By Jeremy Smith
BRUSSELS, April 24 (Reuters) - European farmers should see their first official guidance in a few months on how they might grow genetically modified (GM ) crops alongside traditional plants in the future, the EU's farm chief said on Thursday.
The EU executive, hosting a debate to hear scientific views on the controversial issue, will present its views on technical measures that farmers would take to minimise cross-pollination between GM , non-GM and organic crops.
Although the all-day session has not produced policy making conclusions, the Commission will use the data given by a wide range of interested parties -- scientists, the biotech industry, farm and environmental groups -- as the basis for its proposals.
"It should bring us a step closer to finding a rational and efficient approach to ensure the co-existence of conventional and organic agriculture with genetically modified crops in the European Union," said European Farm Commissioner Franz Fischler.
"I hope that the results will also help us to draw up a first set of guidelines on co-existence before the summer," he said.
EU agriculture ministers would be informed of the debate's progress at their next meeting in May, he said.
Delegates heard a dozen papers from various EU crop scientists presenting their studies on co-existence and discussed the technical merits of differing separation distances between plants, flowering times and risks of cross-pollination.
The two GM crops where co-existence was particularly addressed were maize and oilseed rape, as the limited cultivation of these crops is already approved in the EU.
In Spain, for example, successful commercial cultivation of GM maize over the past five years proved that co-existence between different agriculture forms was possible and manageable, according to Swiss crop giant Syngenta AG .
Spain is the only EU state to grow GM maize on a commercial scale, using the "Bt" variety. Its national area sown to maize, of which more than 80 percent goes into animal feed, is some 500,000 hectares. Of this, around five percent is GM maize.
"Co-existence between the different types of agriculture has been successfully achieved in Spain, demonstrated by its five-year experience with Bt maize cultivation," said Esteban Alcalde, Syngenta 's regulatory manager for the Mediterranean countries.
ECONOMIC LIABILITY
One of the EU's main tasks will be to set rules for economic liability if there is cross-pollination of neighbouring crops.
Civil legislation on liability for damage to crops, which in this case would apply if commercial value was reduced due to cross-pollination, differs widely across the 15-nation bloc.
Some farmers fear that GM varieties will contaminate their traditional crops and reduce their value. But the reverse might occur, where a GM crop cross-breeds accidentally with a normal type, thus losing the specific GM characteristics of the crop.
Fischler takes the view, supported by the biotech industry, that the EU should not exclude any form of agriculture and farmers should be able to grow the crops that they choose.
"Co-existence means that no form of agriculture, GMO or non-GMO, should be excluded in the EU in the future," he said. "Only if farmers are able to produce the different types of crops in a sustainable way, will consumers have a real choice."
Green groups were less impressed, saying contamination risks were so high that strict EU-wide rules had to be in place before GM and non-GM crops could be grown in close proximity.
"As with so many other previous meetings organised by the European Commission, this round table seems primarily geared towards paving the way for genetic engineering in European agriculture," European Parliament Greens said in a statement.
"It is well established, especially for maize and oilseed rape...that if GM crops are grown on a large scale and without any precautionary measures, then gene flow will occur between fields, farms and across landscapes," it said.