Word: gmos
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...supporters of GMOs say these complaints have run thin. They point to the U.S., where more than 90% of all soya is now GM and no adverse effects have been found. "Opponents keep saying that GMOs might do this or could do that," says German Member of the European Parliament Britta Reimers, who is with the centrist, pro-business Free Democratic Party. "But after countless studies over the years, we have not seen a single verifiable piece of evidence that there are any health or environmental dangers in GMOs...
...Still, Europe's demand for soya means it has no choice but to import GMOs, since about 75% to 80% of the global soya crop is from transgenic breeds. The E.U. rules mean imported GM food has to be labeled and separated along the supply chain to safeguard against "contamination" of organic farms. Any produce containing more than 0.9% GM content must be labeled as such, a policy that can lead to shipments being sent back...
...Irritated by such legal entanglements, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso has signaled that he wants the European debate on GMOs to focus firmly on science rather than emotion, and he seems ready to use whatever procedural weapons are at his disposal to break the political deadlock in the approval process. Businesses have also weighed in, saying the E.U.'s reluctance to accept GMOs is costly: denying farmers money-saving technologies means European agriculture loses ground against rivals. And it runs counter to the E.U.'s ambition to foster innovation and technology; despite public hostility, Europe is home...
...Could public opinion now be changing? Recent debate over food security may be having an effect. The U.N. says the world population is set to reach 9 billion by 2050, requiring a 70% rise in global food production to feed the planet. With the added threat of climate change, GMOs like drought-resistant crops could offer hope that global demand will be met. "European public opinion on GMOs was shaken two years ago with the food crisis, when prices spiked wildly and there were riots around the world," says Jo Swinnen, senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Studies...
...This might just be the moment Europe begins warming to GMOs. If so, it could finally lay to rest the Frankenstein-food moniker. Even Greenpeace has stopped using the term...