Nov 26, 2004

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Genetic Engineering Act finally passed

Red-green have the final say

(26 Nov.) The new Genetic Engineering Act has been passed. By achieving the necessary ‘chancellor’s majority’, the red-green ruling coalition in the Bundestag overruled the Bundesrat’s objection. Now the Federal President just needs to sign it. Once the Act has been published in the Federal Law Gazette (Bundesgesetzblatt), it can come into force in the New Year.

The revote in the Bundestag (lower house) was necessary because the majority of the federal states in the Bundesrat (upper house) had raised an objection to the bill. The Bundestag overruled the objection without discussion. 305 members of the ruling coalition voted in favour of the bill drawn up by consumer protection minister Künast – four more than the required chancellor’s majority.

With the decision in the Bundestag, a long and bitterly fought battle is for the time being over. It is primarily the regulations on coexistence between different farming systems with and without genetic engineering that remain contentious.

While Renate Künast is pleased that the Act will protect “GM-free farming from the creeping dominance of GMOs”, the National Farmers’ Union (Bauernverband), plant breeders, major scientific organisations, industry and the Bundestag opposition see the Act as a “genetic engineering prevention act”. The regulations on liability in particular come in for a lot of criticism.

Liability: protection or prevention

According to these regulations, farmers who grow GM crops are jointly and severally liable for “significant damage” to conventional farms as a result of GMO contamination. This liability of farmers who use GMOs applies even in the absence of culpable behaviour. The German National Farmers’ Union regrets that “the Act thoroughly thwarts the Brussels requirement to allow for coexistence.”

Under the newly prescribed conditions, Germany will see at most only isolated cases of GM crop farming. As shown by a recent survey by the National Farmers’ Union, for more than sixty per cent of farmers the ‘incalculable liability risk’ is reason enough not to cultivate GM crops for the moment – even though a large majority of the 900 farmers surveyed regard the cultivation of GM crops to be necessary on competitive grounds. Only a third of farmers see no benefits in green genetic engineering.

The Genetic Engineering Act contains announcements of further legislation – e.g. on good farming practice and on monitoring. Whether and when the ministry of consumer protection will present concrete proposals remains unclear. Since the federal states have to approve these, agreement appears difficult. As along as there are no legally prescribed good practice regulations on e.g. separation distances and on transporting GMO products, producers of GM seed are obliged to list the applicable good farming practice requirements on a package insert.

GM maize: simple coexistence rules

Three days before the Bundestag vote, preliminary findings were presented from the scientific monitoring programme of the field trials with GM maize that were conducted this year in seven federal states. Following the evaluation of six of the 28 trial fields, it appears that the GMO content in conventional maize falls steeply with distance from the Bt maize field. GMO pollen contamination above the threshold of 0.9 per cent can be found up to a distance of around 10 metres. At twenty metres and above, the GMO values were well below the labelling threshold. The experience from the field trials shows that a separation strip of just twenty metres between a GM and a conventional maize field is sufficient to avoid any ‘significant damage’ requiring compensation in the neighbouring field.

The data on the cultivation of GM maize gleaned from the field trials under farming conditions will be evaluated by the spring. Even the ministry of consumer protection has agreed to take the field trial experience into account when drawing up the good farming practice rules.

No end to the debate

There is much to suggest that the Genetic Engineering Act will remain a subject of discussion. The European Commission expressed doubts in the autumn whether parts of the Act were compatible with EU guidelines. Now Saxony-Anhalt intends to lodge a complaint against the Act with the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe. After just two years, Renate Künast’s ministry must present a report on the experience with enforcing the Act. Then there will be a decision about another amendment of the Genetic Engineering Act.