Bruce Chassy

Prof Bruce Chassy is a professor of food microbiology and a professor of nutritional sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. With David Tribe, he runs the pro-GM website, Academics Review.

ILSI connection

Chassy was lead author of the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) publications "Nutritional and Safety Assessments of Foods and Feeds Nutritionally Improved through Biotechnology” (2004) and "Nutritional and Safety Assessments of Foods and Feeds Nutritionally Improved through Biotechnology: Case Studies” (2008).

These two papers were prepared by task forces of the ILSI International Food Biotechnology Committee. A report by German NGO TestBiotech examines how the 2004 ILSI paper prescribed the industry-friendly risk assessment process for GM foods, which was later adopted by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).

The TestBiotech report recounts how ILSI came up with the concept of comparative assessment, which is based on a comparison between genetically engineered plants and conventionally bred plants. They are seen as being equivalent if no significant differences are identified in the comparison of certain basic components, such as protein and carbohydrate content. ILSI itself admitted that the concept of comparative assessment was simply another name for the term "substantial equivalence", which the OECD coined in the early 1990s as a basis for risk assessment of GM foods:

In 2002, a task force of international scientific experts, convened by the ILSI Intl. Food Biotechnology Committee (IFBiC), addressed the topic of the safety and nutritional assessments of foods and feeds that are nutritionally improved through modern biotechnology. In 2004, the task force’s work culminated in the publication of a report that included a series of recommendations for the nutritional and safety assessments of such foods and feeds. This document has gained global recognition from organizations such as the European Food Safety Agency and has been cited by Japan and Australia in 2005 in their comments to Codex Alimentarius. The substantial equivalence paradigm, called the comparative safety assessment process in the 2004 ILSI publication, is a basic principle in the document.

The concept of substantial equivalence of GM and non-GM foods as a basis for risk assessment has come in for much criticism by scientists - hence, perhaps, ILSI's avoidance of the term.

TestBiotech explains why comparative assessment is so helpful to the GM industry:

the concept of Comparative Assessment helps to simplify risk assessment. In consequence, it avoids a more comprehensive risk assessment of genetically engineered plants. An in depth investigation would be necessary if genetically engineered plants were considered as substantially different from conventional plants because of the methods used in their production. In this case, which is much more plausible from a scientific point of view, a much broader concept for risk assessment would be needed.

In 2004, TestBiotech reports, EFSA published its Guidance Document on the risk assessment of food and feed derived from genetically engineered plants. Comparative Assessment was defined as the most important starting point.

Other contributors to/authors of the 2004 ILSI paper and members of the ILSI task force that generated it are employees of the major GM/agrochemical companies. For example:

• Kevin Glenn - contributor and ILSI task force member - Monsanto
• Barbara Henry - contributor - Bayer CropScience
• Ray Shillito - contributor - Bayer CropScience
• Robin Eichen Conn – ILSI task force member – Cargill
• Jason J. Hlywka - author - Cantox (consultancy firm to agrochemical and pharmaceutical companies)
• Natalie Hubbard - vice chair of the ILSI task force - DuPont/Pioneer
• Ian C. Munro - author - Cantox
• Martina McGloughlin - author - University of California, Davis
• Harry Kuiper - author - chair since 2003 of European Food Safety Authority GMO Panel, the group of experts responsible for the risk assessment of GM crops
• Jeff Stein - member of ILSI task force - Syngenta
• Jack Zabik - member of ILSI task force - Dow AgroSciences

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