The international and European Legislation on genetically modified organisms

Biotechnology offers humanity the power to change the characteristics of living organisms by transferring the genetic information from one organism, across species boundaries, into other organism. While the biotechnology may offer great benefits to agriculture and producers and, potentially, to consumers, it does not come without risks and uncertainty. Being the products of agricultural biotechnology, the genetically modified organisms have been criticized since they have been commercialized worldwide. The variety of the scientific experiments on GMOs and the uncertain status of the experts on the scientific evidence of their harm, make necessary to take appropriate and proportional measures against the risks they pose. Keywords : European Union, genetically modified organisms, food safety.