According to the UK Green Party website the Green Party will try to achieve the following if they gain power at the 2010 general election:
AG613 Remove EU regulations controlling permissible seed varieties and the right to patent animal or plant material. Press for a national and international ban on the patenting of life-forms, including agricultural crops and animals. (see ST360 & AR410)
AG614 Press for local food procurement policies to be allowable under EU and WTO rules. Encourage local food policies in all public services, institutions and government offices.
AG615 Phase out and ban all intensive/industrial livestock farming, including poultry and fish farms, which involve overstocking, heavy use of feed, chemical or fossil fuel inputs, pollution or inhumane conditions for livestock.
AG616 Introduce regulations to discourage the feeding of grain, imported crops, fishmeal and slaughterhouse products to livestock. Ban live animal export immediately and phase out unnecessary animal transportation within the UK. Press for WTO rules to be changed to allow import bans on the basis of cruelty and prohibit imports of animal commodities not produced humanely. (see AR406)
AG617 Ban substances which represent the greatest threat to the environment or health through their toxicity, persistence or capacity for bio-accumulation. Phase out the use of synthetic chemicals which do not meet UK and international organic standards..In the longer term, ban the use of environmentally and socially harmful methods of growing and treating food and other agricultural products. (see also AG604)
AG618 Introduce stringent regulations to protect rural residents and communities from the use of pesticides and other chemicals, to include a ban on the use of any synthetic chemicals near homes, schools, workplaces and any other places of human habitation and compulsory recording and notification of spraying activities.
AG619 Introduce stringent regulations to monitor and prevent run-off of agricultural chemicals and nutrients into adjacent land and watercourses, to include pollution from fish farms.
AG620 Legislate for a strict liability regime which makes farmers liable for misuse of harmful substances. Ultimately the government and chemical manufacturers would be liable for poisoning of employees, rural dwellers or consumers, harm to wildlife, pollution of watercourses or accumulation in ecosystems.
AG621 Introduce a food security clause at the World Trade Organisation to allow countries to protect their domestic agriculture from foreign imports up to the point of self sufficiency.
AG622 Safeguard organic food growing standards and ensure that agricultural products are labelled to show any non-organic treatments. (see FD205-211)
AG623 Apply the precautionary principle to the regulation of genetic research and its application to safeguard against irreversible damage to the ecology of this planet (see AG208-211). Ban the introduction of genetically modified organisms and their products in all agricultural systems of production including human and animal feed. Ban the transgenic manipulation of animals for any agricultural purpose. Safeguard against any genetic modification which is made in the pursuit of profits, rather than the interests of people, animals and biodiversity.
AG624 Establish and uphold the rights of consumers, farmers and local authorities to choose GM-free food and to establish GM-free zones. Legislate for a strict liability regime which makes bio-tech (GM seed) companies fully liable for any losses through contamination or harm caused to wildlife or human health.
AG625 Maintain systems for the independent monitoring of water quality and the application of standards.
I would be interested to hear both positive and negative views on UK Green Party’s Agriculture Regulation policies in the comments below?