The Biosafety Protocol, being negotiated under the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity, would regulate trade and other transboundary movement of products modified by genetic engineering. GMOs include food crops that have been genetically modified for greater productivity, nutritional value or for resistance to pests or diseases. The proposed Biosafety Protocol, as it is currently written, provides for a precautionary approach that would permit a country to block imports of genetically modified products, even if no scientific evidence shows they cause any harm. Some environmentalists have expressed concern that GMOs could harm the environment by spreading their built-in pesticide resistance to weeds and pests, or exposing beneficial organisms to toxins. Negotiators supporting the proposed wording in the protocol include representatives from the European Union and developing countries, who want the biosafety treaty to allow such decisions to be made on the basis of reasonable concerns, even in the absence of hard scientific evidence.
International action based on the precautionary principle is necessary.
Loy added that a number of international institutions all incorporate a similar precautionary principle into their basic rules. The State Department officials cited the World Trade Organization's Sanitary and Phyto-Sanitary Agreement that addresses safe trade in plants, animals and food products, and the Codex Alimentarius Commission under the World Health Organization and the Food and Agriculture Organization. Loy said that proposals made by some negotiators in Montreal seek to redefine the original precautionary concept as set forth in the Rio Declaration of Principles. We have to worry about that. We do worry about that.