D.J. NORDQUIST: Good morning, everybody. Hi, welcome. Thanks for coming. I'm D.J. Nordquist, director of communications for the initiative on food and biotechnology. A special hello to all of those of you watching this event live via webcast -- there's a camera right up there.

For those of you not familiar with our project, the initiative was established earlier this year to be an independent and objective source of information on agricultural biotechnology for the public, media and policymakers. We are funded through a grant from the charitable trusts through the University of Richmond, and have been set up as an honest broker in the debate over agricultural biotechnology, meaning that we are committed to providing information and encouraging debate and constructive dialogue. We are happy to sponsor today's event in an effort to advance that goal.

Today, we hope to stimulate an informative discussion about the political, economic and cultural differences that have led the European Union and the United States to adopt such divergent approaches to the regulation of genetic and modified crops. We hope the initiative's participation will help frame the debate, the international debate, and help put it in a deeper context. This policy dialogue is one in a series of events that the initiative is hosting. As I mentioned, it's also being broadcast on the web. If any of you are interested in additional information about the initiative and our research, please go to our website, that's www.pewagbiotech.org. We will also archive this broadcast and have a transcript available on our website tomorrow.

Now, it gives me great pleasure to introduce today's moderator, a man who most of you undoubtedly already know, so I'll make his biography short. David Gergen has been an active participant in American national life for 30 years, serving as an adviser to Presidents, a commentator and editor, a teacher and a best-selling author. Mr. Gergen served in the white house as an adviser to four Presidents -- Republicans Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and most recently, Democrat Bill Clinton, whom he agreed to serve, first as counselor to the President, then as special international adviser to the President and Secretary of State, Warren Christopher. Mr. Gergen serves as editor at large of "U.S. News & World Report." He is host of "the world at large with David Gergen," and appears as a regular analyst on the ABC News program "Nightline." He is also a professor of public service at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and is co-director of its Center for Public Leadership. This fall, he published a book, "Eyewitness to Power: The Essence of Leadership from Nixon to Clinton." With Mr. Gergen's clear qualifications and experience in dealing with thorny political issues, the initiative is very pleased to have him here with us today, to help navigate the contentious issues surrounding trade in jam, food and crops. With all that he's got on his plate, no pun intended, we're glad he could be here with us today. Please welcome Mr. David Gergen.

DAVID GERGEN: Good morning, and welcome to one and all, to this very interesting session that we're about to have, sponsored by the fuel initiative. My role is to ask a few questions and duck, as far as I can tell. And the rest of us are here to learn as much as we can about what is a -- can be a very contentious issue between the United States and Europe at a time, of course, when we are so deeply joined in fighting terrorism. And I think that many raise the question of whether this fight over food could, in fact, spill over in some fashion to our relationship in other areas.

We have -- the initiative has organized a first-rate panel. Many of you here probably are familiar with some of these individuals, but perhaps you have not heard them talk among themselves. We just had a conversation in another room here for a few moments, and it was not only enlightening, it was really, really interesting, and so I'm looking forward to hear from all four of these. Let me introduce them briefly. You have their bios in your packets, so I don't want to spend a lot of time now on the bios, but I'll introduce them briefly in the order in which will speak.

Julia Moore will open, to provide context, and she is someone who is now at the Woodrow Wilson international center for scholars. She has been studying this issue for a while now. She spent a year in London, conducting research for her project on genetically modified -- the GM food controversy. She has been a major player in public policy in this city for some 20 years. I will not go through all of the different relationships that she's had, where she has had a splendid record. It's really quite a resume. But before this, she was at the NSF for five years as director of legislative and public affairs.

She will be followed by Tony Vanderhagen -- and we're glad you're here, sir -- who is a minister counselor in the European commissions Washington, D.C., delegation, responsible for consumer affairs and food safety. And in particular, biotechnology. He first joined the European Commission in 1968, so he is deeply familiar with the workings of the EC, with European politics and this issue, as you know, involves politics as much as science. And he has been particularly active on the questions of food and health and consumer protection in recent years. So we're particularly delighted that you have been able to join us this morning, Tony.

Also joining us is David Hegwood. David Hegwood, who's counselor to the secretary of the United States Department of Agriculture. That's a position to which he was appointed in June of this year. His responsibilities include the coordination of international trade issues and biotechnology issues. He is an attorney. He began his career as a foreign service officer in the foreign agricultural service of the USDA. He was deeply involved there in the Uruguay realm and served as agricultural attache at the U.S. Embassy in Rome and the U.S. Mission to the European Union in Brussels. So David comes to us with an enormous amount of knowledge and background of these very issues, as well in sitting in an American chair.

And then we will ask Fred Yoder to join the conversation. Fred is the President-elect of the National Corn Growers Association and has kindly come to us today from Ohio, where he has a farm with 1,000 acres of corn, soybeans and wheat, as I understand it. Is that correct? And I think, as all you know, the National Corn Growers Association is a huge organization, which represents nearly 32,000 individual members in 44 states. Mr. Yoder has also worked closely within that organization on biotechnology, recently completing his term as chairman of the biotechnology working group. So we have four people who are extremely well-qualified to talk about this.

I think all of you know the basic contours of this question, the genetically modified food, the biotech food has taken off here since 1966. It has been a major part of American agriculture in these last several years. Today, the United States, the global land here in the United States that's used for planting biotechnology crop varieties represents 68% of all of the land in the world that is now under such production. Indeed, the United States' land mass that is used for producing biotech crops is greater than the entire land mass of the United Kingdom. So this is a significant portion of American agriculture. For the last three years, there has been a moratorium in Britain and Europe, with regard to the import of GM foods.

And now, as all of you know, there is a proposed regulation which is quite controversial, which has been put forward by the EC for potential adoption by the Council of Ministers and by the European Parliament in the next couple of years, and that is what brings us here. The proposal of those of those -- of the regulations and the United States' strong response. As you know, David Byrnne was here two weeks ago in Washington to talk about that. Some believe he ran -- he was surprised by the degree of opposition he found to the proposed regulations, and now is the time we want to advance that conversation by really allowing an engagement, encouraging an engagement between representatives from the European side and the American side. Again, Julia, perhaps you can provide much richer context. Help us -- to help set up the conversation and then we will turn to Tony.

