GMO Deregulation Becomes Law in Europe: 20 Organisations Condemn a Deeply Harmful Vote Against Food Sovereignty and the Rights of Farmers and Consumers

17 June 2026 – Twenty Italian organisations (list below) defending peasant, organic and biodynamic agriculture, as well as the rights of consumers and citizens, deem the European Parliament’s final vote on the proposed Regulation on GMO plants produced with New Genomic Techniques (NGTs, rebranded in Italy as TEA – Assisted Evolution Techniques) to be extremely serious. The regulation has also been stubbornly backed by major European and national agricultural associations, against the interests of farmers. This measure forms part of a broader deregulation agenda promoted by European institutions under the false belief that it will improve competitiveness.

The Regulation will result in a complete deregulation of new GMOs: it provides for the removal of risk assessment, traceability, identification and detection methods, liability rules and measures to prevent contamination, as well as product labelling for consumers. Moreover, EU Member States will not be able to exercise the opt-out, that is, the option to ban cultivation on their own territory, currently applied by two-thirds of Member States and by some regions. These core provisions of Directive 2001/18 on GMOs will no longer apply to NGTs, which will be able to circulate freely on the market and in the environment, without transparency and without pre- and post-market monitoring.