The Sunshine Coast has joined 50 other communities on Vancouver Island and the B.C. mainland to declare the area a genetically engineered (GE) free zone.
The resolution from the District of Metchosin was adopted at the Association of Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities (AVICC) convention held April 12 to 14 in Sooke.
It asks the provincial government to "legislate the prohibition of importing, exporting and growing plants and seeds containing genetically engineered DNA, and raising GE animals, on Vancouver Island and in associated coastal communities and in the marine waters nearby."
It also urges the province to "declare, through legislation, that the area encompassed by AVICC is a GE free area in respect to all plant and animal species."
The area encompasses all of Vancouver Island as well as Islands Trust communities and the Sunshine Coast, Powell River and Central regional districts on the mainland. AVICC members include Gibsons, Sechelt, the Sechelt Indian Government District and the Sunshine Coast Regional District.
The volunteer group GE Free BC called the resolution "an amazing victory for sustainable agriculture."
"Being a GE free zone means that citizens have said no to genetically engineered crops. A resolution is not a bylaw, but it makes everyone understand the level of opposition to GE crops," the group said in an online post.
The resolution will be forwarded to the provincial government for a response and will also be presented at the fall Union of British Columbia Municipalities convention (UBCM), though it will likely be referred back to the smaller association, said Iris Hesketh-Boles of AVICC.
"It's very regional in nature," she said.
Another municipality could revise the motion at UBCM to give it province-wide application, she added.
