New Commissioners
On 1 December 2024, the new EU Commission took office. Olivér Várhelyi from Hungary as Commissioner for Health and Animal Welfare is the main person responsible for the dossier on New Genomic Techniques (NGTs). Christophe Hansen from Luxembourg, Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development, is also involved in the file because within the Council the agriculture ministers negotiate the new NGT legislation.
Report from Hungarian Presidency
After the Spanish and Belgian Presidencies, the Hungarian Presidency also failed to achieve a majority among member states in favour of a “general approach” (an agreement between countries on a united position to take forward to the next stage of intra-institutional negotiations). This means that the Council still has no mandate to start the trilogue with the EU Commission and the EU Parliament in order to agree on new NGT legislation.
On 5 December 2024, the current Hungarian Presidency submitted their final report to the other member states. After having presented a so-called “non-paper” at the beginning of their Presidency with a focus on issues that they considered should be discussed more thoroughly and written comments by seventeen delegations, there was no movement during the Hungarian Presidency: Two meetings held in person (19 July and 19 November) made very clear that the member states were sticking to the position they had held since the start of the negotiations in the Council.
According to the Presidency’s report the most important discussions focused on equivalence criteria of NGT plants to conventional plants, detection and identification of NGT plants and products and the empowerment of the Commission for adopting delegated acts, or more precisely changing the equivalence criteria. Non-legislative acts are defined as acts that are adopted by the Commission and serve to amend or supplement non-essential elements of the legislation. Further topics: the risk assessment for category 1 NGT plants and products, the scope of the regulation (whether wild plant species should be covered or not), labelling of category 1 NGT food and feed products, and the question of sustainability of NGT plants.
AGRIFISH Council and outlook for the Polish Presidency
On 10 December 2024, Commissioner Várhelyi made his first appearance at the AGRIFISH Council since taking office. Despite being from an NGT-skeptical country, he represented in his new role the position of the EU Commission. Thus, he emphasised that last summer the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) advised once again that there is no additional hazard associated with NGT plants compared to conventionally bred ones and that the Commission’s proposal is scientifically sound. But on patents, Varhélyi was very cautious about any proposals. Nevertheless, he concluded hoping that during the Polish presidency “we will see a breakthrough” on the NGT file.
When it comes to the incoming Polish Presidency, two points are considered certain: the Poles want to finalise the negotiations in the Council, and they want to focus on the patent issue. Two dates are rumoured for the presentation of their draft paper: the 2 January and mid-January 2025. Apparently, they will be following the Belgian Presidency's proposal on patents, meaning classification as category 1 NGT should only take place if there are no patents on the corresponding plant. According to a study by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN), 94% of all NGTs currently in the development pipelines fall under category 1. According to the Commission's legislative proposal, for category 1 NGTs, which are considered equivalent to conventional breeding, risk assessment and labelling are not required.
Whether the member states that have spoken out in favour of deregulation will support such a patent proposal is an open question. It is also questionable whether the member states that are critical of the deregulation proposal would be satisfied with an amendment relating only to patent issues.