“Europe is poised for a fresh battle over genetically modified (GM) crops,” says Andrew Bounds in the FT. The EU Health Commissioner is proposing that the EU allows 0.1% (rather than the current 0%) of imports of staples such as rice and corn to be GM. Although well below food industry demands for 0.9%, the change can be made quickly without the need for time-consuming new EU rules, although it still requires the approval of experts from all 27 member states. The move is a response to the relentless rise in global food prices, which has hit the EU hard. About 77% of its animal feed is imported. The blanket GM ban means farmers pay around 10% more for supplies than rivals, which in turn forces up prices for consumers.
But not everyone agrees with the change. “The EU is falling for the biotech industry’s pro-GM hype,” says Helen Holder of Friends of the Earth. Sir Martin Doughty, chairman of Natural England, warned Gordon Brown not to see GM food as a “quick fix”. The “extremely strong” weedkillers used on GM crops damage wildlife and the “radically different” organisms that can be developed “change our crop, tree and animal husbandry”, doing irretrievable damage to our environment.
Nonsense. Politicians must defy “irrational fears about Frankenfoods”, says William Echikson on Breakingviews. There is “no credible evidence GMOs are dangerous”, they “reduce costs for farmers and consumers”. Monsanto’s GMO corn seed even resists a pest that attacks maize stalks, reducing the use of pesticides and fertiliser. The fact that “the rest of the world has weighed evidence about GMOs and found no problems” must lead to changes to EU policies.
Quite right, says The Independent. Some of humankind’s biggest advances have come through agricultural innovation, “from irrigation in Mesopotamia to Jethro Tull’s seed drill”. GM crops to resist salt and drought “can be part of this noble tradition” by increasing yields, bringing more land under cultivation and saving people from starving. It’s “positively immoral” for any government to reject GM out of hand.