The EU Court legitimizes the Italian ban on the cultivation of GMO corn | EUROtoday

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The EU Court of Justice has confirmed the legitimacy of a ban on the cultivation of genetically modified maize in Italy, establishing that states can ban the cultivation of GMOs with out justification, as a part of the process established by EU legislation, supplied that the holder of the authorization doesn’t object. The ruling issues the attraction of an Italian farmer sanctioned for having grown GMO corn. The Court discovered the process that enables Member States to ask the Commission for a geographical limitation of the authorization for the cultivation of GMOs to be compliant with EU legislation.

The Italian farmer who had appealed in Luxembourg had acquired fines totaling 50,000 euros and had been ordered to destroy his cultivated vegetation. The Court recalled that the ban on the cultivation of MON 810 maize in Italy was adopted on the premise of a process established by Union legislation, launched in 2015, which permits Member States to restrict or prohibit the cultivation of genetically modified organisms on their territory. This process supplies that, when a Member State requests the modification of the geographical scope of the authorization for the cultivation of a GMO with out offering any explicit justification and the holder of the authorization doesn’t object inside 30 days, the European Commission takes word of the modification, which turns into instantly relevant.

The judges in Luxembourg underlined that the Union legislator has a large margin of discretion in areas that require advanced assessments and have political, financial and social repercussions, such because the cultivation of GMOs. In this context, the process which permits Member States, in a logic of subsidiarity, to acquire a ban on the cultivation of GMOs on their territory with out explicit justification, if the holder of the authorization doesn’t object, isn’t opposite to Union legislation. According to the EU judges, the ban doesn’t violate the precept of proportionality nor does it create discrimination between farmers from completely different member states. The Court additionally dominated out that the ban on the cultivation of a GMO constitutes a violation of the free motion of products, because it doesn’t stop the importation or advertising of merchandise containing that GMO. Finally, the Court clarified that the duty to justify the limitation or prohibition of cultivation of a GMO applies provided that the holder of the authorization opposes it. In the presence of tacit consent, this obligation doesn’t exist and there’s no interference with the liberty to conduct enterprise.