JULIA MOORE: I've been asked in about three minutes to summarize for the audience how we got here and why. I don't know if I'll be able to completely answer those questions, but I'd like to start by saying that science is really not at issue here. You have everyone in the European Union, from past Atlantic U.S. trade representative Bob Zolik's counterpart, conceding that GM food really poses little if any environmental or health risk to consumers, but acknowledging that European consumers by and large do not want GM in their food. What are the reasons for this? Some have said that it is not a food divide, but a cultural divide, and they've pointed to the fact that Europe is the home of haute cuisine and America is the home of Big Macs and Whoppers. And it's because the Europeans care more deeply about the quality of their food, and therefore this issue has taken on an importance which it hasn't in the United States.

Others have also looked at about 20, 25 years of public opinion polls, which show that America is the most technologically and science-friendly place on Earth. We think that science will contribute to our future more than any other country. We've never met a gadget or gizmo we haven't liked. We are just the scientific and technological kings of the world. I think that's not what the public opinion data shows.

Europeans are not luddite. They have a long and eminent science history, and there's actually not all that much difference between how Europeans view GM food and how Americans view GM food, if you're just looking at sort of the popular public opinion polls. In particular, Europeans, like Americans, accept biotechnology for health and medicinal purposes, and are much more wary of biotechnology when it's used in food. Another cultural difference that people often point to is the European attitude toward the countryside. Americans with, you know, Yellowstone and Yosemite and the Grand Tetons -- that, for an American, is wilderness. That's where you go to watch your birds, that's where you go for your hikes and your walks. That's what you think of when you think of the environment, and nature wildfire refuges.

In America, I would never go birding on the farms that surround my parents' house in Grover, Missouri. It just, for me, wouldn't be any fun. And you begin to look at the geographic and demographic differences between America and Europe, and maybe you start to understand that there are differences between us that GM food brings out. But for me, while these issues are interesting to look at, the real divide that exists between America and Europe is over public trust and confidence in food regulators. I think that in Europe, largely due to mad cow disease in Britain and then finally mad cow disease and foot-and-mouth disease in very small ways spreading to the continent, you really have a public that does not trust its government to provide for their food safety.

At the same time, the first bulk commodity products of GM food were coming into Europe, government officials in the U.K. were standing up and basically saying to their public that "everything we've told you for the last seven or eight years about mad cow disease is wrong. We told you that we didn't think that it could be transmitted to humans. That was wrong." And by the way, eight people may have died from mad cow disease exposure, a number that's now up to about 100. "All those measures that we said we would put in place that even if it would be transmitted to humans, we'll protect you -- well, we really didn't do a very good job with those measures." And the impression was that both science and government had failed the public.

And just on the heels of this, with no direct consumer benefit, only with products that benefited farmers and growers and food multinationals, these genetically modified products appeared on the European marketplace without labels. This also came on the heels of actually a very successful product being sold in Britain -- a genetically modified tomato paste that came in a can, that offered 40% more tomato paste and a better-tasting tomato paste for the same price as that smaller can sitting on the shelf that was produced by a competitor. Those products just flew off the shelf. In fact, there's a misperception it was a financial disaster. In fact, it was a very successful marketing and consumer success story perpetrated by Venica Foods, Safeway and Sanesburys in the U.K.

I think that what is going on now is, Europe is trying to rebuild the public confidence that it lost through the crisis now through the BSE crisis, now through foot-and-mouth, through a number of agricultural and food scares in Belgium and other places. Until that process is complete, I think we're still going to have this divide between the U.S. and Europe on genetically modified food.

DAVID GERGEN: Thank you very much, Julia. Tony, can you walk us through, if you would please, sir, the regulations that have been proposed so that we all understand them. And either now or in a bit of time, perhaps respond to Julia's central point, that this controversy has more to do with the lack of confidence in European government than it does to do with the safety of the food.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Yeah, thank you, David. I would like to add something to what Julia said, but first of all there was not only BSE as a food scare, there was also Dioxin, there was also --

DAVID GERGEN: Get a little closer, if you could.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Closer? There was also not only BSE, but there was also Dioxin, and there was also the blood scandal, where scientists, by the way, told politicians -- at least in the beginning -- that there was no danger. So the big problem is that consumers don't trust neither politicians nor scientists anymore. And on top of that, one should not forget that there is a food service in Europe, as there is in America, and there's no added value for the moment in the GM products. So the European consumer says, what's happened within all these scandals? Says, why should I take the risk if there's no -- if it's not cheaper, if it doesn't ripe better? And so that's what -- the problem now the European politicians are confronted with, is how to regain this confidence.

And first of all, I should say that the commission now is taking a clear stand in favor of biotech, saying it is safe. But this is a very recent position, because it's had to wait for the results of almost 60 studies which were undertaken under the auspices of the commission. By the way, just a few explanations for those who are not familiar with the institutional system. You have on the one hand the European commission of 20 members. It is not elected. But it's a sort of European government in the making, if I may say so. They are chosen by the member states and also by the President, which has to be accepted by the European farmer. So on the one hand, you have the European commission, which has -- in fact, it's very important -- the power of the monopoly, of proposals. The power of proposals. On the other hand, you have the European Parliament, which is similar to your house here. And then you have the Council of Ministers, which is rather similar, if you can compare it to the Senate.

The commission has taken the decision to come forward with two new proposals, one on traceability and one on labeling and also one on the premarketing of GMs. But that's more sort of modernization, if I may say so, of an already existing legislation, which was quite complicated and the premarketing approval which exists in Europe was decentralized in some way. Member states could take over, could receive the application from the company and decide to approve it or not to approve it. And if there was no objection from the other member states, it was accepted. Now everything will be centralized and the roles shall be, in the future at least, there will be a European food authority which will be created, and which will be affected by the end of next year, beginning of 2003.

This European food authority will be responsible for the risk assessment, and also a very important thing in the context Julia and I described already, is the risk communication with the public. As far as -- I have to come back two seconds and just correct you, David, slightly -- there was no moratorium on imports. There's a moratorium on approval. Of course, we have already approved 18 GMOs that can't go into Europe without any problem for the moment. But I have to confess that since October '98, 14 GMOs are dropped and are pending, although they have been approved by the scientific committees. But they have been dropped by the member states and the political pressure under the public opinion pressure we just described. And you can argue at length about this, but democracy is also a factor, and politicians have to take into account what their population thinks. And under this pressure of the public opinion, five member states dropped sort of a, you know, there is a system -- weighing system, correct? And there is a minority blocking possibility and five members states together could drop this procedure. And that's why since '98 there has been no approval anymore.

