Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Minutes of Evidence


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 160-179)

24 MAY 2004

MR ELLIOT MORLEY, MP AND DR LINDA SMITH

  Q160 Joan Ruddock: It is not below 0.1%, is it?

  Mr Morley: You can detect there is 0.1.

  Q161 Joan Ruddock: I know you can.

  Mr Morley: But it is whether it is really practical.

  Q162 Joan Ruddock: Where between 0.1 and 0.9?

  Mr Morley: That is right. You have to examine what is feasible, I think.

  Q163 Joan Ruddock: But where is that?

  Mr Morley: That will be part of the consultation in terms of we will obviously receive different representations, I am quite sure. All I can say to you, and I know it is not a great answer, is I would like to see that set at the lowest practical level.

  Q164 Joan Ruddock: Have any other Member States expressed a view on this?

  Mr Morley: Austria have approached it on the basis that they would like to take the GM-free route and they would like to make it statutory GM-free areas, but it has been made clear by the Commission that that is not acceptable and will not be allowed. All the other figures for organic have been 0.9. Denmark, France and Germany have said 0.9.

  Q165 Joan Ruddock: If it were to be placed lower than 0.9, who do you think should then be responsible for seeing that the lower standard is met? Is it the organic farmer?

  Mr Morley: If you had a lower threshold there would be some responsibilities on the organic farmer, but also you would have to gear your thresholds in relation to the GM farmer to deliver 0.5. At the moment we are gearing to 0.9. We may have a lower figure for the organic sector but we would have to do that on a voluntary basis in relation to the thresholds that we would set. The difference would be that it would be enforceable if it was an EU standard.

  Chairman: We will come back to GM-free zones in a minute because we did take some time with Professor Grant. If we could now move on with Patrick to look at the separation distances and some of the implications of whether these distances are going to be easy to determine and introduce. Patrick?

  Q166 Patrick Hall: Could I look at what I think has happened but also looking at the Department's evidence to this Committee[7]I may have got some of this wrong, so can I clarify this first. The SCIMAC guidelines came out before the NIAB work. That is correct, is it not?

  Mr Morley: And before the FSEs, yes.

  Q167 Patrick Hall: So the SCIMAC guidelines predate the year 2000 and that was looking at the separation distances required to achieve a one% labelling threshold. Defra asked NIAB to carry out some work on some different threshold levels and what separation distances would need to be attached to those levels. I think just recently—it says in your evidence—that body has been asked to review the work that was done a few years ago in the light of the farm-scale evaluations.

  Mr Morley: That is right.

  Q168 Patrick Hall: When is that current review likely to be available?

  Mr Morley: I think the work on maize has been produced. The work on oilseeds is due this summer, is it, Linda?

  Dr Smith: Yes.

  Mr Morley: We would expect that work to be reviewed, possibly by ACRE in terms of a peer review.

  Q169 Patrick Hall: Is it the NIAB guidelines that are likely to be those the Government proposes to adopt rather than the SCIMAC one which is older and also not based on 0.9?

  Mr Morley: It is true that SCIMAC produced separation distances. Those separation distances were based really on established agronomy in relation to different strains of the same plant, for example. They were using figures like that for separation. The work that has been done by the National Institute of Agricultural Botany is more up-to-date in the sense it is actually doing some gene flow studies from the field-scale evaluations. It is very useful data. When we have all that data together, when we have an opportunity for giving it a thorough scientific review, it will form the basis of the separation distances that we will put forward as a recommendation in the consultation. That will be open for consultation and it will be open for comment and discussion.

  Q170 Patrick Hall: With the aim of that being the statutory basis of how we achieve the EU threshold?

  Mr Morley: That is right. The aim will be to deliver the minimum of that 0.9, that will be the aim of it. That will be the scientific basis of the judgment.

  Q171 Patrick Hall: How and who will monitor and enforce practice on the ground vis a vis those separation distances?

