ISO 21569:2005 describes the procedure to qualitatively detect genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and derived products by analysing the nucleic acids extracted from the sample under study. The main focus is on polymerase chain reaction (PCR) based amplification methods.

It gives general requirements for the specific detection and identification of target nucleic acid sequences (DNA) and for the confirmation of the identity of the amplified DNA sequence.

Guidelines, minimum requirements and performance criteria laid down in ISO 21569:2005 are intended to ensure that comparable, accurate and reproducible results are obtained in different laboratories.

ISO 21569:2005 has been established for food matrices, but could also be applied to other matrices (e.g. feed and plant samples from the environment).

Specific examples of methods are provided in Annexes A to D.