29
December 2000, its evocation granted policymakers further flexibility. The resolution
maintained that risk assessments may not always be possible on account of insufficient
data, and that cost-benefit analyses should consider the “public acceptability” of risk
management decisions.
42
The EU’s evocation of the precautionary principle, already too
permissive in the views of US policymakers, had just become more so.
In response to challenges to the legitimacy of European GMO regulations from
above and below, the Commission in 1998 proposed a new directive to govern the
deliberate release of GMOs into the environment and the placing of GM food products on
the market, replacing Directive 90/220. In the wake of the BSE crisis, the Commission
had already reorganized its internal handling of food safety matters by centralizing them
within a recast (and renamed) Directorate-General for Health and Consumer Protection
(or, under the French acronym, SANCO) in 1997 (Skogstad 2003, 6).
43
Once more, the
Commission was divided between those who desired less-restrictive authorization and
labeling requirements (namely DG Industry, DG Research, and DG Trade), and those
who sought stricter controls (such as DG Environment and DG SANCO) (Stewart &
Johanson 1999, 273). By contrast to the early 1980s, however, the leading players in this
later round of regulation were DG Environment and DG SANCO, both of which favored
a precautionary approach to risk regulation. Overall, the Commission was eager to put in
place some sort of system that would meet member-state demands on environmental and
consumer protection, and in so doing bring an end to the de facto moratorium and fend
off a potential US legal challenge.
Both the European Parliament and Council pressed the Commission for further
regulatory controls. The majority of the European Parliament insisted on tighter
restrictions regarding labeling requirements and thresholds pursuant to which products
could contain traces of GMOs and still be sold in the EU.
44
The member states were
mixed in their views, with some appearing to do everything possible to ensure that no
GM crops would be grown in their territories (such as Austria and Luxembourg), and
42
See Council Resolution on the Precautionary Principle, Annex III to the Presidency Conclusions, Nice
European Council Meeting, 7-9 December 2000. See also Vogel 2001, 28-29.
43
This reorganization represented the Commission’s move “away from an approach emphasizing food
security…and towards an approach emphasizing food safety, linked to the protection of consumers” (Vos
2000).
44
“Genetic Engineering: European Parliament’s Vote on GMOs Described as a Step Backwards,”
European Report, 15 April 2000.
Convention