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Researchers at the University of Cambridge are working to modify the chicken genome to prevent the spread of avian flu and other diseases. The British relaxation of rules on crop and livestock genome modification would open the door for scientists to further research into genome editing. According to Cambridge experts, there is currently knowledge and technological tools to modify the chicken genome to prevent the further spread of disease.
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Last week, the German agrochemical company Bayer confirmed its return to the organic seed market, initially focusing on vegetable seeds - tomatoes, cucumbers, and sweet peppers. The company said in a statement that its new organic seed offering would be commercially available in the United States, Canada, and Mexico from 2022, as well as in Italy and Spain.

The European Commission is preparing the Commission's work plan for 2022. The Commission's final work plan should be presented on 19/10/2021 during the European Parliament's plenary session in Strasbourg. According to preliminary information, the European Commission should plan to present legislative proposals during 2022 concerning, inter alia, integrated water management (focusing on surface and groundwater pollutants); certification of carbon removals; the EU framework for harmonized measurement of transport emissions; reducing the release of microplastics into the environment; but also, a review of competition policy rules. According to the original Farm to Fork plans, the Commission should also present in 2022 a revision of the Directive on sustainable use of pesticides, or several revisions and proposals aimed at food labelling (nutrition information, country of origin, expiry date).

The European Commission is preparing a proposal for a regulation to reduce the risk of deforestation and forest damage associated with products placed on the EU market. The first working version of the document was published last week. The draft regulation is being prepared by the European Commission's Directorate-General for the Environment (DG ENVI), the regulation should include a requirement to strengthen the due diligence system for specific products and selected commodities and a ban on placing deforestation-related commodities on the EU internal market. The ban should not apply to all production processes of companies, but to selected commodities without geographical discrimination. However, the current draft version also envisages the possibility of categorizing countries according to the degree of risk of deforestation into low, medium, and high-risk countries (but this possibility is already criticized by environmental organizations, who fear that low-risk countries could move goods from high-risk countries without much attention). Deforestation criteria would be based on scientific knowledge, build on existing internationally recognized definitions, be non-discriminatory and practicable. Selected commodities most threatening further deforestation include palm oil, soybeans, wood, beef, cocoa, cereals, and coffee. The aim of the proposal should be to prevent at least 29% of deforestation by 2030 in connection with the production and consumption of the commodities concerned. The Slovenian Presidency proposed a possible exchange of views on the proposal to the Agriculture Council on 11-12/10/2021 in Luxembourg, with a progress report to be adopted at the Agriculture and Fisheries Council on 13-14/12/2021. The European Commission is likely to present the proposal on 22/12/2021, which should be presented by the Executive Vice-President of the European Commission, Frans Timmermans.

The European Parliament approved a new regulation on antimicrobials in plenary on 16/09/2021, rejected a proposal calling for stricter restrictions on the use of antibiotics in animals, and supported the Commission in its ongoing efforts to tackle antimicrobial resistance. A legislative proposal was presented as early as May 2021, proposing criteria for identifying antimicrobials to be reserved for the treatment of certain infections in humans, as recommended by the European Medicines Agency. The Commission will now draw up a list listing all antibiotics that will be classified as antibiotics reserved for human use. Thus, some antimicrobials can only be reserved for human medicine, and according to Stella Kyriakides, Commissioner for Health and Food Safety, this is a crucial step in the fight against antimicrobial resistance. However, the May proposal was opposed by the Greens' political faction in the European Parliament, led by German MEP Martin Häusling, who submitted a counterproposal on behalf of Parliament's Environment Committee (COMENVI) in July. Häusling challenged one of the criteria for the inclusion of antimicrobials in the reserved list (of great importance for human health, existence of a high risk of resistance), namely the criterion that the reserved antibiotics must not include antibiotics which are essential for animal health. However, according to Häusling, this criterion is not strict enough, as there is a risk that many of them will not be included in the dedicated list of antibiotics at all due to this criterion. However, on 16/09/2021, the EP plenary rejected Häusling's counterproposal.
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