October 31, 2007

Austria fails to win EU support for GM corn ban

Austria failed Tuesday (October 30) to win enough support among European Union countries to keep in place a ban on genetically modified corn, which should allow the 27-nation bloc to escape World Trade Organization action, an official said.

A qualified majority neither in favour nor against the ban, which the European Commission has asked Austria to lift, emerged at a meeting of EU environment ministers in Luxembourg.

In the absence of a decision by the ministers, it is up to the Commission to decide on the ban against the strain MON 810, which is produced by US biotech group Monsanto Co. (MON).

Vienna has banned the import and use of the strain, which was authorized in the EU in 1998, in human and animal food since 1999.

However, the WTO has ruled the ban is illegal in a September, 2006, decision against a moratorium on EU authorization of GM products between 1999 and 2004.

The EU has until November 21 to lift the ban or else other members of the WTO can take retaliatory action.

Under EU rules, a member state can apply a temporary ban on GM if it presents new scientific information, but the European Food Safety Authority has twice found no evidence that the corn in question can be harmful to humans, animals or the environment.