EU set to ban US maize feed after GM scare

The EU has moved closer to a ban on US maize-based animal feeds after Europe’s governments demanded that imports be certified free of unauthorised GM crops.

EU member states on Tuesday agreed unanimously to proposals requiring that all corn feed shipments from the US are guaranteed not to contain the unauthorised GM maize BT10.

The move is likely to lead to a de-facto ban on EU imports of US maize-based animal feed by the European Commission later this week.

US officials stress that BT10 has not directly entered the human food chain and that the GM product is safe.

“Corn gluten feed is used only for animal feed - not human consumption. US food safety regulators have concluded that BT10 poses no potential health or safety risks,” a US spokesman told EUpolitix.

“We look forward to continuing our dialogue with the EU, and believe that any measures taken should be proportionate and carefully considered.”

A corn gluten feed trade worth €347 million a year could be now be hit after shipments of unauthorised GM crops were exported from the US.

The dispute centres on BT10, a biotech animal feed manufactured by Swiss company Syngenta, sold to the US and exported to the EU without approval.

The European Commission is to ask that each shipment is accompanied with an analytical report – a measure that would halt all imports for weeks.

“Exports of corn gluten feed from the US which are accompanied by this analytical report would be allowed to enter the EU, but without this analytical report they would not be allowed to enter the EU,” an EU source told Reuters.

“We're talking about a measure which would say that exports of corn gluten feed essentially should be certified, should be accompanied by an analytical report by an accredited laboratory certifying that these exports are free of BT10.”

Washington and American officials and scientists are cooperating with Brussels in a bid to defuse the situation.

“Experts from the US government have been working constructively with the commission to resolve issues related to an inadvertent, low-level release of BT10 in the US,” said the US spokesman.

EU health and consumer protection chief Markos Kyprianou has stressed the need for tests that can detect, and thus prevent, unauthorised GM entering Europe.

“Kyprianou continues to emphasise the importance of detection methods,” said a commission spokesman on Tuesday.

Existing detection methods are modelled to test products for authorised GM not unauthorised or experimental crops.

“We have detection methods for GMOs that are authorised. We do not have one for this GMO because it is unauthorised,” said the commission spokesman.

Syngenta is still developing reliable detection methods for BT 10 and workable tests are not expected for another two weeks.

Any possibility of certifying imports would depend on the agribusiness giant providing EU authorities with a BT10 test.

Although just 1000 tons of BT10 affected product was imported into the EU, the row raises questions about the Europe’s ability to manage GM crops.

Brussels is angry over the incident which has damaged the authority of the EU’s controversial, and already discredited, authorisation procedures.

Syngenta insists BT10 poses no threat to human health and is very similar to BT11, another genetically modified corn strain - already approved by the EU.

Friends of the Earth has attacked the company’s secrecy over BT10 and the GM crop’s antibiotic resistance gene.

“The failure of Syngenta to provide the basic information needed to test for their contamination is a disgrace,” said a spokesman.

“The commission must insist that this secrecy ends and Syngenta sets up a fund to pay for testing. The polluter must pay, not the public.”

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