SYN-EV176-9 maize and its derived products have subsequently been notified by Syngenta Crop Protection AG (hereafter ‘the notifier’) as existing products under Article 8(1) and Article 20(1) of Regulation (EC) No 1829/2003 (hereafter ‘the Regulation’) and entered in the Community Register of genetically modified food and feed. The scope of the notification covered food consisting of and/or containing or produced from SYN-EV176-9 maize, food additives produced from SYN-EV176-9 maize, feed consisting of and/or containing SYN-EV176-9 maize, feed materials produced from SYN-EV176-9 maize and feed additives produced from SYN-EV176-9 maize.

The notifier of SYN-EV176-9 maize, in a letter to the Commission dated 19 September 2005, indicated that it has stopped selling seeds of SYN-EV176-9 maize in the Community after the 2005 planting season.

The notifier has further indicated to the Commission that it has no intention to submit an application for renewal of the authorisation of SYN-EV176-9 maize under the Regulation in accordance with Article 8(4), Article 11, Article 20(4) and Article 23 respectively. Therefore neither the cultivation nor the placing on the market of SYN-EV176-9 maize and its derived products will be authorised in the Community after 18 April 2007.

Measures should therefore be adopted in order to ensure effective withdrawal from the market of seeds from inbred lines and hybrids derived from SYN-EV176-9 maize. As a consequence of the non-availability of seeds, any products derived from SYN-ENV176-9 maize can be expected to disappear from the food and feed chain in a reasonable period of time.

Since the notifier has stopped selling seeds of SYN-EV176-9 maize in the Community after the 2005 planting season, stocks of products derived from SYN-EV176-9 maize have been used up and are not expected to be present on the market after 18 April 2007. However, minute traces of genetically modified material from SYN-EV176-9 maize might remain present in food or feed products for a certain period of time.

For reasons of legal certainty, it is therefore necessary to provide for a transitional period of time within which food and feed products may contain such material without being considered to be in breach of Article 4(2) or Article 16(2) of the Regulation where this presence is adventitious or technically unavoidable.

The tolerated level and the period of time should be set taking into account the time needed until the effective withdrawal from the market of the seeds produces its effects throughout the food and feed chain. In all cases, the tolerated level shall remain below the labelling and traceability threshold of no higher than 0,9 % provided for by the Regulation for the adventitious or technically unavoidable presence of GM material in food and feed.

The entries in the Community Register of genetically modified food and feed, as provided for in Article 28 of the Regulation, regarding SYN-EV176-9 maize should be modified in order to take account of this Decision.

The notifier has been consulted on the measures provided for in this Decision.

The measures provided for in this Decision are in accordance with the opinion of the Standing Committee on the Food Chain and Animal Health,