No GMOs: activists destroy a GM Mon810 maize field in North-East of Italy

On Tuesday, the 24th of June, a hundred of Italian activists destroyed a field of GM maize in Vivaro, in the north east of Italy.

26 / 6 / 2014

On Tuesday, the 24th of June, a hundred of Italian activists destroyed a field of GM maize in Vivaro, in the north east of Italy.


GM crops are becoming a long standing issue in that part of Italy, where, since 2010, Giorgio Fidenato, along with a bunch of other farmers, is attempting to introduce the Monsanto's Mon810 maize.


Although it is an illegal action, as we explain below, the farmers keep on in seeding and cultivating GMOs, while as a matter of fact, they are only fined for few thousands euros and institutions do not take effective actions.


The GM crops are a controversial issue in Europe. By principle, they are permitted after a review process lead by the EU commission that, case by case, should take into account the opinion of all the member countries and the advice of EFSA, the European Food Safety Authority.


In fact, the EU commission is the real and last responsible of the final decision.


The EU relevant legislation is the result of opposed pressures.
Where general principles are stated, they appear to be focused on safety, science debate, freedom of choice, ecological and environmental equilibrium protection, safeguard of non-GM cultivations and products.
However, as a matter of fact, the member state have little or none freedom of choice and is expected to compile the co-existence regulation.
At present, a member state is not formally allowed to simply prohibit GM crops on his territory, on the ground of a pure political choice.
All health and environmental issues are supposed to be treated ad EU level, through the EFSA advice. A government may only raise an “exception” called safeguard clause, that can last at maximum 18 months, after which the alleged new data are reviewed and, were they found unsignificant, dropped.
The States can only raise economical concerns, and have to analytically demonstrate that avoiding GM cultivations in wide or restricted areas is the only effective way to safeguard non-GM crops and/or typical products.


All in all, the legislation is a somehow unclear mixture of directives and recommendation, general statements and legal instruments of limited effectiveness like the co-existence regulation.


At the moment of writing, in Italy a safeguard clause is in force. Moreover, the Region Friuli Venezia Giulia, where Vivaro is, has enforced a ban over the GM crops while waiting for the EU answer to its co-existence regulation that is supposed to be enough strict to subsequently enforce by itself the ban, in fact.
Then nowadays, the GM crops are, strictly speaking, forbidden in Italy.
That has been recently recognized by two court sentences: one by the administrative court of Region Lazio and the other by the State Council which confirmed the pronunciation of the administrative court (while appealed by Fidenato against it).


Fidenato and the other farmers do not take this into account and explicitly speak about “civil disobedience” and “freedom of choice” (they call themselves “libertarian movement”).
The first time they seeded the Monsanto's GM maize was in 2010. It was also the first time that we, the activists from the North-East social centers, reacted destroying the field.


Actually, our concern is not about legality, although we are convinced that GM crops should formally not be allowed anywhere in the world.


Our concerns are about the consequences of GM crops (and intensive industrial agriculture in general) on human health, environmental equilibrium and agricultural system.
We think that GMOs are the extreme unacceptable end of the commodification of food and agriculture.
We and many other wrote a lot in the past about those issues, and about the fact that the only real choice to ensure food safety and sovereignty, along with a reduced impact on climate changes and environmental pollution, is to convert the food production to a local, small-scale system.
Which basically is also the advice of UN experts, it is worth to note.


The advantages of GMOs are all on the Companies side.
As it is well-known, only a bunch of crops are cultivated worldwide and their modified traits are about resistance to chemicals produced by the same companies or about Bt toxin production.
However, they actually do not result in larger yields or less expensive management.
At the opposite they lead, at least, to an enormous increase of the amount of used chemicals and the appearing of super-resistant weeds.


 Moreover, no long-term safety assessments have never been properly made. The EFSA advices are severely undermined at least by two simple facts. The “substantial equivalence” principle, and the fact the there are no independent studies on the raw data given by the companies (up to 2011, often there were not even the raw data because they were protected by intellectual property rights).
In fact, the EU ask the companies to certify and control themselves and their products.


That is why we stepped over the plants in 2010, and in 2014 we did it again,
Because political institutions that should be in charge of destroying GM fields and hamper the seeding are simply frozen.
We also seeded hemp on the fields doomed to GMOs and we occupied the EFSA headquarters in Parma to raise the case that it only works as a gateway for Monsanto & co.


We are facing court cases for those actions, and we will do in the future for the last ones.


However, we state it clear: we will ever and ever oppose to GMOs, with our bodies if it is needed, as many other movements did or do worldwide, because they are an unacceptable violence against human health, environment, agriculture as a common good.


Our Europe is GMOs-free, on the side of food safety and sovereignty and the true freedom of choice of farmers and people.

Ho distrutto un campo ogm e lo rifarei

Organismi Genuinamente Mobilitati