EU ministers rebuff plans to overturn GMO bans (Reuters)

LUXEMBOURG (Reuters) - EU environment ministers dealt a blow on Friday to efforts to get more GMO crops grown in Europe as they agreed to uphold eight national bans on genetically modified (GMO) maize and rapeseed types.

The vote was a sharp rebuff for the European Union's Executive Commission, which had wanted the ministers to endorse an order to lift the bans within 20 days.

It also played into the hands of the United States, Canada and Argentina, whose suit against the European Union at the World Trade Organization alleges that EU biotech policy harms trade and is not founded on science.

The EU's 1998-2004 biotech ban, they say, was illegal.

"The (decision to lift the bans) were all rejected, it was very unlikely but Spain led and other countries followed," a Commission official told reporters.

Spain is one of the few countries to extensively grow GMO crops in Europe where much of the public view them as "Frankenstein" hybrids despite industry assurances they are safe.

Even though the EU has now lifted its six-year unofficial moratorium on approving new GMO products, national governments have consistently clashed over biotech policy.

Between 1997 and 2000, Austria, France, Germany, Greece and Luxembourg banned specific GMOs on their territory, focusing on three maize and two rapeseed types approved shortly before the start of the EU moratorium.

The maize types include one that is manufactured by Swiss agrochemicals giant Syngenta and known as Bt-176, another that is made by U.S. biotech giant Monsanto and known as MON 810, and a third made by Germany's Bayer and known as T25.

Both rapeseed types are made by Bayer.

The ministers also failed to agree on authorizing a GMO maize made by Monsanto, known as MON 863.

"That comes back to the Commission," the official added.