After months at an impasse, EU countries had a breakthrough moment on Friday 14 March, managing to find enough support for a common position on the EU’s plans to deregulate new genomic techniques (also as new GMOs or gene editing).

Concretely, this now means that the institutions have all the ingredients – that is, both positions from the two lawmakers – to move forward in talks to finalise the plans once and for all.

The final recipe mix for deregulation of the technology will be a compromise that lies somewhere between the two positions. This means we can already see what is likely to go all the way to the end, and what are likely to be the key sticking points in negotiations.

For instance, there are a few places where the Parliament and Council are on the same page as the Commission. There is consensus on the core idea of splitting plants created with the new technology into two categories with two different approval paths. NGT plants considered equivalent to conventional ones (so-called ‘NGT 1’ plants) would be exempted from the requirements of the EU’s GMO legislation, while category 2 NGT plants would still have to follow stricter requirements (see diagram below, on the left).

But there are places where the Council diverges from both the original Commission proposal and that of their counterparts in the Council. Most prominent of these include the sticky area of patents, which has proven a make-or-break issue since the beginning of negotiations. The Council in the end decided it would like to allow patents on NGT 1 crops – a stark contrast to the Parliament position, which backs a ban on patents.

Other areas of difference include on labelling, with the Parliament taking a stronger position demanding labelling of NGTs throughout the food chain, while the Council has pushed for only plant reproductive material to be labelled. See above (on the right) for an overview of the core negotiation points between the Council and the Parliament.

Now that all the positions are wrapped up, EU lawmakers can start interinstitutional talks, known as ‘trilogues’. Here, the different positions between the two lawmakers are hashed out. This is why the final shape of the law will be a compromise that lies somewhere between the two positions.

And that could prove challenging, given that the two positions differ significantly in important details – to the extent that experts from TestBiotech, which campaigns against the deregulation of the technology, maintain the legislative proposal could “still fail in the final votes after the trilogue”. They point out that, despite technically garnering enough support in the Council, there is still plenty of criticism from member states who were not on board.

Another key factor to take into consideration is that conversations are playing out in a very different political context this time around, with the Parliament leaning much further to the right. That being said, the file will be handled by the same MEP as that one that negotiated Parliament’s position, centre-right Jessica Polfjärd, so it remains to be seen how easily she can be persuaded to shift on key points of difference.

All in all, there will still be plenty of plot twists to keep us busy on the file – but the Council’s position has taken the plans to loosen this new genetic technology one step closer to reality, and one step closer to EU farms and forks.

The decision on new GMOs links closely to the EU’s seed law reform, the plant reproductive materials (PRM) proposal.

The latest discussions on the file back in February did not manage to yield any results. However, sources say that the Polish – who currently chair these meetings and dictate the agenda – are working to progress the file.

According to sources, ministers are still struggling to find a common position on the definitions of both conservation varieties and gene banks, with most member states coming out against the Polish proposal on conservation varieties.

Meanwhile, the pressure is on to seal a deal on the file from other prominent stakeholders, with EU farmers’ association Copa-Cogeca calling for a definitive position on the proposal alongside the deregulation of new GMOs, given the interlinkage between the two.

While ministers have mostly steered clear of mixing the two, movement on the gene editing proposal might present an opportunity to consider the crossover between the two files.

The likeliest outcome as things currently stand is that some progress will be made under the Polish presidency, but that an agreement on the file is most likely to come under the Danish, who will lead the charge over in the Council in the second half of 2025.

As with the deregulation on new GMOs, a position from both lawmakers is needed before talks can move to the next phase of deliberations and a final position is hashed out between lawmakers in the trilogue process.