The US won a closely watched trade dispute on Tuesday when the WTO ruled that the EU breached international rules by restricting imports of genetically modified crops and food made from them.
The decision, which was not made public but was discussed by federal trade officials, also represents a victory for the agricultural biotechnology industry, which for years has been battling opposition to its products from consumers and governments in Europe and some other countries.
The ruling by a three-person panel at the Geneva-based trade body is not expected to flood Europe with biotech foods. But US government and industry officials said it would help discourage other countries from adopting similar barriers and would set a precedent that countries must have sound scientific reasons for rejecting genetically modified crops. Some countries have feared they would lose exports to Europe if they were to grow the crops.
"One of the reasons we brought the case was because of the chilling effect the EU's actions had on the adoption of biotechnology," a US trade official told reporters on Tuesday.
Officials of the countries involved in the dispute were still trying to digest the ruling, which US officials said was 800 pages, the longest ruling in the organization's history.
The US, joined by Canada and Argentina, filed a complaint against the EU in 2003, claiming that a moratorium on approvals of genetically modified crops that Europe adopted in 1998 violated a food trade treaty that requires regulatory decisions to be made without "undue delay" and to be based on science.
The three countries also complained that six European countries -- Austria, France, Germany, Greece, Italy and Luxembourg -- violated trade rules by banning even biotech crops that had been approved by the European Commission.
Europe had argued that it did not have a moratorium but that it just took more time to weigh the possible risks to health and the environment posed by genetically engineered foods. It said it needed to take a "precautionary" approach to regulation, which is different from what it called Washington's "laissez-faire" stance.
The trade organization panel appears not to have challenged Europe's regulatory process for biotech crops. Rather, it said Europe failed to follow its own procedures, resulting in undue delay of decisions.
The panel ruled in favor of the US regarding the bans by the six countries. It also ruled in favor of the US on 23 of 27 specific crops, according to Val Giddings, a biotechnology industry consultant who said he had been briefed on the ruling.
Genetically modified crops, mainly corn, soybeans and cotton containing bacterial genes that provide resistance to herbicides or insects, are widely grown and consumed in the US but rarely in Europe.
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