EC Report Provides Overview of Projects Tracking Public Debate on Nanotechnology

The European Commission has released a report, “Understanding Public Debate on Nanotechnologies: Options for Framing Public Policy,” that discusses several commission projects designed to assess “the nature of public debate on nanosciences and nanotechnologies, and the ways in which deliberative approaches could lead to better governance of these technologies.” The overview includes summaries of the FramingNano, Nanocap, Deepen, and Nanoplat projects. The authors, who were involved as coordinators or participants in these projects, acknowledge that nanotechnology policy is still in its initial phases of development and could be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of products expected to enter the market in the near future. They note that international authorities have not yet agreed to definitions relating to the technology and that the European Union is regulating nanoparticles as “chemical substances” under REACH. Among other matters, they observe that nanotechnology in food is expected to be defined as a “novel food,” much like genetically modified foods have been defined since the 1990s, and that a food-additive proposal before the European Parliament is the “first piece of legislation to include explicit reference to nanotechnology.