United Kingdom
March 21, 2013
21 Mar 2013 : Column WA167
Written Answers
Thursday 21 March 2013
Agriculture: Genetically Modified Crops
Question, asked by Lord Jones of Cheltenham
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of research by scientists at the European Food Safety Authority published in Issue 57 of Science in Society regarding the potential dangers to human health posed by the virus Gene VI when it overlaps with the cauliflower mosaic virus CaMV 35S promoter.[HL6250]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Earl Howe):
The research paper in question was published in 2012 in the journal GM Crops and Food: Biotechnology in Agriculture and the Food Chain. It provides an overview of the different variants of the cauliflower mosaic virus (CaMV) promoter region, including overlapping fragments of the virus gene VI, that have been used to produce genetically modified plants. CaMV is a virus that infects plants of the Brassica, or cabbage, family but not animals or humans.
Some websites have highlighted this paper and claim that the presence of the viral gene VI or parts of it, in authorised varieties of genetically modified (GM) plants is a health concern and such plants might not be safe for human consumption.
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which carries out the risk assessment of GM plants, has refuted this interpretation of the data presented in the published paper. All GM plant applications assessed by EFSA since its creation in 2002 that contain fragments of CaMV have included a detailed analysis of the inserted fragments and no safety concerns were identified in relation to the sequence of the inserted fragments of the viral gene.
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