Pushing Biotech in Europe

From the International Herald Tribune: A new push to win EU acceptance for biotech
First few paragraphs...

The biotechnology industry, claiming the backing of European Union governments, signaled a new effort Monday to win greater leeway to grow genetically modified crops in Europe, a region where citizens have long been skeptical about the safety and value of the technology.

EU experts deadlocked Monday on whether France and Greece should lift their bans on growing the sole bioengineered seed approved for planting: an insect-resistant corn engineered by Monsanto.

Biotechnology industry executives say that a bigger vote expected next week could lead to two additional engineered corn seeds being given permission to be marketed in the EU by year-end. One is produced by Pioneer Hi-Bred International, a unit of DuPont, with Dow AgroSciences. The other is from Syngenta.

Even so, a variety of forces are pushing Europe into re-examining the potential of gene-altered seeds despite a view among many citizens across the trade bloc that the crops are unsafe, dangerous to the environment and represent an unwelcome incursion by corporations into agriculture....