www.czu.cz ; www.raupp.info

The EU's food safety agency should give its first risk analysis this year of
live genetically modified (GMO) crops -- an issue that has split the bloc's
membership down the middle, January 2005 by Jeremy Smith .

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) will assess the safety of two
GMO maize varieties whose manufacturers have requested cultivation as a use
when they applied for an EU-wide authorisation, officials said on Monday.

The two products are Bt-11 sweet maize, marketed by Switzerland's Syngenta,
and 1507 maize, jointly made by Pioneer Hi-Bred International -- a
subsidiary of DuPont Co -- and Dow AgroSciences unit Mycogen Seeds.

EFSA scientists had been due to give their opinion last September on the two
types of maize, modified to resist field insects such as the European corn
borer, but have asked for more data. "The clock is stopped when we send out
the request for more information -- but we don't know how long we have to
wait to get it. Then we have 90 days (to evaluate)," an EFSA official said.

Set up in 2002, EFSA's views are used by the European Commission as
independent scientific opinion on the safety risk of GMO products for entry
into the food chain, for consumption by humans and animals and for release
into the environment.

So far, EFSA has assessed GMOs where the requested uses have not included
the actual growing of biotech crops -- a highly sensitive area
forgovernments since many issues have yet to be resolved over possible crop
contamination and environmental liability. Scientists at the agency, which
will move to the Italian city of Parma later this year, are expecting to
assess several other GMOs this year for use in food and feed products --
including biotech rice and sugar beet -- but only two so far have a
specified date for an opinion.

These are 1507 maize again, for which a food use assessment is due in March,
and a hybrid maize from U.S. biotech giant Monsanto known as MON863/MON810,
where its view is due in June.

[www.reuters.com]

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