The
proposition of European Commission for the monopoly of multinationals
on the seeds market was rejected by the EU parliament
Yesterday,
the European parliament has voted for the amendment submitted by the
independent MEP Kriton Arsenis, for the rejection of the European
Commission proposal to impose monopoly conditions for multinationals
in the European seeds market through a legislation. As Arsenis stated
on tvxs website, "De facto, this proposition has died."
This
legislation would give the monopoly of seeds to multinationals
resulting to the loss of traditional seeds. Specifically, Arsenis
stated that "This legislation would set the conditions and
obligations of the farmers on the seeds they should cultivate. The
seeds should be written on lists in order to be used legally by a
farmer. An expensive procedure would be promoted, not affordable by
the farmers, thus biodiversity would be impossible to survive. This
would only serve multinationals as they would be the only ones that
could survive. Everyone would be forced to buy seeds from the
multinationals. Even the smaller companies were against this
legislation. It was rejected almost unanimously by the plenary
session."
Arsenis also
stated that:
"This
is a big win for democracy. The European parliament has sent a
powerful message to the multinationals of seeds, securing the right
on food safety and free access. It would be practically impossible
for the Greek and European farmers to retain and reproduce their
seeds, in case that this battle was lost".
"Undoubtedly,
the wins are the result of the intense work from all, but also the
result of the mobilization of citizens, who through the mail and the
social media flooded European parliament in order to reject the
legislation. This win proves that the European parliament acts
positively in the democratic control and that each citizen has the
opportunity to affect the European legislation on a daily basis."
Some good news at last...Congrats! Well done!
ReplyDeleteLet's hope that will last ...
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