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EU May Allow Members Home Rule On GMO Foods
think_nix (1467471) writes The EU Parliament is paving the way for EU Nation States to decide on banning or allowing GMO foods within their respective territories. An further article at Der Spiegel (German) (Google translation) quotes the German Health Minister's claim that if countries cannot specifically, scientifically argue for a ban, this would allow GMO companies to initiate legal actions against the banning ruling states. Furthermore it was noted, given EU Parliaments current stance on not reintroducing border and customs controls between member states, this will make checks and controls of GMO foods between member states even more difficult.
So I should probably be banned from Slashdot.
It assumed a lot of knowledge about how current EU GMO law works. I think that it was saying that currently the EU in Brussels approves GMOs in European agriculture, and then national governments can choose whether to let the crops into their countries. So the EU approved a strain of corn, and something else (it's mentioned in the article), and France/Germany/etc. have said those two crops aren't allowed within their borders. This just gets rid of the EU step. They'll be banned in Berlin and Paris, not Brussels.
The article also mentions that the nations would need a reason to justify banning a GMO, but given that the MEPs quoted were mostly from countries that enthusiastically enforce the ban and nobody was going "hey, but your government will be forced to let GMOs in," I strongly suspect that the list of reasons a state can give for justifying a ban is really long.
And the scientific consensus on GMO safety is as broad and overwhelming as the consensus that man is behind much of the current global warming.
Anti-GMO hysteria is anti-science, plain and simple. It is no different from insisting that CO2 doesn't drive global warming, and no different from saying that vaccines are dangerous because you heard that some kid got autism a few days after being vaccinated.
The EU, by taking this decidedly anti-science stance, is holding back important scientific advances that will be necessary to feed and supply an ever increasing global population.
We should hold anti-GMO zealots with the same disdain as we hold climate change deniers.
The EU is a weird beast. It's got enough power to be a huge pain in the ass, but not enough to actually do anything. The result is it can't adequately respond to challenges (ie: Crimea, the PIIGS debt crisis), but everyone still hates it for cramping their style. It's somewhat analogous to the US Articles of Confederation, except that government had even less power then the EU (it was somewhere between the UN and NATO in it's ability to bully member-states).
In the long term it's probably much better for Europe if Europeans decide to go the route we Americans did, and create a truly Federal state with it's own Army. The economic advantages of national autonomy are irrelevant if the Russians have just conquered half of Poland, all of Belarus, Moldova, etc. If they paid the right bribe to any single EU or NATO member-state (ie: Bulgaria has had it's eye on a small chunk of Romania since WW1) they could paralyze every Europe-wide organization because on any issue that actually matters ALL member-states have a veto.
Europeans are incredibly good at convincing themselves a small (and in the context of a 7-billion-member human race, even Germany is miniscule), wealthy country is a major global player. You can pull that off if you're wealthy enough. If Nigeria, the Chinese, Indians, and a dozen-odd other states all get their economic houses in order you'll all be Luxembourg.
In the long term it's probably much better for Europe if Europeans decide to go the route we Americans did, and create a truly Federal state with it's own Army.
But the EU has been an anti-democratic power for decades, and it seems magic thinking to believe it could evolve in the right direction now. Giving more power to it is an attack on democracy. Giving it an army seems just foolish.
The previous poster mentioned the US Articles of Confederation (the first attempt at governance after gaining independence) and suggested going the American route. Going the American route would not include keeping the current EU. In this analogy the current EU would be discarded like the Articles of Confederation were and member states would create a new governing body and a new set of rules.
In short, the US didn't evolve from one system to another. We completely thew out the old system, learned from its flaws and started over.
The EU is here to stay. It's too convenient a scapegoat for politicians who can blame any kind of unpopular policy on it. It goes like this: If you have an unpopular policy to push through, band together with the other EU countries who suffer from the same problem, make it a EU policy, and then you can go home, wring your hands and sigh that you really, really don't want to do that to your people but the EU forces you to.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You'd also have to ask the member states to give up their sovereignty. This wasn't easy even in the case of the US as there were a ton of issues that needed resolving (i.e. balancing power between small and large states.)
This would be incredibly more difficult in the case of Europe since the individual member states have had their own identity often going back two or even three millennia, not only that but what cultural identity would they take? I.e. little things like what common language will they speak? (Granted the US has no official language, but 80% of the population speaks the same one...such is by far not the case in the EU.) Also, I'm having a hard time seeing how e.g. England would agree to it, seeing as they even refuse to adopt the Euro (which it turns out was actually a good idea and worked quite well in their favor) and they don't even drive on the same side of the road as everybody else.
Really, my born and raised in Italy and emigrated to the US at age 20 grandfather has a work ethic that a very conservative American would consider exemplary.
One of my friends growing up, his father was born and raised in Greece. He emigrated to the US in his early 20s also. He seemed to share a work ethic and some other traits with my grandfather.
You do realize that nothing you said has any bearing on my point, right?
