Developing Solutions for Coexistence in the EU—Legal, Technical, and Economic Issues

Abstract

Coexistence policy in the European Union (EU) is designed to avoid unintended and adventitious presence of genetically modified (GM) crops in other products, preventing the potential economic loss from admixture (European Commission 2010). Coexistence is a direct consequence of the decision to provide consumers with a well informed choice when it comes to food produced from GM crops. While a mandatory labeling regime identifies GM produce in the market place, the availability of both GM and non-GM depends on the possibility of a downstream supply chain to provide both goods. Therefore, what is commonly called “coexistence measures” are a set of technical, administrative, and liability rules set out to avoid the unintended presence of GM material in non-GM crops at the farm level. Hence coexistence measures are not environmental risk management tools but tools to resolve potential market failures arising from GM crop cultivation in the EU.

The views expressed are purely those of the authors and may not in any circumstances be regarded as stating an official position of the European Commission.