Package 2 problem statement on genetically modified food

You are the Food Safety Officer of a multi-national food ingredient company. Your Managing Director is considering importing genetically modified (GM) food crops for further process into flour and starches. However, he needs to understand the food safety issues related to GM foods before making the decision. In addition, recent press reports on several cases of food borne illnesses associated with food contaminations have also cause concerns to your Managing Director. He would like you to include in your report the analytical techniques that could be employed for the isolation and identification of food-borne pathogens and the detection of toxins that might be present in the food products produced by your company.

As such, you are tasked to submit a detail report to him covering the following points:

• Outline the main principles used in the genetic modification process
• Review the use of GM Food/ Ingredients from various sources
• Discuss the benefit and controversial issues associated with the use of GM
food such as the consumer’s rights, product labeling, religious/ ethnical, and
environmental concerns
• Outline the principles of various laboratory techniques used for toxin detection
and the permitted limit based on acceptable daily intake and food consumption
studies and,
• the principle of some microbiological techniques isolation and identification of
foodborne pathogens such as DNA probes and Enzyme immunoassays.

The deadline for the submission of the report is 19 July 2010, 5pm