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The rise in animal feed prices and potential impacts in the EU:
Causes and links to GMO policy
Download
Friends of the Earth Europe briefing, December 2007 (192kb PDF file)
Summary:
Animal feeds have become more expensive, provoking a crisis in the livestock industry. The European Commission's DG Agriculture, the Biotech Industry and the Animal Feed Industry are claiming that it is the EU's GMO policy that is harming the EU livestock industry. This scaremongering is an attempt to use rising animal feed prices to weaken EU GMO policy when infact the blind rush for agrofuels and poor weather conditions are causing the worldwide shortages in key feed crops.
This briefing looks at the reasons for the rise in prices, addresses whether China constitutes a threat to the EU and analyses GMO policies in different regions of the world. The briefing refers to a report issued by the European Commission's DG Agriculture in June 2007 which accuses the EU's GMO policy of being the problem behind the crisis.
Contents
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Introduction
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"Asynchronous" approval of new GM crops between US an the EU has virtually NO impact on EU feed imports.
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Emerging markets: China does not pose a risk.
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EU livestock crisis exists but not because of EU GMO laws: poor harvests and biofuels.
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What should the EU do?
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European Conference on GM-free Animal feed:
Quality production and European regional agricultural strategy
Co-hosted by
European Network of GMO-free Regions and the Committee of the Regions
Brussels, 5-6 December 2007
Download
conference report by GM-free Ireland (large 3.2MB pdf file)
Summary:
This conference was attended by representatives of the Irish Department of Agriculture & Food, the Irish Cattle and Sheepfarmers Association, the Irish Organic Farmers Association, the GM-free Ireland Network, along with stakeholders representing 43 European Regions and key players from
Switzerland, Brazil, the USA, Canada, India and China to discuss GM-free animal feed, marketing,
supplies, certification, eco-social considerations, retail strategies, and related aspects of CAP reform.
Across Europe, Regional Governments, farmers organisations, animal feed importers, feed compounders,
food retailers and consumer groups are co-ordinating agreed Quality Agriculture strategies for the
production of meat, poultry and dairy produce from livestock fed on certified Non-GMO soya products.
The onference found that Europe can meet its requirement for certified GM-free soya feed from global markets, but security of
supply requires regional coordination and forward planning. Participants called for CAP reform to include
an EC label to support the market for meat and dairy produce from livestock fed on Non-GM feedstuffs, (as the German Parliament has done in January 2008).
Contents:
About the conference; organisers; Irish delegation; agenda;
The Brussels Declaration on Animal Feed;
presentation summaries; downloads; and notes.
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Background
This section of our website provides information about how to stop the contamination of Ireland's meat, poultry and dairy produce via animal feed that contains GM ingredients. (See subsection links above). It outlines the economic and legal benefits of a GM-free food chain, and includes practical information for livestock farmers, animal food producers and exporters, stud farms, horse owners, and pet owners. It also includes an article on the devastating effects caused by Irish farmers' use of animal feed containing GM soya beans and GM soya flour on farmers, ecosystems and indigenous peoples in South America.
We aim to provide a comprehensive listing of non-GM animal feed suppliers for Irish farmers, together with an up-to-date register of providers of non-GM fed Irish animal produce for overseas buyers. This section is a work-in-progress: we welcome your feedback and collaboration.
The main point to bear in mind are:
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In February 2007, a petition signed signed by 1 million EU citizens called on the European Commission to legislate that food products such as eggs, meat and milk where the animal has been fed with genetically modified crops should be labelled as such. The petition was handed over to EU health commissioner Markos Kyprianou. "This petition reflects the broad concern of the public for food safety, for the quality of food and in particular for the use of GMOs in the food chain," said Marco Contiero from Greenpeace at a press conference together with the commissioner. "Currently there is a loophole in the legislation and we hope that the commission will actually act in order to cover this loophole, because millions of tonnes of genetically modified crops are entering the European market every year, used in animal feed," Mr Contiero said, adding that consumers in the EU are not informed about this. "A petition supported by 1 million signatures of course shows a strong interest on the part of European citizens for a specific issue and therefore we will take this into serious consideration," Mr Kyprianou said. "Being presented now with a strong view on the part of the European citizens, of course we will look into the matter again," he said, adding that he would consult with his advisers. The right of citizens to form an initiative and become more involved in EU issues is part of the European Constitution, rejected by France and the Netherlands in 2005 but seeing a revival by the current German EU presidency. According to the treaty, if a petition collects one million signatures, the commission can then be asked to look into the issue. "Even if the EU constitution is not ratified it is still a principle for the EU - it has a political weight that cannot simply be disregarded," Mr Contiero explained. (See EU Observer article).
