Press release - September 30, 2014
Brussels - Commenting on today’s hearing of commissioner candidate for Health and Food Safety Vytenis Andriukaitis, Marco Contiero, Greenpeace EU agriculture policy director said: “This wasn’t a bad performance. He showed his commitment to protect European citizens and their environment, but we will have to see how he intends to turn words into action.
In particular we welcome Andriukaitis’ pledge to make EU decisions on GM crops more democratic and to review the authorisation system as requested this year by the European Parliament and 19 EU countries.
He also repeated the Commission’s pledge not to sacrifice EU food safety and health standards on the altar of free trade. We will hold him to it.”
Although vague about potential measures, Andriukaitis also recognised the need to act against endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs), stressing that they have impacts on future generations, and promised to fulfil the European Commission obligation to define the criteria for identifying gender-bending chemicals.
Contacts:
Marco Contiero, Greenpeace EU agriculture policy director, +32 (0) 2 274 19 06,
Luisa Colasimone, Greenpeace EU communications manager, +32 (0)2 274 19 15,
Note to Editors:
In July, Commission President-elect Junker stated in his political guidelines that we must end a situation where “the Commission is legally forced to authorise GM organisms even though a clear majority of Member States is against”. http://ec.europa.eu/about/juncker-commission/docs/pg_en.pdf