EU experts deadlocked on bans by France and Greece on GM maize; Global area of biotech crops rose to 125m hectares in 2008
Feb 17th, 2009 | By Finfacts Ireland Business & Finance Portal | Category: News worldwide
EU experts deadlocked Monday on whether France and Greece should lift their bans on growing the sole GM (genetically modified) seed approved for planting: an insect-resistant maize engineered by US company Monsanto. Despite opposition in the EU, the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications (ISAAA) said last week, that the global area of GM crops rose from 114m hectares in 2007 to 125m hectares in 2008, producing a harvest worth $7.5bn (€5.8bn, £5.2bn). The number of farmers planting GM crops increased from 12m in 22 countries to 13.3m in 25 countries.