  Mr Morley: There are a number of ways that this can be approached and, again, we will consult on this because there are different options. It could be that we would have a role for our GM Inspectorate, for example. It could be done in relation to standards applied of Crop Assurance. It could be done in relation to contractual standards applied to GM farmers in terms of the contract for the growing of the actual crop. It could be done in whole-farm assessments which are coming as part of the changes within agriculture. There are a number of options by which we can do that. Do you want to answer that, Linda?

  Dr Smith: I think that covers the range. May I add something about the SCIMAC code because the SCIMAC code, as you said, was published before the start of the farm-scale evaluations and as a result of the review that NIAB did of separation distances, SCIMAC then amended their code and used figures that were recommended in NIAB.

  Q172 Patrick Hall: That was part of the FSEs, was it?

  Dr Smith: For the farm-scale evaluations, yes. As the Minister has said, there are several ways of ensuring compliance with the code. SCIMAC themselves put forward a system of assurance through the sale of the seeds which was the basis of their code, which would be one of the things that could be looked at as part of the consultation. There were sanctions through the contract in selling seeds, that the farmer had to comply with the code and if he did not apply with the code then sanctions could be applied. That is one of the options but there are others.

  Mr Morley: That was a voluntary code that people voluntarily entered into. What it meant was that if farmers transgressed the code then the company would no longer sell them the product.

  Q173 Patrick Hall: Can I just anticipate a few years hence when the whole structure of regulation, law and licensing is focused around, and flows from, the 0.9% labelling threshold. You said, Minister, that one could, and you are in favour of I gather, look at lower limits for organic.

  Mr Morley: Yes.

  Q174 Patrick Hall: That was the example. That would have to be negotiated with the EU Commission, would it?

  Mr Morley: No. We could set our own standard in the EU and we could build that into the statutory code.

  Q175 Patrick Hall: Would that not be challengeable?

  Mr Morley: Yes, it would be challengeable because at the moment the standard that we would agree would be a voluntary standard and we could not apply it as a statutory standard because of the current 0.9 threshold.

  Q176 Patrick Hall: So the position of producers who want to achieve a more challenging threshold, such as organic producers, and indeed the supermarkets say they want to be able to sell GM-free, or at least at a lower threshold, that could only be achieved on a voluntary basis but there are bound to be instances where neighbours do not agree and challenge. Before we enter all that, is this not the time to try to avoid it by having some legal flexibility by negotiating with the EU Commission about circumstances under which 0.9% could actually be lowered? Is this not the time to do that?

  Mr Morley: Under the present rules and the present Directive, Member States are free to set a lower threshold for organics. We are taking up that option, it will be part of our consultation. You are right about the enforceability, potentially this looks to be a very difficult area because of what is, what is not a factor. As I mentioned to you, you can legally sell imported organic food using the 0.9% threshold. It does not mean that we cannot explore this. It does not mean that if there is support for this approach that we cannot build this into the guidelines in the way that we structure the co-existence rules to deliver that as an objective in relation to the organic sector. Clearly it would be preferable to remove any doubt or any potential for legal challenge to have the force of EU law. We are prepared to argue for that. I do not know the views of other countries, we would need support for that, but it is something that we are prepared to look at.

  Q177 Chairman: Can I be clear about a couple of points. The AEBC have talked about this idea of an introductory period and in a sense that follows on from what Patrick has been saying, that now is the time to do things. Have you actually taken the AEBC's advice to look at how you would put that in place or is this still something being discussed by Government?

  Mr Morley: We are following the advice that the AEBC has given us and that will influence the shape of the consultation document. We will build their advice into that.

  Q178 Chairman: In terms of the monitoring of this—again Patrick was trying to get this from you—who is going to do this monitoring?

  Mr Morley: There are a number of ways it can be done and what we will have to do as part of the consultation is decide what is the most effective way forward on that.

  Q179 Chairman: You have not got a notion at least of whether it is going to be self-policing or an independent body?

  Mr Morley: I have given you a range of examples of what could be done. You could do that as part of the statutory code.

  Chairman: Let us go on to GM-free zones. I think it is fair to say that this has not got a terribly good press so far from the people we have been cross-examining. If we go over to Bill on GM-free zones.


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