And then, one a new dialect just came into force, which was a sort of modernization of the existing directive, which, since 1995 I think, already foresaw labeling -- don't forget that labeling of GMOs is already in force in Europe. But that had to be modernized. Once it was adopted, these five member states, and a sixth one, even said, "We can't resume the approval process as long as you don't come forward with details of what is in this new directive," and that is traceability and more stringent labeling. So that's why the commission can forward with two proposals -- regulation proposals. One on traceability and one on labeling. The one on traceability is one just to foresee safety in case something would happen, as it's happened in the United States, by the way, with starling. The other one, labeling, is not based on science.

I should insist on that, as Commissioner Byrnne insisted, don't come up with arguments about science. There is no scientific element here. It is only a way to be transparent and a way to regain confidence and to lift confidence of the consumer. By the way, I should say that with the treaty of -- Article 153 foresees the fundamental right for the consumer to be informed. And perhaps a difference, also, between the United States and Europe is that in Europe, labeling is informative. Mostly informative. There are exceptions, but --cigarettes, for instance -- but it is informative, generally speaking. Then in the United States labeling is quite -- is generally speaking, a warning. So you see the difference already, as far as that is concerned. That is the -- in a few words, the description of the legislation which is coming up now, which has to be adopted by the open Parliament and by the Council of Ministers.

And the difference between Europe and the system in the United States is not very big. It will also take a few months, if not a year, before these -- this legislation will be adopted.

DAVID GERGEN: Thank you, Tony. David Hegwood, tell us why the Europeans are wrong from the American perceptive. Why shouldn't consumers know in Europe if it's GM food?

DAVID HEGWOOD: Well, thank you, and good morning. There are many areas in which we agree with our European friends, with respect to biotechnology. I think, as we've heard this morning, we agree that generally these products are safe, and in many respects, food products derived from biotechnology are safer than their conventional counterparts, at least to the extent that they have been more extensively tested and reviewed. I think we agree that this technology has tremendous long-term potential to address many of the food needs of the world, which will become more pressing in the next decades as the population grows and we have more strain on our environmental resources. And I think we agree that the difficulties that we face in this transatlantic issue will ultimately be solved when consumers accept this technology.

But I think where we disagree is with respect to these new proposals that the European commission has released. I want to be clear about precisely what the problem is. There are -- there are two separate issues from the U.S. perspective. One is the approval process for new products. Some of these are, in fact, old products that have been stuck in the approval system for quite a long time. We want to see that restarted.

We accept that every sovereign country has the right to provide an approval process for products of this technology. We have never denied that of any country. We think that the process should be science-based, and we are very encouraged that the EU is moving forward to try and restart their approval process. But the second part of this issue is the traceability and labeling proposal, and that's a completely separate proposal. Now, it's being portrayed as a way to address consumer concerns and to restore consumer confidence in the EU food safety system. And we hear citations to the problems with BSE, to Dioxin, even to Starlink. And frankly, it's hard for me to see how the traceability and labeling proposals restore confidence as the European -- the politicians in Europe seem to hope that it will.

We have two very specific concerns about the proposals. One, we don't think they serve the intended purpose. We don't think they will in fact do anything to increase the safety of the food supply, particularly foods derived from biotechnology. And, two, we think they're commercially impractical. And that's a very serious problem, because from our perspective, part of what's happening here is that Europe has a political problem, and they're trying to shift some of the burden for resolving that political problem onto the United States, onto its trading partners by requiring us to undertake certain measures to change the way we do business to meet their requirements.

Primarily what we're talking about, when I talk about our concerns with the traceability and labeling proposal is the shipment of bulk commodities. Primarily corn and soybeans in the United States. This is not just a bilateral issue, either. There are other countries who are producing these crops and who have the same concerns that we do -- countries like Argentina and Brazil and Canada. But we're talking about commodities that are shipped in vessels that carry 50,000 tons at a time. These are not commodities that are in bags, or oil that's in cans. These are bulk commodities, and we cannot segregate in this country, the genetically modified products, genetically modified corn or genetically modified soybeans from the conventional varieties. We can't identify in every ship the specific genetically modified varieties that are contained in that ship. So we have no way of saying, "This ship contains varieties xyz," which in part is what the European Union regulation would require.

So we have to ask, why does this traceability and labeling proposal help to restore consumer confidence? Why is this requirement being imposed upon the United States and other exporting countries? Is it -- it doesn't -- the purported purpose is to help withdraw the products. But every shipload of corn or every shipload of soybeans that goes to Europe contains every genetically modified variety that is currently commercialized in the United States. If, for some reason, one variety were identified with a food safety problem or an environmental risk, then how do you withdraw those from the market? When, if that product has essentially gone throughout the world? We have come up, Starlink -- we'll cite it as an example, why we need to do this.

Well, we dealt with Starlink -- the Starlink problem very effectively without a traceability and labeling proposal, and we think the Europeans could do that as well. And just very quickly on labeling and the consumer's right to know and how you address that issue. There's a much simpler way to address the labeling issue in Europe, and that's to provide for labeling of products that are not genetically modified, similar to the way we provide labeling for organic products or provide labeling for fat-free products. And those are all commercially driven labeling regimes, and if this was a commercial issue, if it's a consumer issue, then why can't it be dealt within the context of a commercially driven labeling system?

DAVID GERGEN: Okay, a number of questions arise from that. Before we go back -- 'cause we already had Tony shaking his head here at one point on the traceability. We'll come back. But I wondered now if -- Fred, if you could describe for us in a little more graphic detail, from a farmer's point of view, why -- tell us how it sort of works at the farm level and then gets into a product that goes overseas, and why traceability and labeling really are disruptive, or what are presented in terms of exports, so we can understand it and just see the process at work.

FRED YODER: First of all, just let me say that the farmers have tried some biotech products over the last several years, and they work, and they work very well. We have a high degree of confidence in their safety and we do see increased production from using these. However, keep in mind that biotech seed costs much more than the conventional seed, so we have to justify the additional costs versus benefits before we make the decision to use it. And it doesn't always happen that we do that. I mean, we have to weigh that value versus what we get out of it. And so there's many farmers that choose not to grow biotech seed. As a matter of fact, 74% of the corn that was grown in the past year was nonbiotech. Only 26% was biotech. 32% Of the beans, the soybeans that were grown in this country were nonbiotech also.

One of the problems that we get into when we get into desegregating and shipping overseas is the fact that you may -- not so much now but in the very short-term future, you may see several events of BT, corn board protections, for instance. And so each, brand of seed might have a different event, so it gets to the point where you have to segregate seeds or your commodity corn by brand, and separate that and keep it in separate bins and so forth. And keep in mind, we can do anything that the Europeans want us to do.

