Italy: GMOs Gaining Entry with ‘No Public Discussion, No Serious Risk Assessment’, warns ARI
In a press release issued on May 14, 2024, Associazione Rurale Italiana (ARI) has raised multiple red flags against the decision to greenlight the planting of GMO rice.
Here is the full text of the press release, translated to English:
Italy, following the notification B/IT/24/01 with the planting of “Ris8imo” that took place yesterday at the “Radice Fossati” farm in Mezzana Bigli, in the province of Pavia, has lost its global leadership as a GMO-free country.
The chorus of praises cannot hide the scientific limitations of the so-called “Victory Rice”. The inaccuracies present in the notification should have at least raised concerns from the authorities who authorized the experiment. One example is the notification stating, “…The variation was obtained through genome editing (type NGT-1)…”, but referencing a European regulation under discussion in the upcoming parliament that does not provide any scientific description of “NGT1”, as extensively documented by the French food safety agency in two reports, has no value unless it is an attempt to present the product as “NGT1” exempt from future traceability and impact assessment requirements. In short, it’s a trick.
After 24 years of national legislation guaranteeing the “GMO-free” status of Italian agriculture, due to the reckless decisions of the Draghi and Meloni governments, with the “Ukraine” and “Drought” decrees respectively, Italy is becoming a country at risk of biotechnological drift.
The manner in which politics, academia, and so-called major agricultural organizations have imposed on the Nation the risk of losing the work done over the past decades to position Italian agriculture at the top of the quality production rankings is, to say the least, disconcerting.
No public discussion, no reasonable information campaign, no serious risk assessment, particularly regarding the economic damage to sectors such as organic or DOP and IGP, which we are facing only because of a subservient compliance with agribusiness and the most backward part of the academic and trade union world.
Accusations of Luddism and attacks against those who, for almost a quarter of a century, have scientifically opposed old and new generation GMOs confirm the total unwillingness to engage with citizens on strategic issues for agriculture and society as a whole. It is pointless to recall that the agricultural sector, in addition to being fundamental to the country’s economy, also provides food for all our fellow citizens, who were not asked if they are willing to have modified rice on their plates to acquire resistance that, at most — technically — will be effective for 3-5 years.
Imagining that rice consumers will be happy to buy a box of Arborio with “Ris8imo” is currently a simple illusion; the vast majority of Italians do not want to eat GMOs. The trick of renaming NGT products as “TEA” (Assisted Evolution Techniques) shows contempt for the intelligence of this country’s consumers.
For this reason, we publicly denounce this imposition, which is due to the lack of courage to civilly and democratically address a political and scientific discussion on the issue of genome editing and its applications.
We will continue our activities of information and documentation to counter this attempt to mystify the issue of new GMOs, passing them off, once again with the same promises as the old GMOs, as the miraculous solution to all agricultural problems, from pests to drought, from the necessary reduction of pesticide use to the sharp increase in production, whose failure is also recognized by the Nobel laureates who developed CRISPR/CAS. Promises and deals for the seed industry.
We produce food, we do not manufacture it, and we will never tire of saying it!
For more information visit ARI Website