| | 30/January/25
| | How the agroindustry brought down the EU pesticide law – and how to avoid falling into their lobbying traps again Despite the well documented risks pesticides pose to biodiversity and human health, the European Union has consistently failed to make meaningful progress in reducing pesticide use, with pesticide sales barely decreasing over the last decade. In 2020, the European Commission announced its flagship Green Deal, promising to halve the use of pesticides by 2030. However, when a regulation was introduced to turn this goal into binding targets (known as the Sustainable Use Regulation), it became the target of relentless behind-the-scenes lobbying by the pesticide and broader agroindustry. Creating fears of food shortages, this coordinated lobbying led to the regulation’s downfall, leaving European citizens and nature exposed to toxic chemicals. A briefing from Friends of the Earth Europe shows how the agroindustry's lobbying strategies dismantled this crucial pesticide legislation, outlines the dire consequences, and proposes a way to move forward. Tactics outlined in the briefing include greenwashing new GMOs as pesticide reducers, when the main firms behind them are pesticide makers —like Bayer and Corteva. In reality, new GMOs are unlikely to cut pesticide use and some are designed to increase it. Friends of the Earth Europe Action alert: Mexicans should not be forced to eat GMO tortillas by the US and Canada In light of the December 20 ruling of the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement (UCMCA) tribunal in favour of the United States and Canada and against Mexico in the dispute over GMO corn, here's a reminder that individuals and organisations are invited to sign on to the civil society statement in solidarity with Mexico by 5 February. CBAN Frankenfoods: Chewing over a polarised debate When the term “Frankenfoods” emerged in the 1990s to describe GMOs, it was a weapon of rhetoric designed to invoke fear. Critics deployed it to align bioengineered crops with populist interpretations of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the tale of a creation run amok with disastrous consequences. Proponents dismissed the term as alarmist, unscientific and a crude attempt to derail technological progress. But more than two centuries after the seminal fable about the tension between scientific innovation and social responsibility was first published – and more than 30 years since the term first emerged in relation to agriculture and food – it's worth revisiting whether “Frankenfoods” might have been a more apt metaphor than either side imagined, writes Pat Thomas of Beyond GM/A Bigger Conversation. A Bigger Conversation We hope you’ve found this newsletter interesting. Please support our work with a one-off or regular donation. Thank you! __________________________________________________________ Website: http://www.gmwatch.org
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