U.S. soybean shippers press EC to relax low-level biotech traits in feed

The American Soybean Association urged the European Commission this week to find a workable and commercially viable answer to soften the European Union's zero tolerance for the low-level presence of EU-unapproved biotech traits in feed.

ASA said its position is backed by the European livestock and feed industries.

ASA and its European supporters believe a partial practical way to solve this problem is for the EU to allow the low-level presence of a biotech trait that has undergone regulatory review and received safety clearances in the country of export. Another answer to the problem is for the EU to greatly improve the timeliness of its approval system and ensure that its approval process is wholly science-based, ASA said.

According to the St. Louis-based trade association, the EU is the fourth-largest export market for U.S. soybeans, representing sales of more than $1 billion in 2007.

Since 1994, ASA has carried out numerous missions to the EU on biotechnology issues. During the past six months, ASA has held many meetings in the EU on the biotech approvals and zero tolerance issue.

We have made it very clear that ASA views low level tolerances of 0.1 percent as wholly impractical for commodity soybean crop production and imports,?said ASA President John Hoffman in a recent letter to Paola Testori Coggi, deputy director general of the EC's agriculture directorate. Given the complex nature of commodity production and exportation involving millions of metric tons of soybeans grown by hundreds of thousands of growers on millions of acres/hectares, a tolerance of 5 percent should be a minimum starting point.

Source: American Shipper