Category: Ecoperspectives

The following article is part of an Eco-Perspective special in which the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law is collaborating with the VLS COP21 Observer Delegation

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By  Professor Tracy Bach

So says Bill McKibben in his recent  New Yorker article  chronicling the political shift on climate change he sees occurring right now.  McKibben points to three recent events as indications of a successful  peoples movement away from fossil fuels.  First is President Obama’s decision last Friday not to grant a permit to Transcanada to build the Keystone Pipeline.  Second is the growing understanding of why the world’s carbon reserves should stay in the ground, and the business decisions being made on it.  Third is the rapid drop in renewable energy production costs and the concomitant growth in solar and wind as core, not fringe, energy sources.

Despite these trends, McKibben concludes that COP21 “will be a way station in this fight, not a terminus.” He concludes that while the peoples movement on climate change has touched the international negotiations – that “the proposed agreement for the talks reflects some of the political shift that’s happened in years since the failed negotiations at Copenhagen” – the agreement as is “won’t close that gap between politics and physics” because “almost no nation is stretching.”

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The post “Almost no nation is stretching” appeared first on Vermont Journal of Environmental Law.

The following article is part of an Eco-Perspective special in which the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law is collaborating with the VLS COP21 Observer Delegation

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By Madhavi Venkatesan

Each generation inherits a world that was created out of beliefs contemporary and relevant to a certain time. These beliefs affect prevailing values; values, which become embedded within the framework of decision-making. Often times, these values are based on beliefs that may no longer be understood, known or even correct. Nonetheless, they are transferred from one generation to the next and modified by another generation’s cumulative addition.

From this perspective, a lack of understanding of the beliefs that comprise the framework of society can eventually be problematic. And this is evident in the present period.

Let’s take a step back to the 1930’s when Simon Kuznets developed a method for assessing the production capacity of an economy. The method, which earned him the Nobel Prize in Economics, provided the foundation for the calculation of the gross domestic product. By definition gross domestic product or GDP is the sum of all goods and services produced within a country’s national borders during a specific time period; everything from desks to diapers can be included.

Since the 1940s , GDP has become a simple assessment tool of economic capacity between countries and over time within the same country. However as Kuznets warned, though the indicator is useful for determining production capacity, it is limited as a metric to evaluate the state of an economy’s inhabitants. GDP as a single aggregated value cannot assess quality of life and it cannot provide insight on the distribution of wealth.

In spite of the statements of Kuznets and other economists of the time and over time, GDP has arguably become the single metric of not only domestic economic progress but also global economic progress. As the indicator of progress it is the targeted metric of economic policy. GDP is tracked and targeted by government and central bank policy makers with the intent to increase its value over consecutive periods.

There are four components to GDP, consumption spending, investment spending -investment on production capacity, government spending and net exports—spending by foreigners for US goods relative to US spending on foreign goods. In the United States the single largest component of GDP, comprising in excess of 65% of GDP , is consumption. As a result, our economy is targeted to consumption, from increasing employment, to low interest rates, to the built-in obsolescence of the goods we purchase.

Given that GDP was established and gained global traction over 70 years ago, our value for consumption has been inherited and modified over a few generations. We have been taught that we have insatiable appetites to consume and have perpetuated the consumption cycle, to maintain the era of consumerism. But this may be the problem.

Over time, through globalization, commercialization and the increasing busyness of life, consumers have become increasingly distanced from the production process of the good they are consuming. Consumers are no longer knowledgeable about the impact that their consumption demand has on the degradation, exploitation and depletion of planetary resources. Instead what consumers are aware of is price.

Fundamentally, consumers have focused on market price and have delegated the inclusion of value parameters including environmental and social costs to producers, but producers are incentivized to minimize cost and maximize return, a seemingly divergent incentive.

In most cases, market prices do not reflect the cost of a good. Lets look at a t-shirt manufactured in a developing country for sale in a developed market. The price of the t-shirt reflects only a portion of its true cost because it neglects social and environmental costs. The price neglects the costs of the exploited wage paid to the textile worker: the social cost resulting from his missing health care and the health and quality of life impact of the non-living wage. Though it does likely include transportation expense, it does not include the carbon footprint or the waste cost related to the landfilling or alternative disposal of the garment. In net, the cost of the consumption is only partially borne by the purchaser; other societies and the environment subsidize the price.

Consider the market price for the air we breath, there is no price, it is free and we need air to live. But, in spite of it being essential for life, it is a costless component of the production process; waste has been released into the air we breathe for years. If there had been a cost for disposal, or even better, a social value that prevented the release of air borne waste, the pollution that has collected in our atmosphere for the past three hundred years would have be significantly less. As simple as it may sound, consumers could have promoted the welfare of the atmosphere through their collective demand that air quality be preserved. How money is spent sends a very strong signal to producers of what will sell.

Both consumer awareness and economy-wide alignment are requisite to promote sustainable economic outcomes. This is, for example, evident in viewing the relationship between economic growth and carbon emissions over the past few hundred years. The energy consumption rates required to promote production and thereby foster consumption  have enabled the speed of climate change activity being witnessed today. Atmospheric carbon dioxide is correlated to GDP growth; however, degradation and exploitation of the environment are also correlated with the present measure of economic growth.

COP21 will offer the needed international platform to evaluate the basis of climate change activity, which arguably is related to how we measure and drive economic growth. The inclusion of sustainable economic development within the Paris Package  provides an opportunity for the inclusion of quality of life and ecosystem balance in the defining of economic growth. These elements essentially recognize that how we measure quality of life is fundamental to the economic outcomes we create. From this perspective COP21 could be the catalyst to move beyond GDP  to determine a constructed international standard for economic progress. Ultimately, the goals of the UNFCCC to “stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic (human induced) interference with the climate system” may be better aligned with a measure such as  gross national happiness , the better life index or a similar parameter. Further, the long term impact of COP21 may be dependent on explicitly promoting such a value shift.

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The post Ready for COP: Economic growth and climate change appeared first on Vermont Journal of Environmental Law.

The following article is part of an Eco-Perspective special in which the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law is collaborating with the VLS COP21 Observer Delegation

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By Bonnie Smith

Chronic hunger plagues 805 million people worldwide. Although this is 100 million less than 10 years ago, the future of food security remains uncertain in the face of climate change. The world is growing, and so is the demand for food. The World Resources Institute projects the world will face a 69% food gap in 2050 if food production remains the same.

Adaptation efforts will be particularly challenging due to changing precipitation patterns, warming temperatures, and extreme weather events resulting from climate change. The agriculture sector accounts for 55% of total world GHG emissions; paradoxically, it must strive to reduce GHG emissions and to increase food production simultaneously. Ideally this will be done without increasing deforestation and consequently decreasing carbon storage. To face these climate change hurdles and maintain consistent crop yields, countries will likely consider using or expanding current use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs).

GMOs are organisms that have been inserted with another organism’s genetic material to achieve new properties. The new properties for crops typically include herbicide tolerance, virus resistance, and water-uptake efficiency. The new genetic material can come from plants, animals, viruses, or bacteria. For example, in the US the majority of soybeans, corn, and cotton are GMOs with genetic material from soil bacterium, bacillus thuringiensis ; the bacteria produces a protein toxic to certain insect larvae, but not to humans and animals.

In addition to the US, many countries have already taken stances on this divisive topic. Others remain undecided as they weigh the pros and cons. The US along with Argentina, Brazil, Canada, and India are leading producers of GMOs. Among countries limiting GMOs are: EU countries, requiring approval of all genetically modified products prior to distribution; Switzerland, banning GMO farming since 2005; Russia, banning all imported GMO products; and China, banning GMOs for human consumption but allowing them for livestock.

Monsanto , a producer of GM seeds and Roundup herbicide, advocates for using heat and drought resistant GM seeds to adapt to climate change impacts.  Other proponents argue GMO crops can adapt more quickly to sudden weather changes than conventional breeding methods.  They also maintain that farmers can produce more with fewer resources, thus having less climate affecting impacts.

Opponents of GMOs champion alternatives like ecological agriculture and conventional breeding that, they say, are just as good if not better. They also site environmental hazards, unknown human health risks, biodiversity loss, and economic concerns as reasons to ban or at least label GMO crops.   Mark Spitznagel , professor of risk engineering at NYU School of Engineering, compares the “GMO experiment” to the US financial system before the 2008 crash, which many people believed to be “too big to fail.”  He differentiates the two explaining that there are no possible bailouts when the GMO enterprise fails, and that the consequences would be much more devastating. Genetic engineering is only 40 years old. Uncertain future consequences of using this new technology is troubling to many people who believe the risks outweigh the potential benefits.

As more countries submit their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) and consider adaptation methods to climate change, it will be interesting to see how the global dialogue surrounding GMOs develops. The agriculture sector is the largest contributor to global anthropogenic non-CO ₂ GHGs. The agriculture sector directly impacts climate change. Climate change directly impacts the agriculture sector. Deciding how to feed a growing, hungry planet and also curb temperature increases will be one controversial topic stemming from this paradoxical challenge.

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The post Ready for COP: Growing Pains: Are GMOs an Adaptation Solution for Growing, Hungry Populations Affected by Climate Change? appeared first on Vermont Journal of Environmental Law.

The following article is part of an Eco-Perspective special in which the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law is collaborating with the VLS COP21 Observer Delegation

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By Kelsey Bain

Sea-level rise is an unavoidable threat facing our planet in the coming century. Even avoiding increasing global temperatures above 2°C likely wont save us from a twenty-foot rise in sea-level by 2020. This kind of devastating sea-level rise will have disastrous effects on worldwide economies, agricultural, and livelihoods. It will also irreparably change the face of some of the world’s most treasured landmarks.

Historical treasures the world over may be threatened, even if we stay within the 2°C target limit agreed on in Cancun. Further, a recently released study from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that if we don’t hit this target limit, a global temperature warming of 4°C could cause anywhere from 22.6 to 35.4 feet of global sea-level rise.

So what does this mean for coastal communities, and the many global icons located there?

A report from the Union of Concerned Scientists last year outlined thirty national landmarks across the United States that could be lost or severely damaged from the effects of climate change. Among those monuments was Faneuil Hall in Boston, where the Sons of Liberty Planned the Boston Tea Party. Also included were the U.S. Naval Academy, the Kennedy Space Center, Jamestown, NASA’s Langley Research Center, and the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Monument. Around the country 118 national parks are considered to be at risk . Additionally, the U.S Interior Department released a report in June that revealed sea-level rise from climate change will damage the national park infrastructure and historic and cultural resources totaling in over $40 billion . And that’s just in the United States.

Climate change has the potential to cause rises in sea-level that may submerge areas currently home to between 470 and 760 million people on six different continents. Climate Central recently compiled a series of photographs that depict what sea-level rise will look like in cities such as Mumbai, Sydney, Shanghai, Rio, New York, Durban, London, and D.C. These cities are all major cultural and economic hubs for their respective countries, and any damage to them will likely also damage their countries as a whole.

In the battle against climate change, sea-level rise represents more than just economic losses. It means significant losses to culture, history, and livelihoods- not to mention lives. A study published in Environmental Research Letters found that 136 UNESCO World Heritage Sites will disappear with a warming of 5.4°C, warming that falls within projected ranges from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Sea-level rise may force us to say goodbye to cultural treasures such as Japan’s Itsukushima Shrine, the Sydney Opera House, the Statue of Liberty, Venice, Chile’s Rapa Nui National Park, and countless others. Further,
for cities such as Miami and New Orleans , its not a question of if they will be underwater, but when.

For those cultural icons that are still salvageable, it is imperative that we reach an ambitious binding goal for limiting global temperature increases. After all, we can certainly survive without some of these historical landmarks, but why would we want to?

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The post Ready for COP: Saying Goodbye to Cultural Landmarks appeared first on Vermont Journal of Environmental Law.

The following article is part of an Eco-Perspective special in which the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law is collaborating with the VLS COP21 Observer Delegation

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By Katherine Dressel

The European Union recently celebrated 30 years of the border-free Schengen Area , a crucial pillar of the European Single Market. Schengen cooperation guards the fundamental right of 400 million E.U. citizens to cross internal borders without being subjected to cumbersome border checks. This guarantee also applies to many non-EU nationals, cross-border commuters, and tourists. With COP21 fast-approaching the city of Paris, the Schengen Area is struggling to find a balance between freedom of movement and security.

Schengen Area

The refugee crisis in Europe has been the worst crisis since World War II. A record number of individuals are seeking asylum within the E.U. A U.N. refugee agency reported that 218,394 people crossed the Mediterranean to reach Europe this October, which is close to the number from the entire year of 2014. The refugee crisis is challenging the notion of free movement of people across borders. Pressure is mounting to close the E.U.’s open borders along the migrant trail. The recent flood of refugees has overwhelmed countries outside of the E.U., which have been receiving limited support from Member States. European leaders are demanding a restoration of border control, and are questioning the concept of the Schengen area. Have citizens of the E.U. been taking Schengen and the right to move freely for granted?

The French government will reintroduce border controls for the month surrounding COP21, beginning on November 13 ^th and ending on December 13 ^th , two days after the COP21 is scheduled to end. According to Article 23 of the Schengen Borders Code , this measure is taken “where there is a serious threat to public policy or internal security.” The possibility that any open zone of the Schengen area will be suspended “is impending dangerously over the core principle of free movement and is a further blow to the European integration.”

For this month, no one—includ ing E.U. citizens—will be able to move freely across French borders. French officials published a document via the E.U. Council which states France’s plan to reintroduce controls at the borders of Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, the Swiss Confederation, Italy and Spain “on the occasion of COP 21. ” Le Monde published that “since the Borders Code came into force in 2006, each time border controls have been reintroduced, it has been for the purpose of preventing terrorism and crime, and for security purposes related to the hosting of international meetings or sports events.”

It’s not only the refugee crisis that is persuading France to close its borders. Minister of Foreign Affairs and Chair of COP21, Laurent Fabius, says that 80 Heads of State and foreign officials will appear at the Conference. He fears violence by protesters and green activists. The Ministry has created a special procedu re  for accredited participants of COP21, particularly those that require a visa to enter France.

Close-up page of passport with Schengen visa.

It seems that the civil society mobilizing for COP21 is being targeted; “embassies are requesting various documents including invitations from us and proof of the applicant’s ability to pay for transport, among other requests,” says a spokesperson for Coalition Climat 21. Mouhad Gasmi is the voice against shale gas in Alegeria. He filed a visa application on October 21 ^st , invitation to COP21 in hand. The consulate of France in Algeria gave him an appointment for one month after COP21. Climate 21 further states, “the government is choosing who they want to take part in the official summit.”

The public is “unconvinced of the French government’s claim that it is willing to include them, in all their diversity, in the COP process.” Do France and other E.U. Member States need to sacrifice freedom for safety and peace?

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The post COP21: Threat to Public Policy? appeared first on Vermont Journal of Environmental Law.

The following article is part of an Eco-Perspective special in which the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law is collaborating with the VLS COP21 Observer Delegation

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By Sara Barnowski

Climate change is proven – the vast majority of the scientific community , along with many major businesses and nearly every major insurance provider , all agree that climate change is having real impacts on the world today. Most also believe that those impacts are the result of anthropogenic activity. However, the facts about climate change are not being translated into political action. This is in large part because the facts are not driving the discussion.

Sen. James Inhofe

Despite the fact that the latest IPCC report states that “warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s, many of the observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia,” and that “human influence on the climate system is clear,” somehow 18% of the US population still does not believe global warming is occurring, and 35% does not believe that it is caused by human activity. Even worse, the 114th Congress includes 162 climate deniers (approximately 30% of Congress) with only eight states represented exclusively by individuals who believe that addressing climate change is a priority.

