 |
| National
Corn Growers Association and U.S. Grains Council members returned
from a European mission this week. In attendance were (from
left) NCGA First Vice President Gerald Tumbleson, USGC Chairman
Paul Williams, Biotech Working Group Chairman Darrin Ihnen and
NCGA President Leon Corzine. |
NCGA,
USGC Visit Europe on Biotech Mission (7-1-05)
National Corn
Growers Association (NCGA) and U.S. Grains Council (USGC) leaders
traveled to Europe last week for discussion of the key issues facing
Americans and Europeans in regard to biofuels, biotech corn and
trade.
The joint mission
met with officials from Great Britain, Belgium, Switzerland and
Spain. NCGA President Leon Corzine, NCGA First Vice President Gerald
Tumbleson, Biotechnology Working Group Chairman Darrin Ihnen and
NCGA CEO Rick Tolman represented corn growers on the trip.
Biotechnology
was a big issue in each country the group visited. Corzine and Tolman
said the scientific community is embracing biotech corn. Governments
and the European Union are lagging behind, however.
“Biotechnology
is safe and is not posing any health risks to anyone,” Corzine
said. “It’s becoming clearer that the European Union
is using this as a trade barrier. Most producers want access to
the technology in order to help them with product practices.”
Tolman said,
“The whole scientific community in Europe is very supportive
of biotechnology. But this hasn’t changed the political climate.
Recent votes by the European Union and its parliament have made
it very clear this is a trade issue, not a food safety issue.”
The mission
was happy to hear that Europeans are using biofuels as a way to
decrease oil dependence.
“Europeans
are beginning to understand the importance of renewable fuels and
it’s increasing in places, just as we are here,” Corzine
said. “There’s a great deal of interest in what agriculture
can do in order to meet energy needs in the United States.”
“There’s
a lot of interest in Europe on biofuels. They’re making some
fairly significant commitments to biofuels. They have a goal of
hitting 2 percent of their transportation fuel in biofuels by the
end of 2005. These are EU-commissioned goals,” Tolman said.
“If you run through the math on that, that’s more aggressive
than we have. We were able to share a lot of information with them
about what we’re able to do on bioenergy in the United States
and what they’re doing. They’ve made an institutional
commitment to biofuels.”
The mission
also talked about trade issues with European officials.
“When
we were in Spain, the Spanish importers very clearly said they were
anxious to reopen the market with the United States,” Tolman
said. “They prefer to buy from the United States. Given that
there is biotech corn being grown in Spain. There was a very strong
outcry from the importers in Spain that they would like to be able
to buy in the U.S. again.”