRUSSELS — The European Parliament voted down a proposal that would have let individual member nations "opt out" of the European Union’s (EU) policy of allowing some biotech food and feed imports.
The opt-out plan was announced in April by the European Commission. The proposal would have given the EU’s 28 member countries the opportunity to disallow genetically modified (GMO) food and feed if those countries could provide justifications for making the request.
The European Parliament voted twice to reject the measure Oct. 28. In the first, 579 of the body’s 751 members voted it down. In the second, 619 voted against it. Earlier in the month, Parliament’s Environment and Food Safety Committee also spurned the proposal.
"The committee’s vote (in early October) sent a very clear signal to the full Parliament that an opt-out policy for importation was just not a feasible way to act like a unified economy," said Nathan Fields, director of biotechnology with the National Corn Growers Assoc. (NCGA). "While it would have been less than easy (for a country) to opt out, unbelievable layers of bureaucracy would have been added there."
It’s unclear what will become of the opt-out proposal, as EU Food Safety Commissioner Vytenis Andriukaitis has said it won’t be withdrawn. "I am not aware of an alternative approach that could properly address the challenge at stake and respect at the same time the EU institutional framework," Andriukaitis said the day of the Parliament vote.
"This would be a lost opportunity to give a concrete answer to a genuine and legitimate concern of the European citizens, which undermines not just the GMO authorization system, but also confidence in the EU itself."
The EU has a separate policy allowing individual countries to ban or limit the cultivation of GMO crops. The plan was adopted in January 2015 and went into effect in the spring.
NCGA officials hope the overwhelming rejection of the opt-out proposal will allow the EU’s focus to return to approving more biotech traits, Fields said. "The problem with this proposal is it was another excuse for importation approvals to be delayed. It had put a pause on them but we hope now that they can continue."
In the spring, the EU approved 10 new biotech traits and renewed seven others. Among the traits approved were those for corn, soybeans, canola, rapeseed and cotton. The approvals were for 10 years. The traits joined 58 already authorized by the EU, the commission said at the time. There are more waiting for approval, Fields said.
When the opt-out proposal was announced, the office of U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman stated the plan would allow EU countries to ignore scientific evidence showing the safety of GMO food and feed. The United States exported a record high $155.1 billion in agricultural products worldwide in 2014, his office said.
The president of the American Soybean Assoc. welcomed the news regarding the opt-out plan, saying the organization is looking forward to further expansion of America’s trade relationship with Europe.
"This is much needed action by the European Parliament," Wade Cowan stated. "One of the unifying principles of the EU is to provide a single market, both within Europe and as a partner in global commerce. Enabling each of its 28 member states to go rogue on GMO acceptance, based on societal or political concerns, is hardly a unifying strategy for success."
The U.S. Grains Council said the commission’s refusal to withdraw the opt-out proposal – despite the overwhelming vote against it – is concerning.
"Market access, timely predictable, science-based regulations and regulatory transparency remain top priorities for U.S. agriculture," said Floyd D. Gaibler, the organization’s director of trade policy and biotechnology. "We are supposed to be negotiating one agreement with a one-market EU for the benefit of producers in both countries, not 28 separate side deals."
