State still bans GMO crops despite federal rebuke

In 2011, the German government decided that it would reject Mexican honey that was contaminated with transgenic products. Photo: Sipse

Mérida, Yucatán — Almost a year after the state government declared the area free of GMO crops, the Secretariat of Urban Development and Environment (Seduma) and the Ministry of Rural Development (Seder) are sticking to their guns despite a looming federal order to reverse it.

The state’s declaration prohibits crops with genetically modified organisms, such as transgenic soy, which is incompatible with agricultural activity such as beekeeping.

A lawsuit filed by the federal government to annul this state decree has not advanced.

“There is still no resolution date, the process is in the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation. The lawsuit continues in the courts and I do not have more information about it, nor a date for a solution,” explained Eduardo Batllori Sampedro, head of the Seduma, in Sipse newspapers.

The decision to establish a GMO-free state is rooted in a 2011 decision by the German government, a major importer of Yucatecan honey, to reject honey contaminated with transgenic products.

The Court of Justice of the European Union in 2012 decided that foods that had pollen from transgenic crops would not be commercialized.

In December 2016, six months after the state decree was published, the Federation requested the SCJN to annul it.

Not all soybeans are transgenic.

“We are working with a soybean from Huasteca, and in the south organic soy is being tested as an alternative,” said Batllori Sampedro.

Source: Sipse

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