All three Decisions provided for a transitional period of time of 5 years, during which food and feed containing the GM material were allowed to be placed on the market, in accordance with Article 4(2) or Article 16(2) of Regulation (EC) 1829/2003, subject to a number of conditions. The Decisions required in particular that the presence of the GM material in food and feed does not exceed a threshold of 0,9% and that the presence of this GM material be adventitious or technically unavoidable. This transition period was extended until 31 December 2016 with a tolerance threshold of 0,1% by Decision (EU) 2012/69.

Recent test results reported by the authorisation-holder on oilseed rape shipments from Canada intended for the EU showed that the measures undertaken by the authorisation-holder have allowed the removal of nearly all the GM material from the market. Yet the results showed that minute traces (< 0,1%) of the GM material could still be detected in the food or feed chain at the end of the transitional period set out in Decision (EU) 2012/69.

Therefore, Decision (EU) 2016/2268 amending Decisions 2007/305/EC, 2007/306/EC and 2007/307/EC as regards the tolerance period for traces of Ms1×Rf1 (ACS-BNØØ4-7×ACS-BNØØ1-4) hybrid oilseed rape, Ms1×Rf2 (ACS- BNØØ4-7×ACS-BNØØ2-5) hybrid oilseed rape and Topas 19/2 (ACS-BNØØ7-1) oilseed rape, as well as their derived products, sets out a supplementary transitional period until 31 December 2019 which should provide sufficient time to allow the total removal of the GM material from the food and feed chain.