Workshop C1: “Co-Existence?” – Theories and Realities

Saturday, 25th April 2009
12.30 – 15.00

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Chair and moderator:

  • Marianne Künzle, Greenpeace Switzerland

Speakers:

  1. Josef Hoppichler, Federal Institute for Less-Favoured and Mountainous Areas, Austria 
  2. Bernadette Oehen, FiBL Research Institute of Organic Agriculture, Switzerland
  3. Gabriel Paun, Agent Green, Romania

Outline:

Contamination of GE-free agriculture is inevitable once a region or country starts to grow GE plants. There doesn’t seem to be a difference: neither countries with already implemented co-existence laws nor countries still lacking of a legal framework are protected from GM contamination.

On the other hand, coexistence issues have been to a large extent focused on technical measures to avoid the contamination of gm material in non-gm crops or costs and benefits for farmers growing GM crop. In this workshop calculation of the coexistence costs for the gm non-gm maize producer in three case study regions will be presented.

We will also gain an overview about different national legal measurements which aim to protect GE-free cultivation from being contaminated – and how so-called „co-existence“ strategies so far failed as soon as GE cultivation has been approved. We will discuss options how to succesfully keep a region or country GE free.

Programme:

  1. Josef Hoppichler
    – Global GMO-contamination cases, selected country case studies (USA, Japan, Australia, EU)
    – Reactions, counter-actions of civil society
    – Main lessons learned & how to go on to create a GMO-free agriculture
    Presentation: Co-Existence and Global GMO-Contamination (pdf, 2,5 MB, English)
  2. Bernadette Oehen: 
    – Legal situation of organic farmers and gmo free producers in the EU
    – Does recent research include the aspect of gmo free or organic farming?
    – Cost of coexistence for non-GM grain maize production: results of an investigation conducted in three case study regions
    Presentation: Aspects of Coexistence (pdf, 2,8 MB, English)
  3. Gabriel Paun:
    – Current situation in Romania with a special focus on  “co-existence” respectively contamination cases in the past and nowadays
    Presentation: GE free Romanian NGO (pdf, 2,3 MB, English)
  4. Questions and Answers
  5. Exchange 

Background and literature: