Study shows improvements in GM testing

Wednesday 30 January 2002

A Food Standards Agency study has shown that scientific testing methods are now able to identify very small amounts of GM in ingredients in some foods.

The purpose of the study, which tested 203 retail samples of baked goods, was to assess the performance of a technique known as Real Time PCR to measure accuraly the amount of GM in processed foodstuffs.

The samples included bread, cakes buns and rolls bought from a variety of major supermarkets, medium and small retail outlets.

The tests have proved successful in identifying levels as low as 1% GM content of the soya ingredient, even where the soya ingredient was only 0.3% of the loaf of bread.

The Agency study is concerned with consumer choice. There is no food safety issue as the GM soya identified in tests are of a variety that has been approved by the EC as safe to eat. Amounts below 1% are not required to be labelled under EC regulations.

Dr Jon Bell, Director of Food Safety at the Food Standards Agency, said: 'This is work at the cutting edge of science and supports consumer choice.

'New methods of testing will allow the industry to ensure that labelling of GM content is accurate and provides consumers with the highest possible level of consumer choice.'

No GM was detected in the soya content of 85% of the baked goods tested.
Within the 15% of samples where GM traces were found, only three out of 203 samples were found to contain more than 1% GM soya.

Such products are required to be labelled as containing GM under EC regulations.

In each of the three cases, the manufacturers concerned were informed of the study findings and have promised to take action regarding labelling of GM content.