The European Commission is expected to approve an application by a Swiss company to import a genetically modified (GM) sweetcorn into the 25-nation bloc, ending the EU's moratorium on GM food in place since 1999.

"The commission is set to authorise the marketing of genetically authorised BT-11 maize, valid for 10 years, by Swiss firm Syngenta," the EU executive's chief spokesman Reijo Kemppinen said.

The tinned sweetcorn will have to state clearly on its label that it contains GM products, he said.

The commission has been in the vanguard of calls for the EU to allow the cultivation of GM crops, despite little public appetite in Europe for bio-engineered food.

Only four members of the commission, which since the May 1 entry of 10 more member states into the bloc now numbers 30, have expressed any reservations about ending the ban, sources said.

The decision on whether to lift the moratorium was passed back to the commission after EU member states failed last month to break a deadlock on the issue.

Under EU rules, after successive failures of governments to reach a deal, the decision now rests with Brussels, which has already pioneered new legislation in readiness for the marketing of GM food.

"It's the credibility of this legislation that's at stake. If we want it to be a model for the rest of the world, we have to apply it," one official said.

The end to the EU embargo would please the United States, the world's biggest producer of GM foods which has led a group of 12 countries demanding the World Trade Organisation overturn the European ban.

But it will sit uneasily with consumers. One EU survey suggested that more than 70 percent of Europeans are against so-called "Frankenfoods".

Advocates of GM foods argue that modifications to genes promoting, for example, resistance to certain pests, could greatly increase yields and alleviate global hunger.

But opponents say the technology is being pushed forwards by big corporations without sufficient understanding of how GM plants might affect the rest of the environment.

Adrian Bebb, GM campaigner for Friends of the Earth, said the enlarged EU faced an opportunity "to put the welfare of its citizens before the financial interests of the biotechnology industry or its friends in the White House".

"There is clearly no political consensus across Europe on this genetically modified sweetcorn. Scientists cannot agree over its safety and the public does not want it," he said.

"If the commission decides to force this down our throats then they can only expect the public's confidence in GM foods to sink even further."

However, the commission argues that new EU rules on labelling and tracing GM foods that took effect on April 18 have introduced rigorous safeguards that should alleviate public concern.

The rules, which were agreed last year, require food and animal feed to be labelled if they contain at least 0.9 percent of GM ingredients.

Producers and buyers must also store all data about the origin, composition and sale of GM products for a five-year period, which Brussels describes as the toughest GM food regulations anywhere in the world.

TERRA.WIRE