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.