14:14 26.10.2012

Health Ministry says that presence of GMOs in Ukrainian products is a myth

2 min read
Health Ministry says that presence of GMOs in Ukrainian products is a myth

There are no registered food products in Ukraine that contain genetically modified organisms (GMOs), Director of the MedvedInstitute of Eco-Hygiene and Toxicology of the Ukrainian Health Ministry Mykola Prodanchuk has said on the Social Status Your Health program on the Tonis television channel.

He said that according to Ukrainian legislation only those GMOs that received approval for use as food and were included in the state register of food could be on sale and in the fields. However, there are currently no such organisms on the register, because the safety of none of them has yet been proved, i.e. the use of GMOs in Ukraine is prohibited, he added.

"First and foremost, I want to refute reports that all products now contain GMOs. This is a myth that has been spread for a long time... The tests that we are regularly conducting show that over the past five years the number of cases of the detection of GMOs in food has decreased by thousands of times," Prodanchuk said.

He said that there were currently no cases of the detection of GMOs in products that are sold in Ukrainian stores.

In his opinion, it is unprofitable to use GMOs in Ukraine.

"It's not cheaper in our country to use GMO soybeans than regular soybeans. Why should producers risk breaking the law?" Prodanchuk said.

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