From Procrastination to Procedural Perfectionism – A Short Story of the Long Amflora Authorisation Process

Abstract

In this judgment, the General Court annulled two Commission decisions authorising the placing on the market of the GM potato Amflora. The Court did not base its decision on the arguments put forward by the applicant Hungary, which contested the underlying scientific assessment of the European Food Safety Authority, but found of its own motion a breach of an essential procedural requirement in the applicable comitology procedure.Whilst the Court’s proactive role in scrutinising the Commission's behaviour in the authorisation procedure of GMOs is to be welcomed, the Court arguably missed an opportunity to exercise its role as a deliberative forum for normative controversies underlying the scientific risk assessment.Directive 2001/18 on the deliberate release into the environment of genetically modified organisms, OJ 2001 L 106;Regulation 1829/2003 on geneticallymodified food and feed,OJ 2003 L 268; Article 5 of Commission Decision 1999/468 laying down the procedures for the exercise of implementing powers conferred on the Commission, OJ 1999 L 184.