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The global market for meat, poultry and dairy produce from animals fed on a certified non-GM diet is growing rapidly. Over 70% of EU consumers refuse GM food, amidst mounting scientific evidence of their negative health, environmental and legal impacts. 94% of EU consumers want the right to choose whether or not to eat GM food. The 30 largest EU food brands and the 30 largest EU food retailers have a GM-free policy (see The EU market for non-GM-labelled food). These food brands and retailers are now extending their bans to include meat and dairy produce from animals fed a GM diet.
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Most Irish meat and dairy produce comes from animals whose diet is contaminated with GM ingredients; 90% of this produce is exported to markets which increasingly refuse GM food.
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Although a loophole in EU law still allows meat and dairy produce from livestock fed on GM feeds to be sold without the GM label demanded by consumers, leading EU and US food brands and food retailers are already refusing Irish meat and dairy produce contaminated by GM feed stuffs. These include Marks & Spencers, Coop Italia, and Baskin Robbins Ice Cream.
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The agribusiness-biotech industry and its stooges are promoting the myth that non GM animal feed either too expensive or simply not available.
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Affordable non-GMO animal feed is widely available on the global markets; much or all of this could also be grown in Ireland.
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Irish farmers who phase out the use of GM animal feed are already securing premia in the meat and dairy export markets.
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The extra costs to consumers are minimal.
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Leading Irish animal feed suppliers are willing to import non-GM animal feed in response to demand.
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The Irish Creamery and Milk Suppliers Association (ICMSA) and the Irish Cattle and Sheepfarmers Association (ICSA) are now exploring ways to phase out the use of GM animal feed, so as to gain competitive advantage in the export markets and to protect Ireland's valuable image as the clean green food island.
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The rest of this page provides more detailed information and related resources.
Irish meat and dairy produce widely contaminated with GM animal feed
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Most non-organic Irish meat and dairy produce currently comes from livestock whose diet includes GM soya, GM maize, GM maize gluten, and/or GM oilseed rape. In response to an officlal Parliamentary Question by Green Party TD Dan Boyle, the Minister for Agriculture and Food Mary Coughlan admitted in December 2006 that 95% of the total maize and soya imported into Ireland for use as animal feed in 2005 was genetically modified, along with 3% of imported rapeseed. (She did not supply figures for GM contamination for 2004 or previous years on the grounds that EU law did not then require contaminated feedstuffs to be labelled as such.) Bord Bía still provides its Quality Assurance certification to such contaminated produce, even though it is increasingly refused by leading EU retailers and food brands such as Marks & Spencer and Coop Italia.
Certified non-GMO animal feed is widely available
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The biotech industry and its stooges in the IFA and the Irish Government still promote the myth that farmers must accept GM animal feed because there is no alternative, or that the alternative is too expensive. In reality, affordable certified non-GMO animal feed is widely available. Suppliers include Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) www.admworld.com (which supplies non-GM soya, maize and oilseed rape feed products to leading farmers in the UK), and
IMCOPA www.imcopa.com (which supplies certified non-GM soya from family-owned farms in Brazil). More information and contact details.
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Minimal extra cost to consumers
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According to a UK study carried out in 2005, the extra costs for consumers are minimal:
€ 0.00177 per litre of milk (average UK dairy herd);
€ 0.01331 per kilo of pork;
€ 0.01775 per kilo of chicken;
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The growing market for GM-free food
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94% of EU consumers want the right to choose whether or not to eat GM food, and over 70% of EU consumers refuse GM food. The 30 largest EU food brands and the 30 largest EU food retailers have a GM-free policy. For details, see The EU market for non-GM-labelled food.
