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China’s biotech approval process back in spotlight

 

China’s confusing biotech approval process is back in the spotlight after the country recently approved two GMO products but left four others on the waiting list.

Iowa ag secretary Bill Northey will be in China next week as part of an Iowa agricultural trade mission. He says the issue of biotech trait approval will likely be discussed.

“There needs to be a process—a little more transparent—so people know what’s coming,” Northey says. “Some of the events have been in front of them for a long, long time. All of the information is in, everybody else has approved them, and the Chinese have not made a decision to approve them. So that actually keeps them off the market in the U.S.”

In the end, Northey says, U.S. farmers are the ones being hurt.

“It limits our ability to able to have access to some good technologies that producers at least like to have the choice of being able to use on their farms,” he says.

China on Monday approved Syngenta´s Agrisure Duracade corn and Monsanto´s 87427 glyphosate-resistant corn, sold under the Roundup Ready brand. But four other products are still waiting for approval, including Dupont Pioneer’s insect resistant Qrome corn, Dow´s Enlist soybeans and two alfalfa products developed by Monsanto.

AUDIO: Bill Northey