European Food Safety Authority

This article is part of the Foodspin project of Spinwatch.

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) describes itself as:

the keystone of European Union (EU) risk assessment regarding food and feed safety. In close collaboration with national authorities and in open consultation with its stakeholders, EFSA provides independent scientific advice and clear communication on existing and emerging risks.

GMO Panel

The GMO Panel of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) assesses new genetically modified organisms (GMOs) for approval in Europe and reports to the European Commission, which then submits its decision to the European Council. In the event that the Council cannot reach a qualified majority for or against authorisation, the matter is sent back to the Commission, which is free to authorise the GMO based on a special regulatory procedure called comitology.

The EFSA has never given a negative opinion on a GMO put forward for approval, whatever the scientific concerns about its safety. In July 2009 it gave a positive opinion even on Monsanto's GM maize MON810, which is banned for health and environmental reasons in six EU Member States as allowed under EU law.

Criticism of GMO Panel

Dr Arpad Pusztai is an internationally renowned scientist who conducted groundbreaking research into the safety of GM potatoes and was fired and gagged when he found problems and spoke about them on British television. In an email to GMWatch (dated 10 August 2008) on the tenth anniversary of his 15 seconds of TV fame, he wrote of GM food safety and the EFSA's GMO Panel:

On this anniversary I have to admit that, unfortunately, not much has changed since 1998. In one of the few sentences I said in my broadcast ten years ago, I asked for a credible GM testing protocol to be established that would be acceptable to the majority of scientists and to people in general. 10 years on we still haven't got one. Instead, in Europe we have an unelected EFSA GMO Panel with no clear responsibility to European consumers, which invariably underwrites the safety of whatever product the GM biotech industry is pushing onto us.

Conflicts of interest on EFSA's management board

In March 2011 Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) highlighted in a report that at least four members of EFSA’s management board are employed by or otherwise linked with food industry lobby groups and other commercial interests, a situation that creates potential conflicts of interest. These board members are: Matthias Horst (director general of the German food industry lobby BVE), Milan Kováč (director of International Life Sciences Institute Europe), Jiří Ruprich (Danone Institute) and Piet Vanthemsche (farmers’ lobby COPA and Agri Investment Fund).

GMO Panel members

• Harry Kuiper, Chair
• Joe N. Perry, Vice-Chair
• Sirpa Kärenlampi, Vice-Chair

• Hans Christer Andersson
• Salvatore Arpaia
• Detlef Bartsch
• Josep Casacuberta
• Howard Davies
• Patrick du Jardin
• Gerhard Flachowsky
• Lieve Herman
• Huw Jones
• Jozsef Kiss
• Gijs A. Kleter
• Antoine Messéan
• Kaare Magne Nielsen
• Annette Poeting
• Jeremy Sweet
• Christoph Tebbe
• Atte Johannes von Wright
• Jean-Michel Wal

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Resources

• Earth Open Source. 2011. Europe's Pesticide and Food Safety Regulators - Who Do They Work For? April.

EFSA. 2011. Response to Earth Open Source report, Europe's Pesticide and Food Safety Regulators - Who Do They Work For? 14 April.

Earth Open Source. 2011. Reply to letter from Catherine Geslain-Lanéelle, executive director of EFSA, regarding our report: Europe’s pesticide and food safety regulators: Who do they work for? 20 April.

SETAC. 2011. Response to Earth Open Source report, Europe's Pesticide and Food Safety Regulators - Who Do They Work For? 28 April.