European Union hesitates to import Kenya’s produce even as GMO war rages

 

Last week’s promise by members of the European Union ( EU) that they would allow genetically modified foods from Kenya into their region may have been premature, with the European Parliament taking a new vote on Tuesday.

The new vote will give EU individual states the power to limit cultivation or importation of the controversial GM crops into their territory even if they have been approved by the 28-nation bloc.

Intense pressure Last Friday, Dominique Davoux on behalf of the head of the European delegation to Kenya Briet Lodewijk, had said such crops would be welcome in the EU region provided they met the necessary requirements.

Lodewjik was recanting a statement he had made in June warning Kenyan farmers that the union would not allow GMO exports into the region.

But the new vote removes the decision making from the commission, meaning Kenya or any other country will have to engage with individual’s EU states, many of them opposed to GMOs. Lodewijk’s retraction followed a five-month period of intense pressure from American-funded pro- GMO groups that saw them petition the EU headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. See also: EU, Danish grant Sh68 million for conservation The ambassador’s problems started in June when, in a local morning TV show, he warned that the EU would not accept GMO products from Kenya or from anywhere else in the region. This prompted the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications (ISAAA) to lead a delegation to the EU headquarters in Belgium to petition that Lodewijk be made to retract the statement. ISAAA, an International NGO, has three centres globally in Kenya, the Philippines and the ISAAA Ameri Centre located in New York, which serves as the global administrative and financial headquarters of the agency. It is funded by the Americans through USAID, private seed giants of Monsanto, Bayer CropScience, Sygenta, Pioneer Hi-Bred, two European banks and a host of other sources. Spill-over media The delegation, according to a statement released by ISAAA Nairobi, was led by its director Dr Margret Karembu. Others were MPs Kareke Mbiuki, Florence Mutua and Pukose Satia.