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Agriculture and Environment Biotechnology Commission (AEBC) | |||
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NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WALES
Our ref: SF/CJ/0027/02 Professor Malcolm Grant Chairman Agriculture and Environment Biotechnology Commission Albany House 94-98 Petty France London SW1H 9ST 23 January 2002 Dear Professor GrantOnce again, I would like to take the opportunity to thank you and members of the Commission for "Crops on Trial" report, which helpfully sharpens the focus on actions needed to ensure that future policy on GM crops is soundly based, takes into account public concerns and is accurately communicated. My colleagues in other UK administrations are responding separately to you also welcoming the report, but I wanted to take the opportunity to address your recommendations in the context of the Welsh Assembly Government’s policy on GM crops in Wales. The Assembly Government has a policy to press for a moratorium on all GM crop trials in Wales in line with the Assembly’s desire to operate the most restrictive policy possible within the context of existing EU legislation on future commercial GM crop development within Wales. This position reflects the principled concerns of the National Assembly for Wales as a whole about the impact of GM planting on organic and conventional farming. There is an apparent incompatability between the EU regimes governing GM and organic production, and we want to see this addressed. In the interim, I have taken steps to afford a measure of protection for organic and conventional crops, by issuing a prohibition notice to enforce statutory separation distances between GM and organic and conventional crops on 16 May 2001. The prohibition notice triggered a notification to the European Commission under Article 16 of Directive 90/220 and provided an opportunity to raise these wider policy concerns at European level. The Commission referred the UK notice to the Scientific Committee on Plants for assessment. The Committee opinion, which was published in November last year, while noting that no new scientific evidence had been presented with regard to the risk assessment, acknowledged that the notification had raised management issues which needed to be addressed in a wider forum. I took the opportunity to discuss these issues with representatives of the European Commission last November and was encouraged to learn of the plans they have to address the issue of the coexistence of regimes. In this regard, our concerns over co-existence have also been echoed by the EC Agriculture Commissioner, Frans Fischler, who in addressing the Informal Agriculture Council in September, identified the maintenance of the viability of both conventional and organic farming as one of main challenges posed in the GMO context. In making the Assembly’s stance on the FSEs clear, and in stopping short therefore of the endorsement other UK colleagues offer to the recommendation about the continuation of the trials programme, I nevertheless welcome the Commission’s report and endorse the programme of work agreed to take it forward. It provides an important contribution to public awareness and understanding of these issues. I would value the opportunity to discuss some of these issues further and to hear from you how the AEBC can most effectively inform future policy development on GM crops, and the wider biotechnology sector. I look forward to welcoming you and other members of the Commission to Cardiff in May. Yours sincerely Carwyn Jones AM |
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