ASTA Suspends Market Choices
21 October 2008 The grain marketing program and certification mark, Market Choices – a certification mark established in 2002 to help growers and grain handlers identify non-EU approved corn hybrids – will be phased out by the fall of 2009, announced the American Seed Trade Association (ASTA). The lack of timely regulatory approvals for corn biotech traits has caused the trade of US corn, corn gluten feed, and distillers’ dried grains and solubles (DDGS) with the European Union (EU) to essentially stop. Regulatory approvals for grain and other feed products derived from seed trait technology to enter the EU has lagged significantly behind US and global approvals; a zero tolerance for traits not fully approved in the EU has made importation of US corn and derived products virtually impossible since 2007.
The Market Choices certification mark has been used industry-wide to help growers easily identify corn hybrids approved for food and feed use in the US, Canada, and Japan, but not yet approved in the EU, serving as a tool for growers to identify these hybrids and segregate the grain away from the EU export market.
Representatives of the European agricultural industry requested the European Commission (EC) allow a tolerance for biotechnology traits not yet approved in Europe but approved in the country of origin, but the EC and EU Member States failed to agree to it at the most recent meeting of the Standing Committee on the Food Chain and Animal Health at the end of September 2008. ASTA, stressing the importance of finding an approved market for grain derived from biotech products, noted that if the EC should provide for a commercially viable tolerance or demonstrate a functioning regulatory system for the approval of biotech events, ASTA would evaluate reestablishing the use of the Market Choices certification mark and the related program with any appropriate adjustments needed to make the program effective.
Said ASTA President and CEO Andy LaVigne: “We reviewed the effectiveness, usefulness, and value of the certification mark. After careful consideration, ASTA decided to suspend the use of the Market Choices certification mark and program over the next year. However,” he added, “the seed industry will continue to assist stakeholders by providing information regarding regulatory approval of biotech events in export markets to growers through the National Corn Growers Association and their related program, Know Before You Grow.”
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