Who are all of these climate deniers? Many Americans, if asked to picture a climate denier, would likely picture a figure like Rush Limbaug h or Senator James Inhofe. It turns out that there is more to this assumption than mere stereotyping. Several studies have been published over the past five years, building on existing bodies of research, which all indicate that climate skeptics are most likely to be white, conservative men. I took a closer look at three psychology and sociology studies from three different continents, all of which came to this same conclusion.

A study out of Cardiff University indicated that men are more skeptical of climate change than women, and that “political affiliation is a strong determinant of skepticism, with Conservative voters amongst the most skeptical.” An American study out of Michigan State University was one of the first to explicitly categorize “conservative white males” as the most skeptical of climate change. This study went a step further to analyze conservative white men who self-reported an above average understanding of global warming (considered “confident conservative white men”). By isolating these individuals, the study found that 48.4% of confident conservative white men believe the effects of global warming will never happen, compared to only 8.6% of all other respondents. Additionally, it found that while 71.6% of confident conservative white men believed that recent temperature increases are not primarily due to human activities, only 34.2% of all other respondents feel that way. Finally, a 2015 study published in the New Zealand Journal of Psychology supported and extended the “conservative white male” effect based on a sample of over 6,000 New Zealanders. This study confirmed that conservative white males (along with older individuals with high levels of socioeconomic status and less education) are disproportionately more likely to be skeptical of the reality of climate change and its anthropogenic cause.

Ms. Usha Nair, representative of the global south and current Co-Focal Point of the Women and Gender Constituency stakeholder group

These studies essentially just prove what most of us already knew or assumed. But the impact of the “conservative white man” syndrome is significant. Not only do the studies provide scientific evidence that conservative white men are the least likely to take action on climate change, it also indicates that “beliefs about climate change are fundamentally linked to existing values and worldviews,” and “are not a result of knowledge deficit or misunderstanding.” In other words, they are also least likely to be swayed by the overwhelming scientific consensus or by the urgency of environmental advocates.

None of this would matter so much if it were not for the fact that political decisions related to climate change are predominantly made by men. The UNFCCC Conference of the Parties is actually mandated to “improve the participation of women in bodies established under the Convention and its Kyoto Protocol.” However, progress is slow, and the involvement of women in recent Conferences of the Parties has been limited. Women only represented 36% of the Party delegates to COP20 last year, and only represented 26% of the heads of Party delegations. This year, women represent only 25% of the members of constituted bodies (which is a ~3% decline from last year) and represent only 23% of the regional groups and other Party groupings.

Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, and other Senate republicans

Even if we give the benefit of the doubt to the Conference of the Parties and assume that the participants in the process are all committed to combating climate change, any international agreement that the Parties sign must still be approved by two thirds of the United States Senate for it to become legally binding on the U.S. (although there are alternative mechanisms for the country to deposit its “instrument of ratification” with the UNFCCC). At least one source indicates that 32% of the current Senators are climate deniers, creating a very narrow margin for the 66% approval of any international climate change agreement. The fact that the whole of the U.S. Senate is currently 54% republican , 94% white , and 80% male does not lend hope to the cause.

Now, none of this is to say that every climate denier is a conservative white male, nor is it to say that all conservative white males are climate deniers. It is my ardent hope that the current United States senators (republican, democrat, Caucasian, minority, male, and female alike) will vote to approve the agreement reached at Paris this year. But if they do not, it might be an additional incentive to diversify our elected officials.

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The post Ready for COP: The Role of Gender in Climate Politics appeared first on Vermont Journal of Environmental Law.

   The following article is part of an Eco-Perspective special in which the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law is collaborating with the VLS COP21 Observer Delegation.

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By Madhavi Venkatesan, PhD

Given the defined divide in country specific stakeholders concerns, along with the lens of personal circumstances and beliefs, that promotes a heterogeneity of perspective among COP21 participants, the ultimate success in Paris may rely on the establishment of an agreeable definition of consensus.