We can segregate, but it's the -- the problem comes is the cost. Who bears the cost of these -- of the segregation going on? I mean, in order to comply with the current European Union requirements, you really basically have to a sealed container on the farm because of the lack of tolerances that are put forth to make sure that that particular vessel got shipped directly to Europe, and who's going to pay for that extra cost?

The key here, in my mind, is that the American farmer will grow that our customer desires. Whether he wants biotech, whether he wants conventional. We can do that. We're America, we can -- we're big and we can figure out a way to do it. We've got some technology that we can use. We're only as good as whether we leave it -- when it leaves our farm, it's out of our control. The rest of the chain has to be able to pick up and go, and can also absorb the extra cost, too.

The question is -- we need to have a protocol in place that's reasonable. The European Union's proposal with such tight thresholds is not in our minds feasible to do. However, if you would raise or make the thresholds, say, a 5% thresholds instead of a 1%, now you're talking less costs, you're talking more practical, and you're talking more value to the consumer in Europe that ends up with a product that they want, but with a reasonable threshold that is not all eaten up by additional testing and impurity problems.

DAVID GERGEN: I think most people here understand the difference between 1% and 5%, but can you explain it briefly so that -- on the threshold question?

FRED YODER: One of the problems in dealing with this problem is even in our seed -- as we buy our seed on the farm, the people that grow the seed as far as seed purity are allowed as much as 2% of inert ingredients, and when you go ahead and you put the seed in the ground and you grow a crop, how in the world do you think that the purity is going to get better? Obviously, you know, we have to think pollen, it cross-pollinates. It's not even possible to keep it at 2%. So how in the world can we guarantee a crop -- and we're talking in the very best conditions of raising seed in the purest form that has a 2% tolerance, how in the world can we get it down to a 1% tolerance and meet the requirements? We can't do it. We need to go to a higher tolerance in order to make sure that things are practical. And that's the whole problem as far as purity.

DAVID GERGEN: Tony, why is that an unreasonable position on the part of American farmers and USDA? He's saying, look, on the traceability question, if you're really going to -- we have a hard time getting out 2%, and you're putting an impossible burden on us by asking us to get down to 1% on traceability. What is the argument here? And we can live with 5%. If you do 5%, then we can all get along here. What's unreasonable about that proposition?

TONY VANDERHAGEN: We have a contradiction in what Dave said. On the one hand, we should have labeling of GM-free. And on the other hand, we should go higher than the threshold of 1% with the relationship because, in fact, it's quite clear that there is no purity anymore. So we didn't choose for the GM-free labeling because we didn't want Greenpeace or Friends of the Earth to come behind us and say, "Listen, you have labeled this GM-free, and in fact, it isn't." Because it is very difficult today to have a pure product.

On the other hand, we chose to have a threshold of 1%. I must confess that it is low. We think that the industry in time would be able -- the American farmers with time will be able to do -- to reach that threshold. But we even think that in parliament, there will be a strong opposition to this 1% and that many members of farming will try to go lower than that. So that's the situation in which we are.

DAVID GERGEN: David?

DAVID HEGWOOD: Well, again, I have to come back to 1%. A 1% threshold is being imposed because this is what the politicians in Europe want. But what's the relationship between a 1% threshold and then you include safety risk or any environmental risk?

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Yeah, the risks -- something that David said that I have to correct. When David came over in March also, he consulted a lot the American administration and also the American industry, and he took into account two of their requests. The first one was just to -- no longer to have the obligation to specifically say which environment is in the commodity shipment. That has been changed, David. The sentence "may contain" will be sufficient now. And the other thing is that we also accepted a threshold of 1% for events that have not been approved in the EU, but which have been approved in the U.S., Which is a risk for the commission to have proposed this, by the way.

DAVID GERGEN: David, is the burden of traceability the more serious, more difficult one to figure out than the labeling issue? The labeling issue is questionable, words on a package. Traceability seems to have some real-world effects on how farmers have to conduct their business. And I'm wondering if -- can one separate out in your mind - at USDA, which of these is really the more objectionable and you really want to get rid of? Would you want to get rid of traceability and then negotiate on for labeling, for example?

DAVID HEGWOOD: Well, I can't put it quite the way you put it. But let me say that labeling is an issue we are struggling with in many countries -- and more and more countries. It's not -- it's no longer just an issue that we face in Europe. And we are trying to look at ways that we can address the labeling issue.

There are commercial implications to labeling, and one of the serious implications is that the response -- there are certain things that can be done from a practical standpoint, but one of the complications is that the response to labeling in countries among the food companies tends to be to reformulate so that they don't have to label. That has an impact on those countries and those food companies' willingness to buy U.S. products because they perceive U.S. products to be containing genetically modified ingredients. But having said that, yes, I think there are ways that we can find to deal with the labeling issue.

The traceability issue is in some ways more complex and more unnecessary. It's being portrayed as something that's needed in case there's a food safety problem in the future, in case there's an environmental problem in the future. In other words, it's being portrayed as something that's being put in place to deal with the possibility that some risk will arise at some point in the future, but as yet is unspecified. And to ask exporting countries to pay a commercial price to address this political risk in Europe -- it's not a real risk, it's a political risk -- we think is unfair.

DAVID GERGEN: I would like to pose one more question to the panel and then go to the floor, and then we're going to also be taking questions from our friends on the internet. Julia, can you walk through the potential scenarios that you see unfolding in this controversy, and which one's the most likely and what are some of the alternatives? Start with this. If we stay on the current course and the governments are unable to resolve their differences, where are we headed? And then let's look at the alternatives to that.

JULIA MOORE: I think we have to remember that this is very complex issue. It took us almost nine years to settle the banana wars between America and Europe. I think that this is a much tougher nut to crack. And I keep having to try to avoid those food analogies, but I don't quite know how to do that.

I think we're going to be talking about this issue over the pond, over the Atlantic, for many more years to come. I think you have to have a lot of -- you have to give some opportunities for the Europeans, albeit they're facing a political problem. It's a real one. You have to give them the opportunity to try and rebuild that trust with their consumers, and I think they're doing that. I believe in the UK, for example -- the food standards agency, which is only a year and a half old, has done a very good job of starting to rebuild confidence in the real basket case of Europe in terms of confidence in governments to protect food safety of the United Kingdom. They're providing much greater transparency than they used to provide before in terms of decisionmaking, in terms of the research that they are doing. They are practicing risk communications at a much higher plane than you've ever seen in Europe in the past.

