The battle of the bean in Europe

Saturday, August 8, 2015

Europe needs millions of tons of soybeans and soymeal to feed its crushers and much of it consists of GM imports. Now the European Commission is considering leaving it up to individual countries whether to accept or reject new GM products

by NORMAN DUNN

This year, European Union (EU) member countries get the chance to reject on a national basis GMOs that have been otherwise approved by the European Commission. This means that individual EU countries can opt for an (almost) GM-free food chain. The outcome could mean chaos on the international soybean market. But present economics suggest a swing to more GM feed products is more likely.

Genetically modified crops, GM feed components and GM foods are all labelled "bad" in Europe. There's not a lot of scientific information backing up this bogeyman image, but governments certainly seem to believe that their respective voters distrust and fear the GM spectre. This puts some lawmakers in a very uncomfortable position. In countries such as Germany and the Netherlands, ministers tend to reject GM solutions offered by the EU Commission in Brussels. However, at the same time they know their national economies could be fatally damaged without, for instance, GM soya imports.

Soybeans and soymeal factor most in current political arguments. Europe needs imports of around 31 million tons per year to keep its oilseed crushers and feed mills going and to feed livestock. Imported soya represents some 70 per cent of all plant protein used in animal feed here. The beans, or meal, come from across the Atlantic. And between 90 and 99 per cent of each shipload is harvested from GM plants – 99 per cent if they come from Argentina, down to 94 per cent if Canada is the country of origin.

In turn, this means that the non-GM protein suppliers in European livestock feed – from homegrown canola to sunflowers and not forgetting a small proportion of European-type soybeans – make up about 30 per cent of the EU's annual feed consumption production. Experts reckon that increasing domestic production could edge up the GM-free proportion of feed to around 50 per cent.

Stopping any serious anti-GM mindset are the big meat and milk producers and exporters – countries such as the Netherlands, the world's fourth largest exporter of meat and third in the global dairy exporter league with total agricultural exports in 2014 valued at 80.7 billion (C$112 billion). This country relies on imported (mostly GM) soybeans or meal for producing 10 billion eggs annually (66 per cent exported), 1.8 million tonnes of pork (62 per cent exported) and 920,000 tonnes of poultry meat, of which 60 per cent is shipped abroad. Germany is often neck-and-neck with the Netherlands in global food export rankings, with associated soybean import demands.

This situation has the anti-GM lobby looking wildly for alternatives to stop or reduce the great annual trans-Atlantic soybean armada. Possibilities include protein peas, field beans, lupine, alfalfa and, of course, European-grown canola and sunflower seeds. Other feed protein biomass sources now being looked into (by the University of Wageningen in the Netherlands among other institutes) are sugar beet leaves, grass, duckweed and algae.

Naturally, nothing can match the soybean in terms of protein quantity and quality. Ironically, probably the only medium-term strategy that could hope to bring some of the pea and bean-type crops up to the standard of the soybean would be genetic modification!

Canola meal is the most important European-grown source of feed protein. The European Feed & Food Statistics (FEFAC) puts the 2012 European supply of canola (and sunflower) seed at 27.481 million tonnes, representing 70 per cent of protein-rich feed in the EU with consumption, including some imports, coming up to 30 per cent of total feed proteins.

Now, the EU is considering giving member countries the opportunity to reject GM soya on an individual basis. So far, individual governments have avoided the feared reactions of their voters by abstaining in votes for GM acceptance and leaving Brussels with the responsibility of allowing in GM products or foods.

However, the tables have now been turned by the European Commission: new GM products, if passed by the Commission, will be automatically approved for Europe. Each member country will then be free to reject the product for its own farmlands or store shelves.

It is a smart move by the EU Commission and will almost certainly result in a massive re-think in some countries about GMOs in feed and GM crops – and in more of such products being shipped into Europe. BF

Norman Dunn writes about European agriculture from Germany.