Biotechnologies and food: a summary of major issues regarding safety assurance

The International Food Biotechnology Council (IFBC) was organized in 1988 to develop criteria and procedures to evaluate the safety of foods produced through genetic modification. The specific objective was to provide a comprehensive, scientifically based report, with extensive literature references, and a glossary of terms for this new field, for safety criteria of foods and food ingredients derived from genetically modified plants and microorganisms. However, the immense scope of the subject required restriction to three general categories of food products: foods and food ingredients derived from microorganisms, single chemicals and simple mixtures, and whole foods and other complex mixtures. Not considered were foods derived from