This model has to have a chance to work and be replicated in other European countries. I think you're also going to have to look, frankly, at the fallout from September 11th. It has not only affected the United States, but it has affected Europe and our trading relationship. I don't know how that trade relationship will have changed because of September 11th. I think it's still too early.

Are we, when we're putting pressure on the Europeans to work with us in this new war on terrorism, going to place the same emphasis on trade disputes that we did before September 11th? I don't know the answer to that question. I think you also have a number of key elections that are coming up in Europe, particularly in France and Germany, which may determine whether the greens are a stronger or less important influence in those important countries.

And that is my cell phone. So you -- the thing that this issue needs most is time. I think most of us here in Washington know the NASA approach that Stan Bolden introduced a few years ago -- faster, better, cheaper. I think the answer or descriptor for the GM debate is slow, difficult and costly. And I really don't see much of a way out of that at the moment. David, is that an acceptable outcome, acceptable path from the point of view of the U.S. Government?

DAVID HEGWOOD: Faster, no. [ Laughter ] Well, it certainly is not a preferred outcome. We -- I think there are things we can do to help improve the situation. And as I said, we recognize that consumer acceptance is ultimately the solution here. We have been living with this issue. We've been losing over $200 million a year in sales of corn to Europe for a number of years now, and I suspect we will be living with that problem for a few more years. So whether it's an acceptable solution, it may be -- it may be the reality. We don't expect a quick solution to this.

But what we hope is that we can avoid putting in place regulations and regimes that will be difficult to remove -- that are unnecessary now from a House and Senate standpoint -- and will be difficult to remove once we get to the point that consumers are prepared to accept this technology.

DAVID GERGEN: Are you prepared to accept that, Fred? Does that put pressure on the U.S. Government to get this -- to really be aggressive here in pushing for a rapid solution to this and not going down this path?

FRED YODER: I think we have to find some middle ground here. One of the things that has come out of this is the biggest problem is not the scientific safety of it, it's the consumer confidence. So if you look at this from a practical standpoint, what's the logical thing to do? We need to put in place a program to gain the European consumer confidence. And you don't do that by making such stringent protocol that they'll never have access to biotech ingredients. But you put a program together that's practical, that's less costly and maybe not real slow, but not real fast, just something that's prudent that gives people the opportunity to gain confidence.

One of the things that we found when I was in Europe last June -- we talked to some consumer groups. One of the things that happened as we talked to them is those consumers didn't understand the process of biotechnology in food products. Once we explained the screening processes we have in the United States here and the regulatory agency that overlooked this and test it to make sure there is no safety issues, that was information they did not have.

And so it seems to me from a logical standpoint, maybe what we need to do is try to give more opportunities for the consumers in Europe to have access to these products and also educational materials so that they can go ahead and make up a reasonable decision on their own.

DAVID GERGEN: I want to come back to Tony in just one second. But, Dave, I want to come back to you before we do that. The tone of what you said suggests that the United States government, while it's going to remain firm in its position, is not going to push that position really aggressively to try to come to a rapid resolution, that you're prepared to accept more years of losses here. And I want to ask the question to Julia Post, has the war on terrorism affected the way we're going to approach the Europeans with regard to food safety issues?

JULIA MOORE: I can't -- we have been trying for a number of years to work more closely with the Europeans on food safety issues. I think there are -- the war on terrorism's pointing a new dimension to that work. I think it raises issues that maybe heretofore we haven't focused on as thoroughly as we might in the future. And I think maybe there -- hopefully there will be a renewed spirit of cooperation on food safety. But as for specific changes, I wouldn't see anything too concrete. I think it's more an issue of the environment in which we will be operating.

DAVID HEGWOOD: Thank you.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Now we would like to say that it wouldn't hurt to try to impose in Europe the American way this product is sold and produced in the United States. I, myself, was the invited to go along to Mississippi to see how this system works here, the commodity system. It is fantastic with total sensibility. It is really fantastic. But don't make the mistake to try to say, "This is the way it works in America. This is good for Europe." That is what we sometimes in Europe call "American unilateralism." And that is sometimes the reason why there is anti-Americanism in the world sometimes.

So I give an example. I talked about the scare, the food scare, which was another thing which didn't help to create confidence in the consumer. That was the ads of American companies trying to sell their products. I'm not going to give the name of the company, but that was totally counterproductive, totally counterproductive, and that didn't help.

So I would say that what could help is that the biotech companies, European and American, really stand up against the rules of the Greenpeace organizations and others to tell -- to try to educate the population. That hasn't been done, and I don't think it's up to the European government to do that. It's up to the private sectors to do that. And again, if there's no -- how would you say, restoration, could you say that -- of the consumer confidence, GM food is dead in Europe if you can't restore this confidence. It is a matter, as Julia said -- and Julia, I have to say something about what you said? Food -- it's quite clear that there's no resistance on the European side as far as GM medicine or pharmaceutical products is concerned. But when it comes to food, food is emotional and is culture in Europe. For those who have gone to Europe, you know that sitting at the table and eat for three hours long is not something surprising and I hope to you is something very important. And, Julia, I'm sorry to say, but there are actually Exceptions -- Britain and Scandinavian countries.

JULIA MOORE: Now we're really hearing about the cultural divide.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: And then a last word about costs. We have -- you keep repeating to us that costs are too high and that the system is reversible, but until now, we haven't seen any paper showing substance changing this. And I think I'm really keen to see that. I think that's important. But there's another cost you're not talking about -- the cost of no biotech being in Europe.

DAVID GERGEN: I'd like to go to the floor if I could. First, I want to go to Cynthia Snyder. And she's been listening here. She said they have just returned from a distinguished tour as American ambassador to the Netherlands and has an interest in this. I'm curious about your perspective and questions that you might have, having heard this conversation. There's a mica here if you want to use that.

CYNTHIA SNYDER: Thank you. A couple of comments and then a couple of questions, picking up, Tony, on your last point particularly of cost to Europe with no biotech. Maybe it would be useful to have you talk about a very specific example of soybeans, for example. Because the change in seeds in Europe now as the result of this, and you can't use the seeds you used to use before, and there will be a need for protein rich seed in Europe that is at the moment, I think, primarily soybeans coming from America and South America. And if this threshold is maintained, which I think everyone agrees is an unrealistic threshold of 1%, what are you going to do? Where's that going to come from, that soybeans?

