Food Law News - FAO/WHO/WTO/Codex - 2002

Yokohama, Japan, 4-8 March 2002

ad hoc Intergovernmental Codex Task Force on Foods derived from Biotechnology (3rd Session)

The Committee:

• Agreed on amendments to the Draft Principles for the Risk Analysis of Foods Derived from Modern Biotechnolog, including provisions for product tracing for the purposes of facilitating withdrawal of foods from the market when a risk to human health has been identified or to support post-market monitoring, and submitted the draft to the 25th Session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission for final adoption;
• Agreed to forward the Draft Guideline for the Conduct of Food Safety Assessment of Foods Derived from Recombinant-DNA Plants to the 25th Session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission for final adoption;
• Revised the proposed draft Annex on the Assessment of Possible Allergenicity and submitted the draft to the 25th Session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission for adoption with the recommendation that the Commission accelerates the adoption of the text;
• Made a number of amendments to the proposed Draft Guideline for the Conduct of Food Safety Assessment of Recombinant-DNA Microorganisms in Food and agreed to submit the text to the Executive Committee of the Codex Alimentarius Commission for adoption at the intermediate step of the Codex Elaboration Procedure (Step 5);
• On the matter of traceability, recognized that in addition to the applications specifically referred to in the Principles for Risk Analysis, that there were other applications of product tracing. It agreed that such applications should be consistent with the provisions of the WTO SPS and TBT Agreements, and noted that work in these areas would be undertaken by other Codex Committees;
• Identified a number od methods for the identification or detection of genetic modification in foods and agreed to transmit these methods for the consideration of the Codex Committee on Methods of Analysis and Sampling.