WTO's decision on GM foods in Europe did not cover safety issues

A World Trade Organisation ruling that the European Union imposed unfair restrictions on genetically modified crops did not tackle the vexed issue of their safety, it emerged on Wednesday.

The confidential WTO ruling, obtained on Wednesday by AFP after it was released to governments the previous night, noted that the organisation's dispute settlement panel had stuck purely to trade issues.

"The panel did not examine whether biotech products in general are safe or not," said the ruling, which ran to 1,050 pages -- the longest ever issued by the decade-old WTO, reflecting the complexity of the case.

Nor did it address "whether the biotech products at issue in this dispute are 'like' their conventional counterparts", even though this claim was made by Argentina, Canada and the United States, which had asked for the WTO ruling.

They filed their complaint in May 2003, charging that the EU stance reflected business protectionism rather than concerns about the impact of biotechnology on the health of consumers or the environment

The problem, the report said, was that a de facto EU moratorium on imports of GM crops between June 1999 and August 2003 broke a WTO agreement that allows governments to restrict imports on health grounds.

No party in the case questioned the EU's right to consider possible risks prior to giving approval for the consumption or planting of biotech crops, the ruling said.

But the core of the problem was that the moratorium led to "undue delay" in decisions over whether particular GM crops could be imported, going against the agreement, the WTO said.

The 149 trading nations in the WTO lay down the framework for global commerce and can take their trade spats to the Geneva-based organisation, which acts as a referee.

The WTO can authorise retaliatory customs duties against members who are found to breach the rules and fail to fall into line.

However, the ruling noted that the EU had already "brought to end the general moratorium on approvals" for GM imports and that the WTO panel would therefore refrain from making any recommendations for further action by Brussels.

That squared with the EU's argument in the wake of the ruling that it had no need to do anything because it had changed the way it approved GM foods for market since May 2004.

However, the WTO ruling spotlighted continued restrictions in six member states of the 25-nation EU, saying they broke trade rules.

The countries -- Austria, France, Germany, Greece, Italy and Luxembourg -- each imposed freezes on a handful of GM crops but these were "not based on a risk assessment", the WTO said.

That has left the EU as a whole in breach of WTO rules, the decision said -- because the bloc works as one within the trade body -- and so it must fall into line.

On Wednesday, EU officials said it was too early to say whether or not they would appeal against the ruling as they were still digesting the panel's report.

Argentina, Canada and the United States can also appeal if they are unhappy with the decision.