Then from a public diplomacy front, I'm intrigued to hear you say that that should come from the private sector. I guess I would have thought that would be less trusted than the public sector. I found that interesting. We can debate that, because, they're, after all, selling it. And we certainly, in the Hague, we tried some public sector public diplomacy, offered together with the EU, we organized a conference with Michael Walsh at the EU on biotechnology and the environment. And we found actually, exactly what Fred said, that when you put before a large number of people an open forum with different points of view, scientific experts, not company representatives, consumer experts, Greenpeace, everyone exchanging views and really bringing out the issues -- that was appreciated.

It did get into the press. It did change consumer views, and actually, the Netherlands is the most accepting country in Europe of biotechnology now. But the whole idea that European consumers don't want this is -- I wonder how scientific that is. Now, you have to get down to who do people listen to and how do you ask them the questions? And one way to do public diplomacy is to bring opinion leaders here. And I have certainly found that when groups have come here and they will listen to -- as you said, Fred, listen to you explanation of how this is done and what it really means -- I've literally heard people say, "Well, what is the fuss about? Why do we object to this?" And just removing them from the context where it's so controversial in Europe and just hearing the facts often makes a pretty significant difference. So I actually would do a plug for public diplomacy.

But one final comment on the cost -- I wonder what the cost to Europe in the long run will be if European agriculture also completely rejects biotechnology. The agricultural subsidies are already half, I believe, of the EU budget and with the increase in productivity that comes with biotech products -- I think that's pretty undisputed, whether it's from test reduction or stress tolerance -- there is an undisputed increase in productivity. If the United States and the rest of the world -- and it does look like the rest of the world are using those products and Europe isn't, what's that going to do in the long run to Europe's own cultural industry?

MODERATOR: Thank you. Tony, you want to respond to that?

CYNTHIA SNYDER: The best food in Europe.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Yes, that's true. I have to make a comment about the budget, 50% of the European budget. Well, in fact, it's not 50% it's lower. It's nearly 40%. But it is difficult. It's difficult to say -- well, to accept this as an argument, because if you really compare it to a federal budget, it will only represent 4.5% Of the federal budget of the United States because the European budget is such that it only covers a series of -- a lot of subjects are still national. I think we should be careful about figures.

For the rest, about soybeans, I think that the feed exports will not be hurt by the legislation. I don't think so, because don't forget, these exports, this labeling that it's now going to be a compulsory and mandatory to have it labeled as well, will not be seen by the public. The question is, of course, how well the reaction -- you probably know that McDonald's, for instance, and the fears of British supermarkets have attached to their consumers not to sell meat or eggs coming from the animals which have been fed by GM feed. But apart from that, I don't think that it will influence in the end consumer.

Yes, it will be labeled as a GM product, but that won't be a problem. So the threshold is not irrelevant. It will be labeled as a GM product, but that's it. The public sector was not the one who could do some education of the consumer. Probably could, but I have said already, trust in public sector is not very big in Europe, and if you take France, for instance, after what has happened with the scandal, there is no trust in the French government as far as this is concerned.

As far as the tools are concerned, we have -- as you probably know that. And we regularly are asked questions from the 15 countries -- and it's true that the way the questions are put then influence greatly the outcome, but I think that we are -- the questions -- regularly in 1997 and then again in 2000 was quite unusual. And 60% of the people responded that way. They didn't trust GMO food -- green biotech, not red biotech which is medical or pharmaceutical. There, resistance is only 40%. It's quite strange. And --

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Usually, there's consumer choice, and there is no choice if there are no products.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Well, you're right. But the British tabloids and the Austrian tabloids have played a tremendous role in this scaring the public. They crafted this now famous expression of Frankenstein food, and this was destructive for the public opinion and it is quite, it's not habit or not a challenge that the greatest is.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: -- tomato paste and there is no choice. So I just wondered, how you do know because people can't choose if the products aren't there. In the Netherlands, there are. People buy them.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Well, I would say that one of the first things the industry and the farmers should do in Europe is to go to and see the retainers. The retainers are the linchpin in the relationship between the industry and the consumer. And the reaction of the retainers - all over the continent is that it took away the products because they were scared -- their supermarket and saw them making demonstrations and that was very bad for them. That's it.

MODERATOR: Other questions from the floor. Here, yes, please.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Yes, I had a question -

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Why don't you stand up there so I can hear, please.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: You mentioned that you thought it could work in the European labeling department, and I had always understood that labeling that is going to be proposed -- would label it as GM whether or not you can test the GM substance, so how would you --

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Well, we want it changed. Yes, we have a problem with process-based labeling because it's -- basically what process-based labeling means is that you could have two bottles of soybean oil sitting here. There's no protein detectable in either bottle. One was produced from genetically modified soybeans. The other was produced from conventional soybeans. The one would have to be labeled even though there's no way to detect -- there's no way to verify that it is in fact what it says it is or that the conventional is, in fact, conventional. So we think that this leaves the door open to the possibility of fraud or misrepresentations in the labeling process.

There are other forms of labeling other than process-based labeling. And as I said, countries around the world are pursuing labeling in order to provide consumer information. We don't necessarily think that mandatory labeling is the best way to go, but at the same time, we recognize that countries are doing this. And if they're going to do it, then maybe we need to start looking at how it can be done so that is doesn't mislead the consumers.

MODERATOR: Yes, sir?

MALE SPEAKER: I'd like to know -- between Europe and the United States, I'd like to know how much that resonates -- we are talking about -- the U.S. And Europe have disagreed on setting international standards in areas. There are also developing countries -

PANEL MEMBER: I'll be happy to take a stab at that. It does resonate beyond. Clearly the United States is the largest user of this technology and has -- probably has more products commercialized than any other country, and so is out front in many ways on this issue. But other countries, such as Argentina and Brazil and Chile and Canada are using the technology. Even China is using the technology. And they have an interest in this. The developing countries, I think, are growing more and more interested in this technology, and I think it's becoming recognized that this technology provides solutions to some of their problems, as somebody mentioned. I think it was at the conference that Ambassador Snyder hosted.

Africa has been trying organic farming for decades, if not centuries, and it hasn't worked. And maybe biotechnology is the way that they can resolve some of their problems.

