The Council of Ministers of the EU is expected to adopt the text of the new regulation on organic farming without debate in Brussels on Tuesday 22 May. The experts on the Special Committee on Agriculture gave the go-ahead on Monday 14 May for adoption of the text which will apply from 1 January 2021 (see EUROPE 12005).
Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Finland, Lithuania and Slovakia will vote against the new regulation, and Austria, Belgium and Hungary will abstain.
If the Council approves the European Parliament position, the legislation is passed. After being signed by the presidents of the European Parliament and the Council, the legislative act will be published in the Official Journal of the EU.
European Coordination Via Campesina has expressed disappointment, however, at some of the provisions of the regulation on organic seed. While welcoming progress on heterogeneous material and organic varieties that will broaden the range of seeds adapted to organic farming on offer commercially, it is unhappy that the text does not remove all the barriers preventing a farmer from selling his own seeds to other farmers.
Requirements to register as a seed producer and the various constraints that go along with them should not apply to farmers who select their own seeds and occasionally sell any surplus, Via Campesina says. Furthermore, the organic regulation does not ban the patenting of genetic characteristics of heterogeneous material and organic varieties, it regrets.
Via Campesina hopes that, once published, the Commission delegated acts will have been drafted in such a way as to ban hidden GMOs and any patented seed from organic farming. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)