For years, the Philippines has been one of the countries around the globe striving for food production and resolving food security issues in consideration to the increasing number of malnutrition prevalence. The Department of Agriculture (DA) as the major national government’s implementing body to primarily monitor and ensure enough food supply in the country provided a solution to augment the supply of foods through innovatively producing genetically modified food variants. This scientific strategy duplicates and modifies the genome to make plants more resistant to diseases as they grow and produce more. This process is also applied in livestock such as those of chicken and pork.
Genetically modified (GM) foods are raising concerns from the consumer regarding the quality and safety of the product. According to WHO, all genetically produced GM products in the market are safe and have passed the safety assessment requirements (as traditional food) giving no harm to human health. DA issued Administrative Order No.8 s. 2002 which states the “Rules and Regulations on the Importation and Release of Plant and Plant Products Derived from Modern biotechnology”, a set of safety precaution before approving the plant for production participated by Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI), Bureau of Agriculture and Fisheries Standard (BAFS) and Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) together with the Scientific and Technical Review Panel. This issuance gave rise to the creation of a committee that consists of scientists outside the Department of Agriculture who will do the risk assessment based on the CODEX Guideline for the conduct of food safety assessment of food derived from the use recombinant DNA.
At the consumers end, almost all produced foods nowadays are directly and indirectly genetically modified to meet the demands of the people. In addition, all GM plant-based foods distributed and sold in the market are being monitored and approved by the LGUs to ensure consumer food safety. However, knowing this, it is left to the consumer’s discretion to consume either organic based and/or GM foods. The choice is yours!
NO II Joanna Marie E. Baltazar
References:
- Food, genetically modified
https://www.who.int/news-room/q-a-detail/food-genetically-modified
- Regulating GMOs in developing and transition countries
http://www.fao.org/biotech/C9doc.htm
- GMO crops, animal food and beyond
https://www.fda.gov/food/agricultural-biotechnology/gmo-crops-animal-food-and-beyond
- GM Food Safety: Philippine Regulations and Food Safety Assessment