IP/00/1484
Brussels, 18th December 2000
President Prodi welcomes the report of the EU-US Biotechnology Consultative Forum
The EU-US Biotechnology Consultative Forum, an independent group of experts, established at the initiative of Presidents Prodi and Clinton and chaired by Ruud Lubbers, Professor of Globalisation at Tilburg University and former Prime Minister of The Netherlands, with his US counterpart Cutberto Garza, Chair of Cornell University, has today presented its report to the Summit leaders.
The establishment of the Consultative Forum was announced at the EU-US Summit on 31 May, in follow-up to a joint initiative by European Commission President, Romano Prodi, and US President, Bill Clinton. The purpose of the Forum, which brought together twenty eminent independent experts from the EU and US, encompassing a variety of perspectives, was to examine the broad range issues of concern in biotechnology in the European Union and United States.
The twenty-member Consultative Forum has worked very hard over a relatively short period of time to produce a consensus report on the complex and critical issues related to the use of biotechnology in food and agriculture. The Forum has looked at the overall context in which debate on biotechnology has tended to become polarised, at principles and possible improvements in regulatory systems, and at biotechnology in the context of sustainable agriculture in the developing and developed worlds.
At today's EU-US Summit, President Prodi welcomed the report, indicating that it would be a useful contribution to the transatlantic debate on biotechnology. The EU, and US Government [have committed to] looking carefully at the recommendations of the Consultative Forum in the coming months, and to pursuing a co-operative approach in this sensitive area.
The report of the EU-US Consultative Forum will be made available on the European Commission website:
http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/external_relations/index_en.htm
The members of the EU-US Biotechnology Consultative Forum :
Norman Borlaug, Ph.D., Distinguished Professor of International Agriculture at Texas A&M University, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for his work on the "Green Revolution."
Derek Burke, Ph D., Professor, former Vice-Chancellor of the University of East Anglia, former Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Warwick, former Chair of the Advisory Committee on Novel Foods and Processes, Specialist Adviser to the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee.
Gordon Conway, Ph.D., President of the Rockefeller Foundation and an agricultural ecologist.
Susan Davies, is Principal Policy Adviser with responsibility for food issues of the United Kingdom Consumers'Association.
Rebecca J. Goldburg, Ph.D., Senior Scientist at Environmental Defense (USA).
Cutberto Garza MD, PhD. (Co-chair); Professor, Division of Nutritional Sciences, Cornell Univesity, Ithaca NY.
Jennie Hunter-Cevera, Ph.D., President of the University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute.
Noëlle Lenoir, Chair of the European Group on Ethics in science and new Technology, European Union, Justice of the French Constitutional Court.
Dan Leskien, advisor to 'Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit' (Germany) on intellectual property rights and plant genetic resources in developing countries and permanent biotechnology advisor to Friends of the Earth.
Måns Lönnroth, Ph.D., Managing Director of MISTRA, the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research.
Ruud Lubbers, Prof., (co-chair), Professor for Globalisation and Sustainable Development at the Catholic University Brabant (Tilburg University), former Prime Minister of the Netherlands.
Terry L. Medley, J.D., Vice President, Biotechnology, Regulatory and External Affairs, Dupont Nutrition and Health (USA).
Pedro Puigdoménech Rosell, Prof., research Professor at the department of molecular genetics, Instituto de Biologia Molecular de Barcelona. CSIC.
Leonardo Santi, Prof., President of the Advanced Biotechnology Center, Genoa (Italy) and Chairman of the National Committee for Biosafety and Biotechnology Presidency of Cabinet of Ministers Rome.
Christopher Roland Somerville, Ph.D., Director of The Carnegie Institution of Washington, Department of Plant Biology and professor of Biological sciences at Stanford University.
Carol Tucker Foreman, Director, The Food Policy Institute of the Consumer Federation of America, former Assistant Secretary for Food and Consumer Services, US Department of Agriculture.
Ryland Frederick Utlaut farmer of corn, soybeans and wheat near Grand Pass, Missouri, past President of the National Corn Growers Association (USA).
Luis Vasconcelos e Souza, is President of the Portuguese Associations of Maize Producers and Vice-President of the European Association of Maize Producers.
Eduard Veltkamp, Prof., Senior Vice President, Research Unilever (the Netherlands).
LeRoy B. Walters, Ph.D., Senior Research Scholar, Kennedy Institute of Ethics, and Professor of Philosophy, Georgetown University.