6-Regulation: Ukraine Parliament rejected GE legislation

[GENET <genetnl@xs4all.be>]

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TITLE:  Attempt to adopt the first GE biosafety legislation in Ukraine
        failed
SOURCE: Green Dossier, Ukraine, by Tanja Topchiy, ttopchiy@hotmail.com
DATE:   January 18, 2001

------------------ archive: http://www.gene.ch/genet.html ------------------


Attempt to adopt the first GE biosafety legislation in Ukraine failed

Today the Parliament of Ukraine - Verkhovna Rada - has rejected a draft law 
recommended by the Parliament Committee on science and education in respect 
of the state system of biosafety connected with genetic engineering, which 
was meant to become the first national legislation in this field. The 
absence of any legal regulation on introduction and use of GMOs in Ukraine 
is considered to hinder official registration of GE plants and their 
"commercial debut" on Ukrainian fields. Monsanto, the most active biotech 
company in Ukraine, has repeatedly failed to register its Bt potato.

However, MPs have decided to wait with the "first-born" draft law. Member 
of the Parliament Committee on environmental policy, Viktor Khazan, has 
harshly commented on the draft law during the hearings yesterday, claiming 
that it does not guarantee a sufficient safety level as to the regulation 
of GMOs. The same opinion was expressed right before today's voting by the 
member of the Peoples' Democratic Party's Parliament fraction, Sergey 
Shevchuk. Having referred to his medical background he asked the deputies 
"not to make foolish things by voting 'for' the draft law, which is unsafe 
for Ukrainian people".

Ukrainian public has not remained voiceless as well. This morning members 
of the Committee on environmental policy have distributed to MPs two 
hundred copies of a public appeal to the Parliament and the President of 
Ukraine with a request to put off an adoption of this draft law. More than 
fifty people, who signed the appeal - ecologists, doctors, agriculturists, 
journalists, lawyers and members of consumer associations - have expressed 
uncertainty that the existing draft law could ensure biosafety and health. 
Instead, as its written in the appeal, this document guarantees 
LifeSciences "easy living in Ukraine". People demand public hearings on GE 
legislation, explaining that "eating GMOs" is everyone's issue. Other key 
demands in the appeal are moratorium on approving GMOs until they are 
proved safe and labeling of the products, which might contain GE material. 
The rejected draft law is now to be considerably revised and rewritten 
before it returns to the Parliament.



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