Summary.

The cultivation of genetically modified (GMO) plants is becoming increasingly important worldwide and transgenic crops are utilised on a large scale in North America and several other areas. Only few of these genetically modified (GMO) plants have been approved in the European Union. This poses a problem for inspection authorities to ensure that the non-approved GMOs (genetically modified organisms) are not imported into the EU either as constituents of feed and food products or as "GMO-impurities" in products of the food chain. It is thus necessary to be able to distinguish GMOs from non-GMOs and to determine whether a specific GMO is EU-approved.

The present report uncovers and overviews existing methods for sampling and analyses of genetically modified plants and to uncover to what extent data is accessible for an unambiguous identification and quantification of GMOs.

The report focuses on identification of the current problems in the inspection area, e.g. how to make the distinction between non-approved and approved GMOs, and links these to the accessible methods. Since the inspection obligations in practise will mainly involve imported seeds (primarily from non-EU-countries), most attention has been devoted to this area.

Methods for GMO detection can be divided into low- and high-technological methods. Among low-technological methods are herbicide and immunological assays and among high-technological methods are PCR and micro-arrays. The principles for the methods and their aiblity for quantification are described in the report. Furthermore, the report focuses on the importance of appropriate sampling methods, the detection limits and emphasises the need for standardisation and validation of the detection methods.

In addition, the report contains lists of the commonly inserted genes and the GMO varieties harbouring them, of EU-approved and internationally approved GMOs, and of companies selling GMO analysis or GMO detection kits