A spokesperson for the German government this week said that Germany intends to stand aside in voting on a controversial variety of genetically modified maize.

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Even if Germany does abstain in the Council vote, scheduled for 11th February, there is unlikely to be a qualified majority in the EU council, meaning the decision on whether or not to license the maize (Dow Pioneer's TC 1507) will pass to the European Commission.

Health Commissioner Tonio Borg said this week that, if there is no majority, according to old EU regulations, under which the TC1507 application was filed, the Commission would be obliged to approve the GM maize.

Environmentalists suggest that a recent decision by the General Court to annul the approval of a variety of GM potato could bode ill for TC1507. The Court ruled that the Commission had committed legal errors in its approval of BASF's Amflora potato, which was licensed in 2010, but withdrawn from sale two years later, before the license was rescinded following the General Court's ruling in December 2013.

Commissioner Borg added that he would like to see new regulations introduced which would allow individual states to prevent GM crops being grown on their territory, even if the variety in question had been approved at EU level. In past voting, these compromise measures were blocked by three of the then 27 member states (both pro-and anti-GM states were involved in derailing the compromise measures).    

Across the EU, GM crops are banned in eight of the 28 member states, though the legality of these bans is a subject of dispute. Italy and France are opposing approval of maize 1507, whilst Britain and Spain are supportive (most of the EU's only licensed GM crop, Monsanto's MON810 maize, is grown in Spain).     

Engineered to produce an insecticidal toxin and resist applications of certain herbicides, the licensing application for TC1507 was first made in 2001. The process had been deadlocked until, following a legal complaint by the manufacturer, the EU General Court ruled that the Commission had been responsible for holding up the application.

Health watchdog EFSA has released favourable scientific opinions on the maize in the past, but environmentalists opposed to its approval maintain that there are serious gaps in safety data and that TC1507 may harm non-target insects.

Although pro-GM governments, such as the UK's, argue that European agriculture risks being 'left behind' unless the bloc embraces GM crops, GM-sceptic governments have expressed fears over the potential effects on their natural environment and food sovereignty and questioned the hype surrounding the crops.

The area under GM crops covers 170 million hectares worldwide. However, 80 percent of the crops are grown in just three countries (the United States, Brazil and Argentina). Reports from the United States suggest more farmers are encountering problems with pests and weeds that have developed resistance to GM traits or herbicides used in concert with tolerant crops.

In 2012, research funded by the US government revealed that widespread herbicide resistance in weeds has led the amount of chemicals used by farmers to increase dramatically since the 1990s, when GM crops were first commercialised. Professor Charles Benbrook, who led the research, stated, "Resistant weeds have become a major problem for many farmers reliant on [GM] crops, and are now driving up the volume of herbicide needed each year by about 25 percent."

Though the crops' manufacturers blame the trend on greedy growers, failing to follow best practice, critics believe such resistance is inevitable, and that certain growers' failure to rotate crops or observe other recommended measures has only exacerbated a latent problem with current industrial techniques.  

Last year, researchers from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand found that the GM crop package adopted by US farmers appears to have put them at a disadvantage compared to their European counterparts. The researchers concluded, "The combination of non-GM seed and management practices used by Western Europe is increasing corn yields faster than the use of the GM-led packages chosen by the US."

They added, "Our research showed rapeseed (canola) yields increasing faster in Europe [alongside declines in] chemical herbicide and even larger declines in insecticide use, without sacrificing yield gains, while chemical herbicide use in the US has increased with GM seed."