Galery

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Victoria Mindova

Milk, meat, eggs, cheese, yellow cheese and other animal products will get a special label if produced from organic instead of GM fed animals. Greece is the fifth country to introduce the label after Germany, France, Austria and Luxembourg. The news was proudly announced by the Deputy Minister of Agricultural Development Milena Apostolaki who however failed to answer the question "When will the label officially come into effect?"

Currently, domestic producers are not required to indicate on the packaging of the finished product if the animal from which it was made was fed with genetically modified foods. According to experts, the information flow was broken because animal foods which are the product of genetic engineering have a special indication. Breeders know whether they feed the livestock with natural or artificial food but the information is not presented neither to the dealer, nor to the manufacturer and the end consumer. The latest initiative of the Agricultural Ministry will provide the end producers with a legal base to put the certified label for non-GM products, which will give them a significant advantage on the food market.

Under European Union regulations that operate in Greece since 2003, marking GM products is mandatory only if the food contains a genetically modified ingredient exceeding the threshold of 0.9%.

GM feeds in the Union are mainly corn and soybeans which have significant market share and lower prices, say local journalists. Products from animals fed with them, however, are not marked in any way. In this case, very often users may think that they buy a product that is biologically and genetically pure but they do not know that the animal from which it was made was fed with genetically modified foods.

The new label would empower consumers to freely choose the quality and origin of the food they buy and would help Greek farmers to demonstrate the highest quality of the products manufactured by them, said Milena Apostolaki.

Certification scheme will be prepared by February and then a technical committee will be formed to finally approve the program. It will include members of all major unions associated with animal breeding as well as of sectors producing and processing animal products. Members of the state laboratory, scientists and representatives of Green Peace will enter the committee too. The inspection body for now remains the Agricultural Products Certification and Supervision Organization (Ο.Π.Ε.ΓΕ.Π.) until it is considered whether the ministry should establish a separate organization.