A BBC noticiou em 30 de Novembro de 2006 que a Hungria definiu a distância de 400 metros como sendo a separação legal mínima para quem quiser plantar milho transgénico. Ambientalistas a sério, os húngaros? Nem por isso. A verdadeira razão, revelada no final da notícia, é económica: a Hungria tem uma posição forte no mercado europeu de cereais em parte porque é um país livre de transgénicos, e não quer pôr isso em risco. Os húngaros sabem fazer contas.

Por cá… ainda está para chegar o ministro da agricultura que mande fazer o primeiro estudo económico sobre o impacto dos transgénicos em Portugal. Mas a ignorância não parece perturbar ninguém, porque a distância real adoptada para o milho transgénico em Portugal é… cerca de 18 metros (para quem optar por linhas de bordadura). Será que o pólen cá em Portugal é mais bem educado e sabe que não pode passar da cerca do vizinho?

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https://www.b92.net/eng/news/comentários.php?nav_id=38304

Hungary sets limits for GM crops

By Nick Thorpe
BBC News, Budapest

Hungary’s parliament has overwhelmingly backed legislation to restrict the planting of genetically modified crops (GMOs).

The Act came despite a plea from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences for more liberal legislation.

Under the law, a buffer zone 400 meter wide will have to exist between any GMOs and adjacent fields.

The written agreement of all landowners within that buffer zone will also be needed for planting to go ahead.

Farmers, environmentalists and scientists who oppose the introduction of GMOs worked closely with parliamentary deputies from both the governing and opposition parties on this legislation.

Critics of the legislation – led by biotech firms, some farmers and a vocal group of scientists in the Hungarian Academy of Sciences – say such stringent conditions will make it almost impossible to plant GMOs in Hungary.

Hungary, like Austria, Greece and Poland, already has a moratorium in place against one particular genetically-modified organism which is permitted elsewhere in the European Union.

The Act is seen as a way of pre-empting expected pressure from the European Commission to end that moratorium.

Hungary is the second-largest exporter of maize seed in the EU, second only to France.

Supporters of the legislation argued that the strong position of Hungarian grain on the European market was partly due to its label as a GMO-free product.
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