Supermarkets pressured to join the GM debate

The government is calling on supermarkets to join the discussion on GM as the House of Lords reported on its 12-month inquiry into innovation in EU agriculture last week.

George Freeman MP, chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Science and Technology in Agriculture, told a Westminster forum on Tuesday that he wants to see a “more nuanced conversation about GM” as well as other technologies available.

He insisted that “especially on GM, retailers and all those with an interest should get together and think about how they are going to deal with it”.

Freeman said the coalition’s emphasis on science mirrors a “mood swing in the public at large” that has moved on from a “negative anti-technology kickback”.

British Retail Consortium food policy director Andrew Opie hit back at the claims and insisted that “the government needs to think about how it’s going to take that debate forward” given that GM is a “unique issue” because of the history of the debate and media coverage.

He said: “Supermarkets give consumers what they want and at the moment, consumers don’t see the benefits of GM so therefore there isn’t a demand for GM coming forward.”

But he admitted that extensive consumer research on GM proposed through the FSA but cancelled last year “would have been interesting”.

The House of Lords sub-committee on agriculture, fisheries and environment said it is “unacceptable” that agricultural research funding at EU level is under €2 billion over seven years, while the agricultural policy budget is around €400bn.

The group is calling for a proportion of the EU budget earmarked for the Common Agricultural Policy to be diverted to agricultural research by the EU’s research programme. Alongside this, it is backing proposals for a European Innovation Network to focus on agricultural productivity and sustainability in 2012.

Together, these steps are expected to fight the “innovation-hostile environment” in Brussels described by Georg Häusler, head of cabinet of DG Agriculture at the European Commission in an evidence session for the inquiry.