Brussels, 07/05/2013 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday 7 May, European Coordination Via Campesina (ECVC) called on the European Parliament and European Council to substantially amend the proposal on rules on the marketing of seeds “to endorse the right of farmers to produce and exchange their seeds”.
On Monday, the Commission proposed to simplify the rules on the commercialisation of seeds, particularly traditional seeds, in an effort to guarantee the productivity and diversity of plant production in the EU (see EUROPE 10841). Currently, the only seeds that can be put on the market are those listed in the official European catalogue, which contains 30,000 varieties that are allowed to be grown in the EU. This authorisation follows an approval procedure which establishes all their characteristics. This registration process will be a harmonised and speeded up, according to the Commission. From now on, old, traditional varieties and seeds that do not meet variety definitions will be subject to less stringent registration rules. Traditional seeds will now not be subject to trials even though the current registration systems are to be maintained. Seeds used in niche markets, which are often the preserve of micro-enterprises, will no longer be subject to any registration requirements. Micro-enterprises that employ up to ten people and have a turnover below €2 million a year will also be able to commercialise any kind of seed without having to undergo a registration procedure of the varieties they are marketing. These companies will also be exempt from registration fees, which will also be reduced for traditional seeds.
European Coordination Via Campesina criticised “this incredible gift to patents and property rights of the agribusiness industry” which represented “a violent assault on farmers' and gardeners' rights”
Andrea Ferrante from Via Campesina stated that “in this proposal, the European Commission leaves the door wide open to unrestricted commercialisation of patented plants. The latter will obviously spread and pollute all fields, without distinction. The law is made so that it is the farmer who has been polluted which will have to pay a fine to the industry, as if he had stolen the seeds. While it is the latter who should bear the burden of farmers' fields decontamination... This is even more serious, as most of those patented plants are hidden GMOs”.
The list of all producers who re-sow part of their harvest (the “farm-saved seeds”), collected on the pretext of sanitary controls, may be given directly by member states to the industries. They will thus be able to claim royalties from farmers. Via Campesina regrets that, for the first time, absolutely all farmers will be inspected and argues that the right of farmers to exchange their seeds should not be restricted.
“Forcing us to pay registration costs, control fees or unaffordable royalties, is trying to force us to turn to the seed industry, with the dependency that it represents, and their chemicals and phyto-sanitary products. And it will simply become impossible for citizens who want to eat healthily to do so”, said Guy Kastler, from the ECVC.
Assault on farm-saved seeds
According to the proposal, farm-saved seed and those produced by peasant farmers and amateur seed breeders will be regulated. Until now they enjoyed exemptions from the legislation (it applies only to seed put on the market for commercial purposes). Farm-seed producers will have to register on a list that the authorities can send to breeders and can subsequently be pursued if they do not provide proof that counterfeiting has not been involved, explained Via Campesina. According to the latter, they will have to pay the costs of health and biosafety inspections (they will only be exempt from registration costs), which will encourage them to abandon their traditional activities and turn towards commercial seed varieties. They will be obliged to register all their seed exchanges and ensure that their registers are available to the authorities and they will be subject to inspections ensuring the legality of these exchanges. Farm-seed producers will be able to exchange seed within the framework of organisations responsible for the conservation of genetic resources as certified by the authorities or market them in the very restricted context of “niche varieties” on the basis that the Commission publishes the appropriate delegated acts, “which could take many more years”
Seed artisans will enjoy a number of new benefits: conservation varieties. Although quantitative and geographic commercialisation limits will disappear (which farmers acknowledge as going in the right direction), these seeds will still need to be stable, relatively homogeneous and older varieties (marketed before the entry into force of the regulation). Conservation varieties that cannot be maintained or reproduced in their regions of origin (the majority of vegetables that come from other continents) or which do not have a region of origin that can be determined, will have to be registered as standard varieties or disappear; - heterogeneous varieties (on the basis of the Commission publishing the necessary decisions); - niche varieties. These really can be a step forward if bureaucracy, analyses and inspections do not cancel out the advantages of not being required for catalogue registration. The ECVC believes that the registration requirement for all purchases and all seed purchasers appears “totally unrealistic”.
Organic seeds (that tend not to be homogeneous or very stable) will still be banned “except in case of a favorable window of heterogeneous varieties”. (LC/transl.fl)