The EU market for meat, poultry and dairy produce that comes from animals fed on a certified non-GM diet is thus growing rapidly, amidst mounting evidence of their negative health, environmental and legal impacts.
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Premia for farmers and producers:
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Sainsburys introduced milk derived from cows fed a GM free diet in some of their UK supermarkets in 2005. They paid £ 0.015 / litre extra to the farmer and charged the consumer an extra £ 0.05 / litre. Sales have been very successful and Sainsburys is now increasing the number of stores selling the product. For more info about this contact Sarah North at Greenpeace UK on + 44 207 865 8100.
The Silver Pail dairy in Cork signed a mutli-million euro contract in March 2006 with the world's largest ice-cream manufacturer, Baskin-Robbins, to provide ice-cream for the European market from Irish cows fed a GM-free diet.
Kepak www.kepak.com and the Kildare Chilling Company may provide premia to Irish farmers who use GM-free animal feed in beef production.
Irish farmers wishing to enter this growing market for safe non-GM fed animal produce should therefore phase out their use of animal feed contaminated with GM ingredients as soon as possible. Currently 95% of soya used in Irish animal feed is genetically modified.
We are currently working with stakeholders to explore the feasibility of setting up:
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a national certification scheme for Irish non-GM fed live cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry;
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a national certification scheme for Irish meat, eggs and dairy produce from non-GM fed animals.
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Register of non-GM animal feed suppliers
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There is a plentiful and sustainable global supply of non-GMO animal feed.
Please contact us if you want to be listed in these registers:
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How to source non-GM conventional and organic animal feed
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Non-GM feed for horses
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Non-GM pet food
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The role of livestock in Irish farming
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70% of Irish farmers produce live cattle, and/or beef, lamb, pork, poultry, eggs and dairy produce. Ireland currently exports 90% of its cattle, meat and dairy produce. Only 30% of Irish farmers produce cereals, vegetables and fruit (which would soon become contaminated if the agri-biotech industry, WTO, EC and our Department of Agriculture and Food succeed in their plans to introduce GMO seeds and crops).
Luckily, Ireland is in a position to achieve a GM-free animal food chain more easily than many other EU countries — at least when it comes to cattle rations. That's because most Irish cattle are outdoor-living grass-fed animals which only consume a comparatively small amount of the processed feed compounds which may be contaminated with GM ingredients. (Some other countries keep their cattle indoors for long periods, during which they may consume large quantities of feed compounds contaminated with GM ingredients.) Note that grass-fed live Irish cattle and beef fetch premium prices in the leading EU markets because of their superior quality and flavour.
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GM contamination of animal feed
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Since 1995, the majority of Irish non-organic meat, poultry and dairy produce has come from animals fed on rations contaminated with GM ingredients. For cattle, this may include GM maize meal and gluten, GM soya bean meal and hulls, and in some cases GM rapeseed meal. Commercially available soy-based feeds generally contain 40-60 percent material from GM soy beans. We have been informed that GM rapeseed meal is also being fed to Irish horses. Most farmers were not aware of this until the EC labeling requirement for GM animal feed came into effect in April 2004. See more information on non-GM animal feed.
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Known sources of GM contamination in Irish farm animal feed compounds
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GM soya beans (includes whole beans, soya meal and soya hulls)
Soy meal is the single most important animal feed in the EU, accounting for 55 percent of protein-rich animal feed. The Member States of the EU annually import approximately 40 million tonnes of raw soy products. Half is used in animal feed, either as entire soybeans or as meal leftover from oil extraction. Soybean imports come from Brazil, the US, and Argentina, which are the world's leading producers of soybeans. All three of these countries practice large-scale GM soybean cultivation. For the most part, imports from the US, Argentina, and parts of Brazil consist at least partially of GM soybeans. It is estimated that 60 to 90 percent of world soybean exports come from genetically modified plants.
