Turkey issues anti-biotechnology regulation  - 2009-11-04

On Oct. 26, 2009, the Turkish Ministry of Agriculture published a regulation on biotechnology in the country’s Official Gazette. The new regulation bans the import of any biotech product unless it is accompanied by official documentation showing that any biotech event in a shipment has been registered and commercially available in the originating country for a period of three years. This new regulation goes into effect immediately and would also require all biotech products to be labeled.

The American Soybean Association (ASA) is working closely with the U.S. government, the American Soybean Association International Marketing (ASA-IM) and U.S. Soybean Export Council (USSEC) staffs, as well as other impacted industries, in finding a quick solution to this situation will shut down almost $1 billion worth of U.S. exports to Turkey.

Turkey is an important importer of U.S. soybeans and products. In the 2008/2009 marketing year, the United States exported over 690,000 metric tons of soybeans and over 223,000 metric tons of soybean meal to Turkey with a combined value of over $370 million.

The documentation requirements for commodity shipments containing biotech products in this new directive go well beyond that required anywhere in the world and would require expensive shipment-by-shipment testing. Additionally, ASA is concerned that the requirement that a biotech events in a shipment must have been commercially available in the exporting country for three years would effectively halt U.S. soy exports to Turkey. That is because two new soybean biotech varieties were commercialized just this year.

The U.S. Ambassador to Turkey has been alerted and is working with his counterparts in country, while USDA embassy staff work with local industry. In addition the U.S. Trade Representative’s (USTR) office is also having discussions with Turkish representatives at the ongoing World Trade Organization (WTO) meetings in Geneva.