Genetic engineering remains extremely contentious in Europe.
This matters because resistance to food altered by biotechnology is holding back development of new crops that may improve our health or help us mitigate and adapt to climate change.
We shouldn’t do away with safety checks where they’re required, but the UK’s Royal Society, the oldest scientific academy in the world, recommends an outcomes-based approach similar to the US model, which looks at the scientifically plausible risks of new crops on a case-by-case basis and balances the costs of using the method against any hypothetical costs of not using it.
The EU’s bill reducing the regulation for crops edited with new genomic techniques will be a step in the right direction, though the role of patenting needs to be examined closely. Cheaper market access will open the door to innovative seeds from sustainably minded research institutions. Given that the EU’s stringent rules on GMOs have been credited with influencing regulation in developing countries, it could also help regulatory progress in those places too.
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Activists such as Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth often pitch organic farming as the only sustainable alternative to conventional, high-tech agriculture. But embracing technology can add resilience to our food systems and support a radically different regenerative system — if only we have the vision and political will.
