Bush told to stop threatening other nations' food safety laws14 August 2001
More than 200 consumer, farm and environmental groups worldwide sent a letter protesting against threats by the Bush administration to challenge other countries' food safety laws as barriers to international trade. Groups representing millions of citizens from Australia, Brazil, Germany, India, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, the US and the UK have signed the letter.
Weyland Beeghly, Agricultural Counsellor from the US Embassy in India, said in May that the US was considering challenging a ban in Sri Lanka of genetically engineered organisms by submitting a complaint to the World Trade Organisation (WTO). The ban is scheduled to take effect on 1 September.
Wichai Chokwiwat, Secretary General to the Thai Food and Drug Administration, told Thai newspaper The Nation, that his country was a target of threats to use US trade laws to retaliate against a Thai proposal made in July to require labelling of genetically engineered corn and soya crops.
The campaigning organisations, which include Friends of the Earth International, called the US threats unreasonable, especially since the US allows its own states to establish food safety and environmental laws that are tougher than national laws. A five-year moratorium on engineered fish was passed in the state of Maryland last April. US pesticide laws also allow states to set limits on pesticide use that are more strict than federal law.
"If a US state can have a moratorium on genetically modified foods, why can't other countries do the same?" said Chair of Friends of the Earth International and resident of El Salvador Ricardo Navarro. "The US has no right to tell Sri Lanka or any other country how to write their food safety laws."
Senior Food and Farming campaigner for Friends of the Earth, England, Wales and Northern Ireland Pete Riley, said: "The hypocrisy of the US in trying to dictate to another sovereign state how it should legislate on GMOs, while allowing variations within its own country beggars belief. Bush's administration has once again danced to the tune of the biotech companies in lobbying for WTO action against Sri Lanka. It is time the US Government and the WTO understood that individual countries have laws which reflect their culture and environment. They are not merely satellites of the US."
The letter to the Bush administration argues that Sri Lanka and other nations have a scientific, regulatory and moral basis to set limits on the proliferation of genetically engineered organisms. A copy of the letter to the Bush Administration, and a full list of signatories, can be found at http://www.foei.org/
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