On Sunday, December 10, the NGO "For Nature to Remain in Bulgaria" is organizing a protest under the slogan "No (new) GMOs!" in front of the Council of Ministers. The environmental NGO convened an emergency press conference on EC's request to remove GMO regulations for the new generation of GMO plants and Bulgaria's position on this issue at the BTA National Press Club in Sofia on Friday.
Dr. Eng. Svetla Nikolova from the AgroLink Association, representative of the NGO, said that the reason for Friday's press conference is the fact that on December 11, 2023 the Council of Ministers and the Committee on Agriculture of the European Parliament will vote decisively on the proposal of the European Commission (EC) to deregulate GMO plants produced with "new genomic techniques" (NGT), such as gene editing. According to her, the most worrying thing is that the Bulgarian government is planning to support a highly debated and very vague in terms of benefits and results regulation without public consultation. She cites a new poll showing that 90% of people in Bulgaria are against GMOs.
Nikolova said that the difference between a regulation and a directive is that the directive allows for independence because each country can protect its own population and businesses that export food, but with the regulation there will be no such possibility.
She said that Bulgarian farmers would be hit hard by exporting to the Middle East or other countries where no one would want to buy GMOs. There will be neither organic nor conventional farming with GMOs because there will be no traceability and everything will be contaminated, Nikolova noted.
According to Ivelin Zhelyazkov, director of the Plantis Agricultural Research and Technology Centre, the new genomic techniques will not contribute to reducing pesticide use in agriculture. Zhelyazkov expressed his concern about the rush, before it is formulated how the control will be carried out and by whom, because the public should also have control opportunities.
Albena Simeonova, President of the Organic Products Bulgarian Association and the Foundation for Environment and Agriculture, asked: "Since Bulgaria is part of Europe and we so seriously support the Green Deal and the Farm to Table Strategy, how can our organic production be expanded after the adoption of this regulation?" Her answer is that it will not be.
Former Environment and Water Minister Borislav Sandov said that interfering in nature with this type of unnatural process leads to serious problems. The new EU policy is based on natural solutions, but GMO is not one. In his opinion, abstention should dominate Monday's vote and then a debate and public consultation are needed before the government decides Bulgaria's position on this issue.
/DS/
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