European Food Safety Authority Publishes Opinion on Nanotechnology Risks
Following the recent publication of the European Commission's independent Scientific Committee on Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks (SCENIHR) opinion on the most recent developments in the risk assessment of nanomaterials, now the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has published its scientific opinion on nanoscience and nanotechnologies in relation to food and feed safety.
Following a request from the European Commission the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) was asked to provide a scientific opinion on potential risks arising from nanoscience and nanotechnologies on food and feed safety. In view of the multidisciplinary nature of this subject, the task was assigned to the EFSA Scientific Committee.
Besides emphasizing the various opportunities potentially emerging from the use of engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) in the food and feed sector, the optinion repeates the well-known problems of lacking data on usage levels, exposure, material toxicity and methodological gaps in assessing nanomaterial risks. Like most governmental analyses, the EFSA also concludes that "the risk assessment paradigm [...] is considered applicable for ENMs" and "current toxicity-testing approaches used for conventional materials are a suitable starting point for risk assessment of ENMs". However, "risk assessment of ENMs in the food and feed area should consider the specific properties of the ENMs in addition to those common to the equivalent non-nanoforms".
The Scientific Committee makes a series of recommendations; in particular, actions should be taken to develop methods to detect and measure ENMs in food/feed and biological tissues, to survey the use of ENMs in the food/feed area, to assess the exposure in consumers and livestock, and to generate information on the toxicity of different ENMs.
- Investigating the interaction and stability of ENMs in food and feed, in the gastro-intestinal tract and in biological tissues
- Developing and validating routine methods to detect, characterise and quantify ENMs in food contact materials, food and feed
- Developing, improving and validating test methodologies to assess toxicity of ENMs (including reliability and relevance of test methods)
At the moment, however, only a case-by-case approach would be feasible to evaluate the risks of specific ENMs.
The opinion is available for download here.
Source: European Food Safety Authority