US-Latin Accord Undermines Biosafety Meeting In Malaysia

As negotiations come to a head in Kuala Lumpur at the first meeting of the Biosafety Protocol of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) the United States along with Canada and a few Latin American states seem poised to render the 86-nation agreement irrelevant. News earlier this week that the Argentine Government has offered to collect taxes from its GM soybean farmers in lieu of royalty payments has stunned many delegations attending the meeting in the Malaysian capital. The announcement comes as the United States, Mexico and Canada are pressing governments to adopt their Trilateral Agreement. The agreement sets the actionable level for GM contamination at a whopping five percent.