In the United Nations Fram ewor k Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) the word “consensus” is used three times, once in Article 7(k) and twice in Article 15. In the first use, consensus is not defined but rather provides the defining boundary for the adoption of “rules of procedure and any financial rules,” as these relate to the establishment of the Conference of Parties. In Article 15 paragraph 3, consensus is referenced as the basis of implementing amendments to the Convention; however, again it is not explicitly defined. Instead, the proportion that constitutes consensus can be inferred as being greater than 75%, based on the parameters provided for action in the absence of noted consensus.

If all efforts at consensus have been exhausted, and no agreement reached, the amendment shall as a last resort be adopted by a three-fourths majority vote of the Parties present and voting at the meeting. The adopted amendment shall be communicated by the secretariat to the Depositary, who shall circulate it to all Parties for their acceptance. (Article 15, paragraph 3)

As noted by Jesse Vogel, specific to the UNFCCC and the Convention, consensus “does not mean complete unanimity. Often it is defined in the negative – the absence of ‘stated objection,’ or of ‘express opposition,’ leaving wiggle room when it comes to defining just what explicit objection looks like. And sometimes, “consensus” can be declared despite the express objection of some.” The lack of clarity of defining what constitutes consensus has been a point of concern for many observers and participants.

La Viña and Guiao comment, “There is, after all, a profound difference between having the agreement of all Parties, and hearing no objections from any of them.” The latter aspect is not necessarily consistent with consensus and in review of prior COP meetings is attributed by some to purposely-deafened ears.

At COP21, the common values of stakeholders will do much to promote a singular foundation for discussion. However, the inclusion, acknowledgement, acceptance, and ultimately overt compromise related to the differences between the national interests represented by meeting participants will be the defining elements of the legacy of the meetings, and the implementation of consensus will play a significant role.

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Climate change affects animals. This is not a new revelation. The first IPCC Assessment Report, released in 1990, discusses how climate change negatively impacts polar bears. But the conversation on animals and climate change often neglects the stories of how animals survive by adapting to climate changed conditions.

This endangered subspecies was considered a “goner,” but then the Quino did something surprising. Surrounded by desert, the butterfly could not migrate butterflynorth to wetter terrain. Instead, it moved to higher ground. The Quino population resettled at a higher elevation and most importantly, adapted to using a new host plant. This adaptation is exciting because it indicates what one scientist calls “a genetic revolution.”

For more articles by VLS COP21 Observer Delegation see: http://vlscop.vermontlaw.edu/2015/10/14/animal-adaptation-to-climate-change-looking-through-the-lens-of-the-quino-checkerspot-butterfly/

Summary: Following the European Union’s update of its policy on genetically engineered crops in March, Scotland and Germany became the first member states to use the policy to ban further cultivation of genetically engineered crops within their borders. With more member states likely to join Scotland and Germany in the wake of their bans, these new policies demonstrate a shift in how countries are thinking about the environmental effects of genetically engineered crops.

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By Andrew Minikowski

This past March, following years of delay and internal debate, the European Union updated its formal policy regarding genetically engineered crops. Under the updated policy, any genetically engineered crop strains must be approved for safety by a European Union review board before they may be grown within the individual member states. As a compromise, the updated policy contains a provision whereby member states may opt out of growing genetically engineered crops—even if they have been approved for cultivation by the European Union itself. Thus, the opt out provision essentially allows member states to individually ban the cultivation of genetically engineered crops within their respective territories.

In early August, Scotland became the first member state to officially use the opt out provision to halt future cultivation of genetically engineered crop varieties by Scottish agriculturalists. The ban was met with resounding applause by anti-genetic engineering advocates, even if many commentators saw the ban as merely a way for Edinburgh to further distance itself politically from London. Indeed, the rest of Great Britain has vigorously embraced the growth of genetically engineered crops since the March policy update, despite significant domestic resistance. However, several weeks after Scotland’s band, Germany followed suit and announced a domestic ban. Given Germany’s prominent role in the European Union and status as a global economic powerhouse, the German ban is likely to be influential in other member states and beyond. But what is it that drove Scotland and Germany to adopt a full ban on the growth of genetically engineered crops?

