Seminar on Novel Food: "What will we be eating in 2025?" in the EP in Brussels. Statements by Jan HUITEMA (ALDE, NL), Jos&eacute; BOV&Eacute; (Greens/EFA, FR), Shadow Rapporteur, Eleonora EVI (EFDD, IT), Shadow Rapporteur, James NICHOLSON (ECR, UK), Rapporteur, Pavel POC (S&amp;D, CZ) and Pilar AYUSO (EPP, ES), Shadow Rapporteur

Brussels

statement

NICHOLSON, James (ECR, UK)

seminar

novel food (T)

AYUSO, Pilar (EPP, ES)

POC, Pavel (S&D, CZ)

HUITEMA, Jan (Renew, NL)

BOVÉ, José (Greens/EFA, FR)

EVI, Eleonora (Greens/EFA, IT)

EP seminar on Novel Food: "What will we be eating in 2025?":  extracts from the MEPs discussion and statements

External shot of the European Parliament in Brussels.

SOUNDBITE (English), James NICHOLSON (ECR, UK), Rapporteur, "Our agrifood sector is constantly changing, constantly adapting and constantly improving. We must always be prepared for change. We need a legislative framework in place to keep up with the technological developments of the past 20 years"

SOUNDBITE (English), James NICHOLSON (ECR, UK), Rapporteur, "Food from animal clones are now explicitly covered by this regulation, with absolutely no room for legal ambiguity as made clear in the recital".

SOUNDBITE (English), James NICHOLSON (ECR, UK), Rapporteur, "The transparencyof the process has been significantly strengthened by obliging the Commission to publish the summary of every application. Also the list of rejected applications should be publicly available."

SOUNDBITE (English), Jan HUITEMA (ALDE, NL), "You all know that world population is growing and the demand for food is increasing rapidly, with almost 60% in 2050, but the resources, land use and things like this are scarce, so we have to produce more with less and in that we need to have innovation. Not only that, also we have to look to food quality. I think nutritional value is becoming more and more important".

SOUNDBITE (French), Jos&#233; BOV&#201; (Greens/EFA, FR), Shadow Rapporteur, "The most important question is, first of all, the health of consumers, which is more important that the interest of companies, it is necessary to remind that. I also remind you that the Parliament has said 'no' for a second time to cloning and imports of cloned animals and here I would like to directly address the Commission and the Council: I don't want you to try and arm-twist us again, just because they are holding trade talks in paralell, like with the US and Canada".

SOUNDBITE (English), Eleonora EVI (EFDD, IT), Shadow Rapporteur, (On nanomaterials) "The executive director (of the EFSA) told us that, of course, in every assessment we have a certain level of uncertainties. This is a fact".

<p>SOUNDBITE (English) Question of a Latvian journalist:</p>  <p>- "What is the market share of the novel foods now? How do you expect it might grow by 2025, taking into account that this legislation will be passed?"</p>

SOUNDBITE (English), James NICHOLSON (ECR, UK), Rapporteur, "Will it be massive? Who knows, I can't tell, who can say in the longer term how big this may or may not grow? I just don't know, if you go back fifty years ago and saw the diet eating habits of the European population, they have changed dramatically in that time, who knows in another fifty years".

SOUNDBITE (French), Jos&#233; BOV&#201; (Greens/EFA, FR), Shadow Rapporteur, "In the food industry we have the implementation of a technology, adding materials that we can't evaluate because we don't have the scientific instruments to measure their amount".

SOUNDBITE (English), Pavel POC (S&amp;D, CZ), Shadow Rapporteur, (On nanomaterials) "This wording we have on the table is a result of trialogues, is a result of the opinion of the Commission and the Council, it's a sort of a compromise between three positions. But I would like to say here that the environment committee and the food safety committee really voted for a much more ambitious wording of this part".

SOUNDBITE (English), James NICHOLSON (ECR, UK), Rapporteur, "Time does not stand still and, if we don't go move with times and take on this new ideas, think them through and have a very serious look at them, then something may well happen or it will pass you by."

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), Pilar AYUSO (EPP, ES), Shadow Rapporteur, "The European Food Security Agency will evaluate according to the existing methods, to all the scientists there are in Europe, but we have to accept that there is no such thing as zero risk and that cars and roads are secure and still there are accidents. That's unavoidable".