Reuters gets it wrong on genome edited foods

The article below contains some nonsense about genome editing and the opinion of the advocate general of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) on the GMO status of certain mutagenesis and “new GM” techniques.

First, the article claims, “ECJ advocate general Michal Bobek advised in January that organisms could be exempt from GMO rules if they did not have added foreign DNA”.

But in fact the opposite was the case. The advocate general’s opinion clearly and correctly states that the EU’s GMO regulation “does not require the insertion of foreign DNA in an organism in order for the latter to be characterised as a GMO”.

The advocate general added that mutagenesis techniques are only exempt from the obligations of the GMO Directive if they do not “involve the use of recombinant nucleic acid molecules or GMOs”.

To “involve the use of” is not the same as to “contain” recombinant nucleic acid molecules or GMOs.