Genetically engineered crops—particularly strains of corn, soybeans, and wheat—have proliferated wildly since their introduction in the 1990s. Many agriculturists were attracted to the crops given their higher yields, lower water requirements, and greater resilience to weeds and other pests. However, there has been strong resistance to genetically engineered crops since their initial introduction. Often erroneously referred to as “genetically modified organisms” or “GMOs,” a crop is genetically engineered when humans insert foreign genetic material into the crop’s genetic structure in order to achieve particular traits that would not be possible to achieve through traditional crop breeding. Conversely, genetic modification is the process by which humans cross-breed particular strains of a crop to achieve desired traits and has been utilized by mankind since the dawn of agriculture.

Though the science on the health effects of genetically engineered crops and food byproducts is inconclusive at best, the consensus on the environmental effects of cultivating genetically engineered crop strains is firmly established. Genetically engineered crops decrease biodiversity, negatively impact local plant species, cross-pollinate (or, perhaps, cross-contaminate) with heirloom and organic crops, and contribute to greater use of herbicides and pesticides that can severely damage local flora and fauna. Due to the environmental and ethical objections of many citizens, 64 countries—including major international players such as Japan, Russia, and China—require the labeling of food products containing genetically engineered material. Of these 64 countries, 28 are European Union member states. In its typical lag behind the rest of the industrialized world, the United States requires no labeling of such products, though three states have enacted legislation to do so. The laws in Connecticut and Maine currently remain dormant under their trigger clauses and will only become operative when a requisite number of other states enact similar legislation. Vermont’s labeling law is slatedto go into effect in 2016 but is currently under heavy assault in federal court by the Grocery Manufacturers Association and its industry allies.

Interestingly, the bans in Scotland and Germany seem to have been prompted primarily by the environmental effects of genetically engineered crop cultivation, rather than ethical or consumer protection reasons. Whereas many individual citizens and Internet “slacktivism” are overwhelmingly focused on the perceived health impacts of genetically engineered crops, national governments seem to be preoccupied with the environmental repercussions of growing such crops. Indeed, this was apparent in the statements of Scottish and German officials when announcing the respective bans.

Richard Lochhead, the Scottish Secretary of Rural Affairs, noted that the ban was prompted by Scotland’s concern for its “beautiful natural environment” and that banning the crops would help cultivate the country’s “clean, green status.” Several members of Scotland’s Parliament voiced support for the ban, commenting on the potential for the crops to harm Scotland’s environment. When Christian Schmidt, the German Agriculture Minister, announced Germany’s ban, the Scottish National Party praised Germany’s decision and noted that “the German government recognizes the importance of…keeping its environment clean and green.”

Thus, the rhetoric accompanying the Scottish and German bans demonstrates that national governments have begun to think about genetically engineered crops from a primarily environmental perspective, rather than in response to potentially unfounded consumer concerns or purely economic motivators. That governments are willing to listen to environmentally motivated arguments should encourage advocacy groups and individuals to petition their own governments froman environmental angle. Indeed, these concerns have surfaced in the United States as well, as the statement accompanying Vermont’s labeling bill specifically noted the threats that genetically engineered crops pose to biodiversity and ecological health.

This shift in thinking about genetically engineered crops bodes well for activists, as the studies evaluating the environmental effects of genetically engineered crops are much more scientifically established than those regarding human health effects. Additionally, given the international influence of Scotland and particularly Germany, it is likely than many other countries may follow their example in the coming months. As for other European Union member states, the individual countries have until October to act under the opt out provisions of the March policy update.

  Andrew W. Minikowski graduated summa cum laude from Vermont Law School in 2015. While at Vermont Law, he served as Editor-in-Chief of the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law , competed as a member of the Pace National Environmental Law Moot Court Competition team, and worked on Vermont’s labeling bill lawsuit as a student clinician in the Environmental and Natural Resources Law Clinic. He is currently serving as a judicial law clerk on the Connecticut Supreme Court. In his spare time he enjoys reading, botanizing, and backpacking.

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