Towards a New Regulatory Framework for Gm Crops in the European Union: Scientific, Ethical, Social and Legal Issues and the Challenges Ahead

Aware of the significant potential of nascent biotechnologies, the European Economic Community (the predecessor to the European Union) was one of the first regions in the world to develop a regulatory framework for them. Back in the 1980s, the objective of Community member countries was to strengthen the standards of consensus and collaboration, and of environmental and health safety, as well as to promote an industrial sector of enormous potential. In spite of all effort, towards the end of the 1990s it was a widely accepted fact that a number of political and economic factors were blocking the development of biotechnology in Europe. From that crisis emerged what in some aspects is probably the most comprehensive and rigorous body of regulations for biotechnology in the world today. However, the very high technical level of those regulations did not prevent a new crisis which EU institutions aim to solve with a new regulatory framework. Thus, since March 2015, the way towards the third regulatory framework for Biotechnology in the EU has been open. Will this third regulatory framework finally offer sufficient guarantees to allow a healthy and sustainable development of biotechnology in the EU? What do we need to do so that 'third time is lucky'? In this work, a group of European and non-European experts, from different disciplines and approaches, discuss the past and the present, as well as the various possible futures, of Genetically Modified Crops in the EU.