DAVID GERGEN: We are also starting to hear from the internet, and a question that I would like to pose to you, Tony, with regard to wine and cheese. And the issue is here that the EC is asking U.S. producers and manufacturers to trace and label foods that are made from GMOs, but other foods, such as wine And cheese that are made with GAO enzymes will be exempt from such regulations. Can you help us see the difference? Is it a coincidence that wine and cheese is --

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Well, first of all, intellectually speaking, it would, of course, have been easier to have a dividing line between products where there is no trace anymore of DNA or protein and those where there is a trace. That would have been easier. But the commission had to deal with two very difficult groups in Europe, and that was the consumer organizations and the greens. He said -- I think some of you heard him saying that he could deal with one of the two, but not the two at the same time.

SPEAKER: That reminds me of Teddy Roosevelt about his daughter Alice. He said he could either be father of Alice or he could be President but he could not do both.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: And we should know that consumer organization really has a big influence on consumers, which is not really the case, if I understand well, in America and the United States. That's why -- to have the consumer organization on our side, and went so far as to include traceability and labeling, labeling products from GMOs.

As far as the enzymes are concerned, there is one enzyme which is a food additive. That enzyme, if it's a GM enzyme, has to be labeled as well. But when it is a processing aid to make cheese and wine and beer, for instance, then it has not to be labeled. And it has not to be labeled either now. It's not an ingredient.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: So let me get -- I don't quite get this. It is genetically modified. It is associated with a genetically modified process, correct? Genetically modified enzymes are associated with the making of wine, cheese and beer, but there will be no label? And yet, food that comes from the United States which is associated with genetically modified organisms, if we wish to use that word, will be labeled? Are we talking politics or science?

TONY VANDERHAGEN: II understand your question, and I see what you're hinting at. He never thought of it and would somebody have suggested it, he would have refused it. It's the way things are. Again, we make a distinction between posted from and posted with.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Do you understand then why Americans may feel that there is a discriminatory quality to this?

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Yes, of course. Of course. We understand that.

MODERATOR: David, did you have a thought?

DAVID HEGWOOD: I don't think I can clarify anything that Tony has said.

MODERATOR: Sir?

MALE SPEAKER: Yes -- [ undistinguishable ]

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Well, first of all, it is quite clear that this issue, which is a political issue, that's quite clear. I think the discussion has shown it linked to consumer confidence, it will take time to be solved. And also, we'll need a lot of debate. We think that the member states should have debate inside their country and that the decision then in the end should be highly political.

I think that we will have, as you said, not a political reaction on the side of the member states, but to be quite frank, we don't know. We don't know exactly how it is going to finish and what the member states in the end will say because we have the impression that -- for instance, you take Germany. You have a Green minister of environment. You have a Green minister of culture, and these two ministers play a role in the council on this legislation. We have the feeling that the decision will be taken by the chancellor and will not be taken at the level of the ministers. But again, we don't know where it's going.

PANEL MEMBER: Could I just make two quick points? One, I think it's very important to realize that in addition to the domestic politics of France or Germany or other countries in the EU, you have an EU-wide debate over reform of the common agricultural policy. I think the best prospect biotechnology has in Europe is to be a part of that debate. And a part of that debate or successfully being a part of that debate is for biotechnology to deliver for Europe, not for U.S. cotton fields, but for Europe, some of the environmental benefits, which I think biotechnology has the capacity to deliver. And Cynthia and Tony made a very important point that maybe we haven't emphasized enough in this discussion. The genetically modified tomato paste that was so successful in Britain was successful because people saw a real benefit -- better tomato paste for less money.

I think the European common man, though it is difficult -- a man or woman -- is difficult to define with 15, soon to be 27 European Union members, who that common person is, if they saw real, either direct consumer benefit, or if they saw an environmental benefit to biotechnology, it would, I think, make some of these trade conversations a lot easier.

PANEL MEMBER: I don't think it's right, but I have no other answer than slow, difficult and costly, with most of the costs being borne by American farmers. It's going to take time. I think that, you know, people in the United States say mad cow disease and may see it on the cover of "Newsweek," but they have no sense of the impact that that had on consumers, both in Britain and the end of last year on the continent.

Most experts sort of accept the estimate that over the next 30 years, over 100,000 people in Britain alone will die from mad cow disease. Now there are other experts that say only a few hundred -- only a few hundred or a few thousand. There are other experts that say as many as 500,000 people over the next 30 years will die from this insidious disease. We are not just talking about, you know, a starling food scare. This is something that significantly impacted the British psyche.

In Germany, where ministers, like in the U.K., had been saying for years -- or slightly different from the U.K. -- "BSE will never happen here." It only took an outbreak of eight BSE-infected confirmed cattle to cause consumer consumption of beef to drop 50%. 50%. I mean, these are not just consumer whims. These are very difficult consumer confidence busting incidents that have to be dealt with. And part of dealing with them is a rebuilding of their regulatory structure, reform of their agriculture, a lot of dialogue on the part of government and NGOs and private sector groups. And biotechnology for European consumers and environmentalists and farmers have to deliver.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: What did you say the mainstream estimate was the number of possible deaths over the next year?

PANEL MEMBER: Most people would look at that 100,000 deaths over 30 years and say, in Britain, that's probably right. Others will say that's much, much too high.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: That's already built in?

PANEL MEMBER: That's already built in. That's with the measures that have already been taken.

MODERATOR: Yes, sir?

MALE SPEAKER: Generally, people buy food items by brand names. [ undistinguishable ]

TONY VANDERHAGEN: I didn't understand the question. Could you speak a bit louder, please?

MALE SPEAKER: Well, here, especially when we buy a food product -- for instance, one side of Kellogg's Crisp is rice. The other is corn. People just buy things that taste good. They try it. If they like it and have developed a taste is that --

TONY VANDERHAGEN: No, not really. And by the way, the element is something very important in Europe if you ask. They export products which are GM-free because they don't want to -- they are bound to be attacked by -- in the -- how would you say it -- or get a bad name because of the GM. So I don't think there is a real difference.

The real difference between Europe and the United States, I would say, here, is that you have this labeling of nutritional facts. We don't have that. I regret it, personally.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I want to come back to the question about technology and feeding and exploding population of poor people and how important that's going to be the future development. The UN has estimated in the next 50 years the world population will go from 6 billion to some 10.5 billion people or more. 95% Of that growth will come in developing countries. The world bank has said that biotechnology could raise food production by some 25% to help those countries meet that growing demand for food. Is biotechnology going to be a critical part of the answer to the exploding world population in the developing countries and the kind of issues that have been sort of resonating in the background as we have been talking about September 11th. I'm just trying to figure out where biotechnology fits in. David, do you have a sense of that?

