Canadian flax growers can look forward to the new marketing season with more optimism than they had for much of the previous year.
Canada and the European Union have revised the trading protocol to give greater certainty that flax shipments tested and approved in Canada as free of genetically modified seed will not be rejected when they arrive in Europe just because further testing finds a few GM seeds.
There will also be a new testing protocol for when the oilseed is delivered to elevators. The goal is to minimize the possibility of unwanted GM Triffid content getting into exports bound for Europe.
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The combination of the two testing systems has costs and is cumbersome but should allow trade of flax destined for Europe’s industrial linseed market to resume. It traditionally accounted for 80 percent of Canada’s shipments there.
The food market, which takes about 20 percent of Canada-Europe flax trade, is still out of reach.
Re-entry for flax is an accomplishment, but these extensive measures should never have been required in the first place. The situation highlights the need to continue pressure on the EU to bring its GM approval process in line with international, science-based protocols.
The tempest was set off by Greenpeace testing food products to see if they violated the EU’s zero-tolerance policy on unapproved GM material in imports. The group than tried to create public fear that European governments are not vigilant in monitoring compliance.
However, the problem is not with monitoring. While the zero tolerance policy remains, no matter how unreasonable it is, anyone selling to the EU must comply.
The federal government should do what it can to encourage Europe to change the zero tolerance policy and also to conform to the 2006 World Trade Organization ruling against its “de facto” moratorium on approving new varieties of biotech crops.
Canada and the EU have agreed to begin free trade negotiations and these GM issues must be addressed in the talks because of the potential for them to become a larger problem.
The number of new genetically altered crops in the research pipeline is rapidly increasing. If the EU’s approval process continues to lag behind North American approvals, it will increase the chance of situations such as wheat or forage seed shipments being rejected because of traces of EU-unapproved canola.
To partly address this problem, the European health and consumer affairs directorate is working on a plan that would change the definition of zero from 0.01 percent of an unauthorized GM trait, to something close to 0.1 to 0.3 percent.
That would lessen the risk of cargoes being rejected because of minute traces of unauthorized GM varieties.
But the over arching problem is the EU GM approval process. The tolerance issue would recede in importance if the EU had a timely, science-based plan.
The EU government wants to overhaul its GM crop regulations giving member states control over approving GM crops for cultivation. It would not affect approvals for food imports and feed use so problems are likely to continue.
Canada was a party, along with the United States and Argentina, in the WTO challenge. The ruling made it possible for the three countries to impose sanctions on the EU to force it to change. They chose instead to work out their differences. Five years have passed without much progress.
Last month, the largest farm organization in the United States, the American Farm Bureau Federation, urged the U.S. government to initiate retaliation proceedings against the EU to comply with the WTO ruling.
Canada and its allies should make it clear that their patience is running out, and that they will use sanctions if the EU does not find a solution.
Bruce Dyck, Terry Fries, Barb Glen and D’Arce McMillan collaborate in the writing of Western Producer editorials.
