August 25 2008, 08:58

The local markets of Ukraine are open for transgenic production

Ukraine does not have legislative basis regulating rotation of transgenic plants, declared Oleg Yukhnovskiy, the President of Union of Producers of Food Industry of Ukraine, LIGABusiness-Inform reported.

“The number of countries demanding to mark products for presence of genetically modified organisms (GMO) continues to increase. According to the directive of the European Parliament and the Council of Europe dd. September, 22, 2003 No 1829/2003, all countries should mark products on GMO presence if its level exceeds 0.9%. But Ukraine does not have a legislative basis, regulating rotation of transgenic plants”, - the expert underlined.

“Therefore lack of the corresponding normative legal documents for a wide spectrum of agricultural products, produced from soybeans, maize, sugar beet, tomatoes, potatoes, rapeseeds, squash or their using in receipts may become a technical barrier, which Ukraine practically cannot overcome in conditions of the WTO”,- O. Yukhnovskiy noted. Therefore, according to the expert, the domestic markets of Ukraine remain open for imports of genetically modified organisms.

And as long as agricultural products and food products from GMO are cheaper, we risk to lose not only the domestic market but also the foreign one.