The environmental (in)coherance of European food policy

1. The environmental (in)coherance of European food policy Adrian Bebb Friends of the Earth Europe September 2006

2. Who are Friends of the Earth? • federation of autonomous environmental organisations from all over the world • in 73 countries, 31 member groups in Europe • campaign for sustainable and fair societies • Campaign against GMOs and for healthy, environmentally-friendly and uncontaminated food

3. EU policy • Agriculture: • 2003 reform of the CAP: • Rural development • Environmentally friendly farming • Quality production • Market orientation 2008 CAP reform will be a major challenge

4. EU policy • Environment (1): • Biodiversity Action Plan • Sustainable use of pesticides • Organic farming action plan • Water policy etc

5. EU policy • Environment (2): • Polluter pays principle • Precautionnary principle Despite these principles being reaffirmed in the new EU Sustainable Development Strategy, in practise they are often disregarded

6. Challenges for sustainable food and farming • Agribusiness lobby • pro-GMO Commission • EU research funding imbalance • Incoherant policies eg organic versus GMOs

7. Challenges for sustainable food and farming Keeping food GMO-free • Public opinion “the market” remains opposed • Contamination will remove freedom of choice • How will it effect our health or environment?

8. Challenges for sustainable food and farming Public opinion • GM food “should not be encouraged” • morally unacceptable and as a risk for society • in many countries levels of support drop now below 1996 levels eg Greece is only 12% (48% in 1996), Germany 30% (56%), UK 48% (67%) and France 29% (54%).

9. Challenges for sustainable food and farming Contamination • The Achilles heel of GMOs • Uncontrollable,irreversible and increases over time • Two rice incidents in the past month, both stemming from past outdoor test sites

10. Challenges for sustainable food and farming Safety - Commission’s WTO submission • "there simply is no way of ascertaining whether the introduction of GM products has had any other effect on human health...there is no unique, absolute, scientific cut off threshold available to decide whether a GM product is safe or not." • "It is a reasonable and lawful position" that insect-resistant crops (the only GM crops being grown in the EU) should not be planted until all the effects on the soil are known. • a key scientific study that was used to support the environmental safety of a GM crop is "scientifically flawed".

11. Undoing the GMO myths: Industry has failed to deliver • 30 years of research and only 2 types of GMO commercially available • herbicide use in the US has increased • contamination cases are widely reported • Cost to farmers in developing countries increased • “feeding the world” remains a myth

12. Sustainable farming in the EU non agricultural gainful activities of organic and conventional farms in the EU in 2000 (A.M. Haring et al. 2004)

13. The GMO pipeline:what is coming next GMO applications for the EU: • Cultivation • 11 applications • 3 waiting a decision (2 maize, one potato) • Import and processing • 35 applications

14. Keeping your region GMO Free • Strong coexistence rules • National bans (GMOs and seeds) • Regional excemptions/bans

15. Summary and conclusions • Strong regions are needed to counteract agribusiness and the pro-big industry Commission • Quality food production is a key part of rural development and will continue to play a big role in regional economies • GMOs continue to be a big threat to regional quality foods and marketing • Regions need to be lobbying NOW for an involvement in decisions about growing GM crops