Culture is local, not ethnic. Well, that's not true either, but you should catch my meaning. It's an entirely different pace of life in the Mediterranean Countries. You can get a similar culture shock if you travel from New York City to New Orleans, and The Big Easy is positively fast paced when compared to Italy, Spain, or Greece.
Its a welfare state government not the national culture that screws things up.
Then why isn't Finland broke and begging Germany for bailouts? Finland isn't going to bring the Euro down. The aforementioned countries just may.....
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Is that a joke? The "gas deal" certainly provides cheap gas all right - so cheap that there's essentially zero profit in it for Gazprom. It's a real testament to how desperate Russia is to not look like they're dependent on the EU to buy their gas. Check out a map of Russian gas pipelines. Notice the complete lack of any pipelines anywhere near China's major cities. The gas deal leads from an undeveloped field through a nonexistent pipeline through nonexistent processing facilities. The pipeline isn't supposed to come online until 2020, and the main field until 2021. And that's assuming they can actually build it, which given their track record while *not* under sanctions is a big "If". And even if all that transpires, it's still a small fraction of their EU gas exports.
Anyone who actually looks at the "deal" can easily see it was just a PR move.
The concept that Russia can just turn east to China is beset by the fundamental problems that Russia doesn't have infrastructure connecting itself well with China, the vast majority of their people live nowhere near China, the vast majority of their industries are nowhere near China, and so forth. Russia is set up to function as part of Europe. And if it came down to it, does anyone in their right mind think that if the EU and US basically told China "us or them", they'd choose Russia, rather than the vastly larger markets of the US and EU that China's already intensely integrated with?
Not like the "breakup" with Russia would be painless for Europe. They'll be paying higher oil rates and significantly higher gas rates, plus higher rates for a wide variety of raw materials. But the situation is highly lopsided; Russia's GDP is an eighth the size of Europe's, a 16th the size of Europe + US. Whatever reduction in trade that hurts the EU / US hurts them an order of magnitude worse, barring huge multipliers on their part. Their manufacturing sector, in particularly high tech goods, is grossly undersized for the size of their population, and that's very unfortunate because such goods (in particular industrial goods, spare parts, etc) are often not fungible. They're also highly dependent on food imports (at least those are fungible).
Give a boy a gun and you arm him for a day. Teach him how to make a gun, and the whole metaphor breaks down.
You'd also have to ask the member states to give up their sovereignty. This wasn't easy even in the case of the US as there were a ton of issues that needed resolving (i.e. balancing power between small and large states.)
This would be incredibly more difficult in the case of Europe since the individual member states have had their own identity often going back two or even three millennia, not only that but what cultural identity would they take? I.e. little things like what common language will they speak? (Granted the US has no official language, but 80% of the population speaks the same one...such is by far not the case in the EU.) Also, I'm having a hard time seeing how e.g. England would agree to it, seeing as they even refuse to adopt the Euro (which it turns out was actually a good idea and worked quite well in their favor) and they don't even drive on the same side of the road as everybody else.
There is a large group of nations within the EU that have little problem with increased integration, Britain is in something of a small minority in its anti-EU stance. Until now keeping Britain in the EU has been seen as important and nobody really thought they should leave. Recently, however, the idea has been voiced in other EU countries that the British should just should just bloody leave if they have that stink in their nose rather continue this constant dithering. People are just getting sick of hearing Britain threaten to leave and then never doing anything about it, especially since it usually seems to be a smokescreen to extort special treatment. There is a whole bunch of things that can be done in terms of restructuring the EU if the UK is no longer there fucking things up to get special deals for it's financial industry. If the UK decides to go it will certainly be watched with great interest as they leave the common market, refuses to join the EEZ which is not an option for most of the UK Euro-skeptics/isolationists since it would involve enacting all those hated EU laws without any say in how they are made (a say which the UK currently has as an EU member). Ukip in Britain, the Freedom party in the Netherlands and Front National in France all believe that Europe is better off as a bag of squabbling nation states that Europe was before the EU was set up. The kind of squabbling, feuding bag full of angry weasels that would not have been able to agree on whether or not the Soviet Union was a threat for long enough to even conceive of forming an alliance against the Soviets to prevent them from gobbling Europe up one squabbling state at a time. NATO was only formed as a counterweight against the Soviets after several swift ass-kicks from the Americans and they cannot be counted on to the play the role of the big bad parent forever. So who is right? Is it Ukip and Co. who think they can take Europe back to being a bag of small squabbling nations and still be taken seriously by great powers like China, India, Russia and the USA? Or is it the so called 'federalists' who see increases in political and economic union as the only way to stand up to the big boys? You tell me? Which is more likely to succeed in helping Europe to deal with the Great powers of the 21st century? One big European cat or a group of cute little house-cats? If this reminds you Americans of a debate that took place in the US before the civil war about the pros and cons of increasing Federalism that is no coincidence. The one difference is that I am not nearly as alarmed at the prospect of a European civil war as some of the more delusional Euro skeptic wing nuts who seem to consider a pan European civil war to be just around the corner.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow