EU must settle the GM feed issue soon
NEWS that Teagasc is about to embark on a GM potato trial over the coming months highlights, once again, the EU’s nonsensical policy when it comes to the use of imported GM feedstuffs, which could prove so valuable to our hard pressed pig sector at the present time.
The coming months will see the GMO debate hotting up in Brussels. Driving this issue forward will be Europe’s intensive livestock sectors with the pig, poultry and feed compounding sectors here in Northern Ireland playing a major role in this context.
Last autumn I attended a poultry conference in Dublin and was informed that research scientists at the University of Ghent in Belgium are working on a genetically modified vaccine to tackle the problem of Salmonella in broilers. Naturally, my ears immediately pricked up at this. And even more so when I was told that the work has been fully funded by the EU.
Admittedly the scientist giving the paper added that the powers-that-be in Brussels may never give the green light to the vaccine, once all the required trials have been completed. However, this does nothing to dilute the double standards ‘seemingly’ employed by the European Commission when it comes to its handling of the GM issue.
The reality is that Brussels must get its act together now on the issue of GM feed imports into Europe. It’s the height of hypocrisy for the EU to allow in food derived from animals fed GM diets while, at the same time, denying its own farmers access to the same raw materials. The intensive sectors in the UK are losing out to the tune of around £50 million per annum because they cannot access GM by-products such as corn gluten. This is an untenable situation, made worse by the fact that the EU’s current policy on GM makes no sense at all.
I had a bowl of what were probably GM cornflakes this morning. And millions of people throughout the EU probably did the same thing. So why can’t local farmers have access to GM by-products. The issue of growing GM crops on this island is entirely separate argument. In any event we don’t have the climate to grow soya. So why is Brussels so slow to certify the use of new GM crops derivatives?
RICHARD HALLERON
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Weather for Belfast
Monday 20 May 2013
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Temperature: 8 C to 13 C
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