Irish farmers' use of animal feed containing GM soybean ingredients imported from Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay and Uruguay is directly linked to major eco-social disruptions in these countries. Problems include massive deforestation; soil erosion; increased use of toxic weedkillers, pesticides, and fungicides; crop contamination; crop losses; soil and water pollution; human poisoning; increased food prices; hunger; and millions of farmers going out of business and being displaced. For details see GM soybean: Latin America's new colonizer by Miguel Altieri (Professor of Agroecology, University of California, Berkeley) and Walter Pengue (Professor of Agriculture and Ecology, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina).
For an in-depth report on how GMO soya is contributing to deforestation in South America, download the excellent Greenpeace report Eating Up the Amazon available at www.greenpeace.org/international/press/reports/eating-up-the-amazon (large 7MB pdf file).
The good news is that there is a plentiful supply of GM-free soybeans having less than 0.9 percent GM content from certain states in Brazil. These areas grow exclusively conventional soybean cultivars and carefully ship their crop to Europe separated from GM products. Soybeans that do not require GM labelling come with a certificate and are sold at a premium. For details see more information on non-GM animal feed.
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GM maize (used in maize meal and maize gluten)
Europe is quite self-sufficient when it comes to maize. Almost two thirds of maize production in the EU is used in animal feed. GM maize is currently being grown in Spain, France, Germany, the Czech Republic, and Portugal. Europe's GM maize crop is mainly used for animal feed. Most of the maize in European animal feed is not genetically modified. If GM maize production in Europe were to increase, so would the amount of GM feed fed to animals, especially cattle. The EU Member States import maize gluten (a protein rich maize feed from the US) and sweet corn (from Argentina) in small quantities. Both of these countries are major producers of GM maize.
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GM oilseed rape (used in rapeseed meal)
GM rapeseed for use as animal feed can now be legally imported into Ireland, although as far as we know there is no GM rapeseed grown in the EU. This is of particular concern because the accidental spillage of these tiny seeds that will inevitably result along the way would result in the de facto release of a GM crop into the Irish environment, without the EC and government authorisations that are legally required for its cultivation, or the consent of the affected farmers and consumers. Any spilled seeds will result in widespread GM contamination of conventional and organic varieties of oilseed rape. Spilled seeds are also very likely to contaminate both related Brassica crops (including broccoli, brussel sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, collards, kale, kohlrabi, mustard and turnip) and unrelated
species, via wind-borne pollen and a process known as horizontal gene transfer. No insurance company will provide cover against GM contamination. For more on this download our 2 September 2005 press release.
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GM cottonseed
No GM cotton is grown in the EU. Although GM cottonseed animal feeds could reach the European market through imports of raw materials, imports from North America remain low and relatively insignificant.
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We are unaware of GM contamiation of the following animal feed ingredients: dried barley, dried wheat, rye, oats, sunflower meal, distiller's grain, citrus pulp, native and imported beet pulp.
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Minimum detection threshold for GM contamination
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The minimum detection threshold for GM contamination in food and animal feed is said to be 0.01% with current technology. This level has been demonstrated to be realistically realisable in Austria, and should be adopted as a legal upper limit.
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EC GM labelling laws for food and feed
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EU Directive 1830/2003 requires all food and animal feed containing more than 0.9% of GM ingredients to carry a GM label which must state "This product contains genetically modified organisms", regardless of whether or not the final product contains DNA or protein resulting from genetic modification. A cursory examination of animal feed bags labels for Irish cattle and sheep indicates widespread contamination with GM soya meal and GM maize gluten.
Animal feed from GM-free crops that have subsequently become contaminated unintentionally by GMOs (during harvesting, storage, transport or processing) is not subject to traceability or labelling requirements if it contain GMO traces below the 0.9% threshold level, provided the presence of such GM material is "adventitious" or "technically unavoidable", i.e. where farmers can show the competent authorities that they have taken "appropriate measures" to avoid the presence of GM material".
