Pegasus

Despite considerable European innovations occurring in the area of GM animal technology, many of these current activities in the field of GM food animals take place outside the EU, in particular regions like the Far East, North America, and Australia-New Zealand. It can be envisaged that some of these animals still find their way into the European food supply chain through imports from overseas, in particular given that the EU is the world’s largest international trading block for food commodities.

Still, in Europe there is an ongoing discussion about GM crops, foods and pharmaceutical products derived from genetically modified (GM) animals which have not entered the European market yet. For discussion on societal issues, such as safety and ethics of foods and pharmaceutical products derived from cloned animals, well-balanced information is needed

Taking into account public perceptions, the competitiveness of EU animal production, and risk-benefit assessments linked with human and animal health, environmental impact, and sustainable production, the results of PEGASUS will provide European policy with pros and cons regarding GM animals and the foods and pharmaceuticals products derived from them.

The objective of PEGASUS is to provide cons and pros for future policy regarding GM animals, together with the foods and pharmaceutical products derived from them. The aim of PEGASUS is:

• To aid the EU’s policy assessment of the relevant research programmes and commercial application of these GM animals together with the foods and pharmaceutical products derived from them.
• To identify ethical concerns regarding their introduction, and societal barriers to commercialisation.
• To identify issues raised as part of the technology appraisal process.

These outcomes will contribute to and inform the EU’s current work to further development the Knowledge Based Bio Economy (KBBE) and contribute to obtainment of its strategic objectives.

• To identify by literature and expert interviews the most important current and future short-, medium-, and long–term technical developments in the area of genetic modification, applied to animals for food and pharmaceutics and the importance for the (future) competitiveness of the European animal production.
  
• To provide insight into the economic dimensions (economic performance, chain governance) of using GM animals in the food and pharmaceutical production chain.
  
• To produce a literature overview and an expert consultation of the risks and benefits associated with GM animal products in the food and pharmaceutical chain , from the point of view of the life sciences.
  
• To identify consumer perceptions associated with GM animals and derived food and pharmaceutical products by integrating existing national and European data.
  
• To collate the documented ethical concerns (positive as negative) raised by stakeholder groups (breeders and farmers, scientists and food- and pharmaceutical industry, NGO’s and policy makers) in different European countries. A final multi-stakeholder group will be held in India. Emerging ethical themes will be categorized and the relation to policy development and governance practice will be identified.
  
• To identify policy gaps (national, (pan-) European, India and USA) and recommend the policy options to be considered.
  
• To provide an integrated analysis of public concerns and preferences for the strategic development and application of GM animals, including the food and pharmaceutical products derived from them.
  
• To identify future European policy and research needs regarding GM animals for policy makers, end-users and researchers.

The interrelationship and the inputs of each Work Package into other Work Packages are schematically depicted in this figure: