The European Parliament's Environment Committee has backed moves by Welsh MEP Jill Evans (Plaid Cymru - the Party of Wales) to radically tighten up proposed regulations on GMOs.

The regulations relate to the labelling and traceability of products containing, consisting of or produced from GMOs. The amendments proposed jointly by Jill Evans and German colleague Hiltrud Breyer MEP feature:

* tighter labelling requirements - only produce with less than 0.5% material produced from GMOs will not have to be labelled provided the presence of the material was adventitious or technically unavoidable;

* tighter Community regulation requiring member states to introduce safeguards to avoid GM contamination of non GM produce. The amended proposals will be debated in a full parliamentary sitting in the beginning of July.

Speaking from Brussels, Jill Evans MEP said:

"I'm delighted with the result of today's vote - the Environment Committee endorsed almost all of the amendments that we'd tabled. This is an important step forward for those of us who oppose the careless proliferation of GMOs in the environment. Thanks to the tighter labelling requirements and the introduction of a traceability scheme it will be far easier to monitor the presence of GMOs in the food chain."

"This is a good day for European farmers who do not want to and who don't grow GM crops. The Environment Committee has made it very clear today that it will not accept the GM contamination of the food chain and it will not accept that conventional and organic farmers are put at economic risk due to the uncontrolled GM contamination of their products."

"These stringent yet sensible measures are good news for farmers and consumers and I look forward to the full parliamentary debate in a few weeks time."

End.