Valentina Zoretić-Rubes, M. Sc.
Ministry of Health, Zagreb, Croatia

GMO has still continued a negative trend image like „Frankenstein plants“, food made by scientists in laboratories. During the last 20 years, the usage of genetic engineering techniques applied on crop and food production has vastly escalated on the global scene. Spreading GM crops and GM food all over the world has lead to the development and implementation of the risk management of the GMO system. This system and the usage of GMO has been introduced in numerous countries and especially in the EU. The presence of GM food on the European market is quite small when compared to the global one. The reason of that lies in a complex institutional administration and a complex harmonised EU legislation in the field of GMO. The procedure of authorising GMO on the Union market is a centralized, mostly complex and time-consuming method regulated by Directive (EU) 2001/18, Directive (EU) 2015/412 and Regulation (EU) 1829/2003. Once authorised in the EU as food, as feed or seeds, GMO becomes automatically authorised to be placed on the market in all Member States of the Union.

In order to protect human health and public Health and the interest of consumers, on the basis of risk assessment towards food safety the Republic of Croatia has implemented a risk management system in the field of GMO. Based upon effectiveness of the risk-management system during the last ten years in Croatia, it can be concluded that Croatia has not been exposed to the impact of GM food. The application of new genetic engineering techniques in plant enrichment shows the necessity of urgent revision of current EU legislation of GMO, as well as the necessity of strengthening the administrative and expert infrastructure, both on national and global level.

Keywords: genetically modified organisms, engineering techniques, risk management