Alan Boyd
Asia TimesJune 23, 2003
The breakdown on Friday of talks between Western Europe and the United States over genetically modified foods has set the stage for a testy legal challenge by Washington that could have deep implications for Asians.
Meeting their US counterparts in Geneva, European Union trade negotiators declined to lift import restrictions, including requirements for safety testing and compulsory labeling. Washington announced shorty afterward that it would continue with a lawsuit that was lodged last month with the World Trade Organization (WTO) disputes committee alleging unfair trade practices. Canada and Argentina are co-signatories. "We'll be moving forward with requesting a panel," said US trade spokesman Richard Mills, adding that the United States would contend that the labeling protocol "denies choices to European consumers".
At the center of the dispute is a potentially enormous industry dominated by US and European agricultural and consumer food giants that has embraced genetically modified organisms (GMOs) because of speedier growing times and apparent quality improvements. About 40 percent of corn (maize) consumed in the US, nearly 50 percent of cotton and 70 percent of soybeans already contain modified genes, and the American Farm Federation has calculated that its members could earn another US$300 billion a year from exports if regulators stepped aside.
However, six of the 15 EU countries are still evaluating the potential long-term health and environmental effects of releasing so-called transgenic organisms into the food chain, prompting a five-year moratorium on the issue that will expire this year. According to the European Commission, the EU's lawmaking body, GMOs are defined as any "organism in which the genetic material has been altered in a way that does not occur naturally by mating and/or natural recombination".
A WTO ruling favoring the United States would have particular repercussions for Asia, which has loosely adopted the European guidelines and is likely to become the main target of GMO exporters once the legal position becomes clearer. The US accounts for at least 20 percent of Asia's $1 trillion food market each year, and the administration of President George W Bush has openly used its diplomatic clout to influence GMO rulings.
China, Japan, South Korea, India, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the Philippines have all introduced regulations that appear to be designed to stall US actions while many quietly pursue their own GMO research programs. China introduced the world's first commercial GMO crop in the early 1990s with a release of altered tobacco genes, and has since allowed studies on 100 edible plants including potatoes, tomatoes and papaya. India has undertaken extensive research, and there are more limited operations in the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand. Yet none of these countries has permitted commercial cultivation, and the crop trials have been accompanied by stiff import controls. This has convinced US and European producers that the issue in both Asia and Western Europe is predominantly one of protecting domestic commercial interests. "Countries shouldn't be able to erect barriers for non-scientific reasons. That's a very important principle in international trade," US Farm Federation spokesman Don Lipton said after the Geneva talks.
Nevertheless, Asian consumers are at best undecided on the issue, and in some countries have been openly hostile to what is being portrayed by local media as another case of bullying by the developed world. India, for all of its research efforts, has some of Asia's toughest regulations against the planting of modified crops and GMO product sales, although the use of smuggled seeds is believed to be widespread. In Japan, consumer resistance forced leading brewers Kirin and Sapporo to discontinue the use of GMO grains four years ago, and the government launched a probe into the alleged use of modified corn in snack foods. Fears in Thailand over possible contamination of the biggest global rice export crop led to the introduction of mandatory labeling and a ban on all GMO products other than for use in government-led trials. South Korea has strict labeling rules, while the Philippines allows only controlled commercial research on condition that applicants institute contingency plans against the accidental release of genes. China, the market targeted for the biggest GMO growth over the next two to three decades, uses standard food-safety rules in effect to keep modified products out, but enforcement is erratic.
"Agriculture is an emotive issue in Asia, so it is not surprising to me if everyone if treading water on this subject," said an Asian diplomat. "We don't fully understand the implications yet if we allow in modified foods, and the course of least resistance is to use labeling to sort of slow the tide until the arguments both ways are more clearly defined. I think you will see a clearer line of thinking and action once the WTO panel has weighed up the legal position and taken some of the consumer emotion out of the subject," the diplomat said.
Perhaps mindful of its European difficulties, the US has taken a more direct approach to having import barriers lifted in Asia, albeit with only mixed results. When the issue was raised at a ministerial gathering of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) caucus in Thailand this month, the topic was referred to a panel of scientific advisors, thus ensuring there will be no early decision. But Washington has been able to use its leverage against individual countries, often with an implied threat of trade sanctions or cutbacks in development aid. Sri Lanka suspended a draft package of GMO rules aimed at imported products in 2001 after the US threatened to take action through the WTO. China was served with a similar ultimatum by US soybean exporters, acting with the support of their government, after introducing GMO restrictions last year. They have not been withdrawn, but reportedly are not being strictly enforced. And diplomats said the US threatened unspecified retaliation against the Thai government last year after it banned the commercial importing of 37 GMO food crops on safety grounds.
Only three Asian countries - India, Bhutan and Oman - have signed the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, a United Nations framework that might have offered some protection against US pressure. Adopted in 2000 but only ratified this month, when the required 50 signatures was secured, the protocol reaffirms the sovereign right of countries to reject modified organisms on scientific grounds if there are safety concerns. Among its most contentious provisions is a system of advance warnings on modified gene imports that would require exporting nations to give prior written notification before shipping their products. All leading European nations have signed, but not the United States and Canada, putting both at a regulatory disadvantage with nations that do ratify the protocol, even if the North Americans are successful with their WTO challenge. "The Biosafety Protocol is a most welcome tool for countries that have, or plan to, impose restrictions on GMOs to protect their environment and the rights of consumers and farmers, but who fear US retaliation through the WTO," said Dan Hindsgaul, a leader of Greenpeace's campaign against GMOs. "The entry into force of the Biosafety Protocol indicates that with strong political will, the international community can move forward in the face of such intransigence."
More Information on the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation
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More Information on Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs)
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