Potato at heart of new debate on GM crops*

JEREMY SMITH IN BRUSSELS

THE humble potato looks like causing a showdown in the European
Commission over biotech foods and crops.

Since July, the biotech industry has been waiting for the commission to
authorise an application by German chemicals group BASF for a
genetically modified (GM) potato for use in industry, rather than as food.

The application for a potato engineered to yield high levels of starch
has triggered controversy far exceeding the usual consumer wariness over
GM foods.

If, or rather when, it is approved by the commission, it will be the
first GM product passed since 1998 that is designed to be grown in
Europe's fields. It is not intended for human consumption but rather for
use in industries such as paper-making.

BASF, which would like to start commercial cultivation next year, has
made a separate application for the same potato under a different
European legal process; it wants to use its pulp, known commercially as
Amflora, as animal feed.

European Union farm ministers discussed the BASF application in mid-July
but failed to reach agreement. As a result, the decision over the potato
has landed on the EC's plate. And that, unless new data, doubts or
scientific opinions emerge, is almost certain to mean eventual approval.

Officials said the Amflora application would probably be discussed at a
full meeting of the 27-member commission later this month, a debate that
is likely to be heated.

In Amflora's case, there has been little movement on an authorisation
from the responsible department, that headed by the environment
commissioner, Stavros Dimas - who is known to be biotech-wary.

It is not the first time Mr Dimas has been reluctant to move on GM
dossiers, diplomats say. "He is sitting on it, but he can also be forced
to act by the president [of the EC]," one commission official said. "The
regulation says that we have to act in 'a reasonable time' - but what is
'reasonable'?"

The biotech industry, which insists its products are as safe as non-GM
equivalents, has long vented its frustration over what it sees as delays
by the EU. It says it loses time and money in not being allowed access
to European markets.

That frustration has been expressed in legal challenges, which have also
encouraged the EC to re-examine its internal policy on biotech crops and
foods.

The most famous example was when Argentina, Canada and the United States
filed a case at the World Trade Organisation over the EU's de facto
moratorium on new GM authorisations, which ran for some six years and
ended in 2004.

The WTO found that the EU's effective blockade on new GM imports
constituted "undue delay" and violated trade rules.