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UK grain, feed trade association cautions traders on biotech food (Monday, Jan. 5, 2004 -- CropChoice news) -- The United Kingdom's Grain and Feed Trade Association (GAFTA) has warned exporters to be aware of the ramifications of shipping gnetically modified foods across borders given the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. "GAFTA has advised the grain and feed exporters to follow the directions of the International Grain Trade Coalition (IGTC), which says that the commercial invoice should say 'Cartagena Protocol Provision: The shipment may contain living modified organism (LMO) intended for direct use as food or feed, or for processing, that are not intended for intentional introduction into the environment,'" according to today's Financial Express. Both organizations urged exporters to: know whether the importing country is a party to the Protocol and when that country declared it to be in force. and to learn whether the country has rules and regulations on documenting shipments of transgenic food and feed "IGTC and GAFTA said that the protocol is silent on what constitutes a living modified organism (LMO) shipment and therefore does not define when the documentation is needed. In this context, the IGTC and GAFTA has recommended to the importing countries that unintentional presence of approved LMOs in non-LMO shipment should not be considered a trigger for the "may contain" documentation. The ITGC and GAFTA has advised that "may contain" declaration may not be applicable to those shipments from exporting countries which have not commencedany LMO of that spicies or a shipment contains 95 per cent non-LMO content which by definition may not conflict with the regulations of the importing country." Source: http://www.soyatech.com/bluebook/news/viewarticle.ldml?a=20040105-9