Only a few GM seeds and crops are legal in the EU. Material from unauthorized GM seeds and crops may also be present in conventional food and feed as a result of "adventitious" or "technically unavoidable" presence during seed production, cultivation, harvest, transport, or processing. This presence is tolerated up to a maximum of 0.5% for a limited number of GM substances which have benefited from a "favourable risk evaluation" by the EC's Scientific Committee on Food, Scientific Committee on Plants, or the European Food Safety Authority (see list updated on 13 January 2006).
Large quantities of Illegal GM animal feed have enterered the food chain without detection or labelling. 2,546 tonnes of Syngenta's illegal Bt10 maize gluten imported by Arkady Feed Ltd was unloaded at Greenore port in Co. Louth on 26 May 2005. The Bt10 maize had been mislabelled since 2001 as a legal variety called Bt11, resulting in about 133 million kilograms of the maize making its way into the human food chain in the USA and Europe. Bt10 maize produces its own pesticide and is prohibited world-wide because it contains an antibiotic resistance gene with threatens the health of animals and humans. This is the first known case of the banned biotech maize arriving in the EU since emergency measures were adopted by the EC to prevent Bt10 seeping through European borders in 2005. The fact that so many tonnes arrived in a single shipment long after the EU required the USA to terminate the practice, raises the question of how many hundred thousand tonnes of mislabelled Bt10 GM feed may have been fraudulently sold to Irish cattle and sheep farmers - and consumed by Irish livestock and people - over the past 5 years or more.
Nobody knows how much Irish dairy, beef and lamb produce contaminated by Bt10 has been consumed, or exported under Ireland's clean green food island image since 2001. Nor does anyone know how many people may have suffered illness as a result.
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No EC labelling law for food produced from animals fed on a GM diet
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Because of a biotech industry backed loophole in EU law, meat, poultry, and dairy produce from animals fed on a GM diet does not carry a GM label. This loophole is directly responsible for the continued growing and importation of GMO crops for animal feed. As a result, 20 million tonnes of dangerous and unnecessary GM ingredients enter the EU food chain each year, without the public being informed; Irish consumers are inadvertently supporting the cultivation of GMOs for animal feed (typically involving massive deforestation and displacement of peasant farmers in Brazil or Argentina); and Irish farmers risk losing their fair share of the growing international market for safe GM-free food. The fundamental right of EU citizens to information requires mandatory labelling of animal products based on GMOs now. Please sign the Greenpeace petition to close the loophole through a petition to the EC which demands mandatory labelling for food produce derived from animals fed on GM feed.
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EU legislation:
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Directive 2001/18/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the deliberate release into the environment of genetically modified organisms and repealing Council Directive 90/220/EEC.
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Regulation (EC) No 1829/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council on genetically modified food and feed.
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Regulation (EC) No 1830/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning the traceability and labelling of genetically modified organisms and the traceability of food and feed products produced from genetically modified organisms and amending Directive 2001/18/EC.
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Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety to the Convention on Biological Diversity.
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Regulation (EC) No 1946/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council on transboundary movements of genetically modified organisms.
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Commission Regulation (EC) No 65/2004 establishing a system for the development and assignment of unique identifiers for Genetically Modified Organisms.
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Commission Recommendation 2004/787/EC on technical guidance for sampling and detection of genetically modified organisms and material produced from genetically modified organisms as or in products in the context of Regulation (EC) No 1830/2003.
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Commission Decision 2005/317/EC on emergency measures regarding the non-authorised genetically modified organism Bt10 in maize products.
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National legislation:
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European Communities (Genetically Modified Feed) Regulation, 2004 (S.I. 424 of 2004).
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Trader notices:
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TN10 S.I. 424 of 2004.
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Other pages in this section:
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More information on non-GM animal feed
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How to source non-GM conventional and organic animal feed
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Non-GM feed for horses
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Non-GM pet food
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The EU market for non-GM-labelled food
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Register of Irish exporters of non-GM animal produce
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Register of Irish retailers of meat and dairy produce from non-GM fed animals
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