DAVID HEGWOOD: Well, it's certainly our view in the Department of Agriculture that biotechnology is a critically important tool to addressing these future food needs -- and not just food needs, but producing this increased amount of food puts greater strain on our environmental resources. And biotechnology offers prospects for both increasing yields and in a more environmentally friendly -- in a more environmentally friendly way.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: In that sense, do you see the European nations as being outliners, that they're running against -- against what is going to become a world trend of using more and more -- raising more and more GM foods?

DAVID HEGWOOD: Well, I think in the long run, the consuming public in Europe will lose its resistance to this technology. But in the short run, it's having an immediate impact. There are farmers in Kenya who want to grow peas and beans for sale to Europe who could have the choice of growing genetically modified varieties that would increase their incomes, and they wouldn't do it because their market is Europe. And so they can't use -- they don't want to use the technology.

MODERATOR: Tony?

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Yeah, I would like to say that biotechnology can be a big help to developing countries also as far as the environment is concerned. But it draws a series of caveats. And the first one is the intellectual property problem. We had the problem with aids medicine, and I think this will be a big problem as well. I don't see how a poor African farmer or Indian farmer will be able to buy the seeds every year.

On top of that, there is the problem of biodiversity. If you go to synagogues, they grow -- and is this going to disappear then in favor of products which they don't usually cultivate? I'm a European, and Europeans are much more cynical than Americans, I think. And I will show you something. I would like to say something. It's very strange that some days this compassionate attitude towards the third world, yet for the moment, the American aid to the third world is 0.1% only of the GDP, which is very, very low.

PANEL MEMBER: And we'll accept your cynicism with regard to that if you accept ours with regard wine and cheese.

PANEL MEMBER: I just want to reiterate one other point I made earlier is the fact that, Tony, you mentioned that you don't think the third world countries could afford the seed or whatever. Keep in mind, here in America even, that the biotech seed costs much more than the conventional counterpart. It must pay for itself. The benefits must be received in order to justify doing this. A lot of people have the idea that the biotech providers and the farmers are just getting filthy rich off of biotechnology, and that's not true at all. We're in a survival mode right now. The only way we've been able to survive here in the United States as far as on the farm is to produce more for less. And that's the bottom line, and it's going to be the same story, I think, in a third world country. If it doesn't pay for itself, then it can't go.

The other point I want to make sure that people understand is, we're willing to grow whatever our customer wants. If the European Union wants conventional products, we can grow the conventional markets. We just want access to that market in a reasonable and cost-effective way. And the way you do that is you have to have a reasonable tolerance. We can do this. We can do this on a large scale, but it must be done in a way that's practical and that everybody can come out on it.

One of the things we heard when we went to the Europe and talked to the different people is they thought we were trying to shove biotech down their throats. We're not. We will grow whatever they want, but it has to be in a fair and equitable way. All we want is access. You know, if we go ahead and develop this system of protocol or traceability or whatever and it's exactly what the European Union wants, how do we know we're going to have access to this market? I mean, there's gonna be an awful lot of cost involved and a lot of efforts. We need assurances that we have access to those markets.

In this country, that identity preserved practically already grow on a farm, it's precontracted. Maybe that's the thing that we need to do. If there's really that much interest in getting these identity preserved products to Europe, maybe we need to put - not put the cart before the horse, let's reassure that we have these markets.

MODERATOR: Okay, we need to wrap up. One more hand back here. And then there's one comment from Cynthia and we're going to wrap.

CYNTHIA SNYDER: Yes, please.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I work for a European country and we also own European food -- when we talk to our food companies that we are selling our ingredients about what their response is going to be labeling on vegetable oil in particular. This is what they tell us, that consumers will never see these products on the shelves. Retailers aren't going to supply them. So at one level, you're not going to achieve the goal that you're trying to achieve of getting consumers out there, because the products will not be allowed on the shelves. The other point I want to make is, as you pointed out, there is no labeling required for the products.

MODERATOR: Cynthia?

CYNTHIA SNYDER: First of all, Tony, I want to say you are very brave, and my compliments to you. I just wanted to underscore, though, the link between European attitude toward biotechnology and the developing world because I think there is a link and we hear it frequently from people from the developing world. I want to get to the very poignant comment that was organized. You're welcome to organic -- those who have the luxury of having a choice. Most people in the world don't. And having that market closed has various consequences.

At the same time, we pointed out the other critical issue, and we're a long, long way from solving that. I think what you're beginning to see as kind of the American solution to our little amount of aid, which is private enterprise. You're beginning to see that leaders in the private sectors deprived in other -- are engaging in these issues in the developing world, not, I think, as you suggested, imposing new products on environments but rather going in and finding what they need and finding a way to grow more efficiently what they need there and that happens well with animal agriculture in a lot of ways. So I think there is a link, and there's also a link to the second generation. Yes, it would be nice to have biotech foods that make us thinner or younger or more energetic, but we are yet to the point of developing that. And finally --

AUDIENCE MEMBER: And that's where we are now?

CYNTHIA SNYDER: Yeah, yeah. And finally, resisting technology doesn't have a great track record.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: You have two to present here.

TONY VANDERHAGEN: Well, as you said, try to defend our position. As far as your remarks are concerned, I would say that we know that some member states will try to get down the road of having also meat and eggs labeled if they have been fed with GM feed. But the commission is certainly not in favor of that, certainly not. It's what the Greens want, what Greenpeace wants. And we don't think it will happen. We'll see.

As far as the information you get from your members, it's true that it won't change anything in the beginning. As Julia said, confidence will not return easily. It will take time and we have the French saying -- [ speaking French ] you have to give time to time. On top of that, we have to see in the end, a GAO product which has a real added value, because until now, it has no added value. And you'll see. Then immediately it is on the shelf, and it can be sold. Well, until people were frightened by the newspapers. But I think that's really important. Scares have to go away now, and we hope there will be no other scares. And by the way, I won't wish it to you, but would there be that in the United States, you would see the public trust and public administration will evaporate like this, you know, which is a really, really big problem. And then we also have to the wait for the second generation of GMOs, with real added value. And then, by the way, when this real added value will be there, the companies will want to label it, because it will really be worth to label.

DAVID GERGEN: This dialogue will continue in a variety unless someone here has an urgent word on behalf of the initiatives on food and biotechnology. I would like you to ask you to join me in thanking David Hegwood, Julia Moore, Fred Yoder and Tony Vanderhagen here.