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WTO to bulldoze European bans on GMOs?

A Hani farmer is holding his traditional rice seeds in his hand, Yunnan Province, China. Enlarge Image

Say no to genetic engineering

While scientific progress on molecular biology has a great potential to increase our understanding of nature and provide new medical tools, it should not be used as justification to turn the environment into a giant genetic experiment by commercial interests. The biodiversity and environmental integrity of the world's food supply is too important to our survival to be put at risk.

Food

Genetically engineering of the food we eat is an inherently risky process. Current understanding of genetics is extremely limited and scientists do not know the long-term effects of releasing these unpredictable organisms into the environment and people's diets.

Greenpeace activists today occupy the cranes of the "Winner" to prevent its cargo of GMO soya from Argentina, reaching Spain. In the foreground Hungarian activist Atilla Soos. Enlarge Image

Biosafety protocol

The Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety is the first international agreement to regulate the transboundary movements of genetically engineered (GE) organisms. The Biosafety Protocol is a subsidiary agreement to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which was signed by over 150 governments at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992, the Protocol itself was agreed in Montreal in January 2000 and came into force September 11, 2003. Now 100 countries have signed up.

Greenpeace volunteers dressed as Uncle Sam dump GE maize on other volunteers representing consumers in straitjackets, suffocating their demand for the right to say no GE food. Enlarge Image

Encourage sustainable trade

The World Trade Organisation (WTO) promotes free trade for the gain of private interests, over and above our health and the environment. It is fatally flawed and is moving the world in the wrong direction - away from peace, security and sustainability. By stalling on issues that are crucial to poorer countries, the WTO faces a crisis of legitimacy.

Rainbow Warrior sails into Doha to challenge the WTO to force the US to commit to the Kyoto Protocol on climate change. Enlarge Image

What is the WTO?

The World Trade Organisation (WTO) is one of the most powerful institutions in the world. It oversees the global trade in goods and services. There are currently 146 member countries of the WTO.

Figures on stilts, dressed as managers of DuPont, Monsanto, Bayer and Syngenta, the world's largest agro-multinational, tag patent clips on plants and seeds around a three-meter globe. Enlarge Image

Why is the WTO a problem?

The WTO is a tool of the rich and powerful. By placing trade above all other goals, it threatens our health and the environment. Its more powerful members use arm-twisting tactics to push developing countries into making bad deals. And it's being used by corporate interests and the US to force-feed the world genetically engineered food.

Chinese consumers queue for GE-Free produce and information being distributed by Greenpeace at a Guangzhou supermarket. Enlarge Image

What is free trade?

The act of opening up economies is known as "free trade" or "trade liberalisation." It usually benefits the larger, wealthier countries whose big companies are looking to expand and sell their goods abroad. In the one sector where developing countries have the most to gain - agricultural goods - wealthier countries maintain the highest level of "protection" of their own markets.

Greenpeace volunteers dressed as Uncle Sam dump GE maize on other volunteers representing consumers in straitjackets, suffocating their demand for the right to say no GE food. Enlarge Image

How does the WTO affect you?

Global trade affects many aspects of life. It can impact everything from the environment to your health and the well-being of people around the world. At the next WTO meeting in Cancun, it is not just trade that is on the agenda but environment and human health. The results will affect everyone.

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For EU related:
Mark Breddy
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mark.breddy@greenpeace.org

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