>Date: Fri, 29 May 1998 11:07:27 EDT
>From: Twittman@aol.com
>Subject: Coalition challenges genetically altered food
>
>Coalition challenges genetically altered food
>Lawsuit cites risks to consumers; tests, labels sought
>BY JIM PUZZANGHERA
>Mercury News Washington Bureau
>
>WASHINGTON -- A coalition of scientists, public-interest organizations and
>religious groups filed suit Wednesday against the Food and Drug
>Administration, seeking to have 36 genetically engineered foods taken off the
>market and asking that the agency be forced to comprehensively test and label
>such products.
>
>The suit, filed here in U.S. District Court, strikes at an industry born in
>Northern California. In recent years it has produced a bumper crop of
>genetically altered foods, ranging from the slower-ripening Flavr Savr Tomato
>from Davis-based Calgene Inc. to insect-resistant corn and soybeans.
>
>The suit contends that exchanging genetic information across breeds and
>species puts consumers at various risks, from unwittingly eating foods with
>genes from substances they may be allergic to -- or are prohibited by
>religious guidelines from eating -- to the potential danger of a technology at
>the cutting edge of science. Already, genetically engineered soybeans are
>showing up in soy-based baby formulas, and corn from altered seed is found in
>corn chips, backers of the suit said.
>
>``By failing to require testing and labeling of genetically engineered foods,
>the FDA has made millions of American consumers the guinea pigs to test the
>safety of these foods,'' said Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of the
>International Center for Technology Assessment, a Washington-based public-
>interest group among those filing the suit.
>
>If successful, the suit could hinder companies such as Calgene, now a
>subsidiary of Monsanto, and DNA Plant Technology of Oakland. Scott Thenell,
>director of regulatory affairs for DNA Plant Technology, said the FDA's
>current process works fine to get consumers the nutritional information they
>need.
>
>``It's imperative that foods that are marketed be safe for consumers, and a
>developer is going to do everything that is reasonable and logical to
>establish that safety,'' said Thenell, whose company has engineered a delayed-
>ripening tomato that could come to market next year. ``I could envision that
>if there was a prescribed set of tests that had to be done and for some reason
>it was over and above what companies are already doing, it could delay the
>introduction of these new varieties.''
>
>FDA and industry officials say genetically engineered foods are tested by the
>producers and reviewed in a voluntary consultation process with the FDA that
>no company with good business sense would bypass. And mandating a label on a
>tomato or bottle of cooking oil that says it was produced by genetic
>engineering would not give consumers any substantive information about the
>nutritional value of the food or other important characteristics, which is the
>only type of label the FDA says it can require.
>
>``It's similar to saying whether grapes are picked by scab labor or union
>labor,'' said Eric Flamm, a senior policy adviser at the FDA who deals with
>biotechnology issues. ``Some people are interested in it. It's not within our
>jurisdiction to require labeling like that.''
>
>The groups backing the suit say the FDA does have jurisdiction because genetic
>engineering causes material changes in the food that federal law requires to
>be identified in labeling. The suit also says the insertion of genetic
>material into foods should be considered a food additive, which requires
>safety testing, such as the rigorous testing given the fat-replacement
>olestra.
>
>The suit also charges that not labeling genetically altered foods violates the
>Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the First Amendment of the U.S.
>Constitution because it burdens the free exercise of religion by, for example,
>Jews and Muslims who have to avoid certain foods.
>
>``The failure of the FDA to label these foods substantially burdens a person's
>free exercise of their religious beliefs,'' said Joseph Mendleson, legal
>director for the International Center for Technology Assessment. Several
>plaintiffs in the suit belong to faiths that have such regimens, ``and the
>only way in which they feel they can adhere to their beliefs and/or their
>dietary regimens is through labeling and knowing what foods are out there and
>how to avoid those foods.''
>
>Backers of the suit said at a news conference Wednesday they were not opposed
>to genetic engineering -- just the lack of regulation of the growing numbers
>of products. They listed 36 genetically engineered foods currently on the
>market.
>
>``This is not all about fear and worry,'' said Jean Halloran, director of the
>Consumer Policy Institute of Consumers Union, which publishes Consumer
>Reports. ``In general it is quite possible that much, a majority, maybe even
>the vast majority, of this food will turn out to be safe. But what we need are
>the assessments and the information for consumers.''
>
>But Henry Miller, a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution at
>Stanford University, said people who want mandatory labeling of genetically
>engineered foods just want to stop the development of products they are
>opposed to.
>
>``What we're seeing is people who have decided they don't like a new
>technology and are trying any means, any maneuver, to disrupt it and to make
>it less commercially viable,'' said Miller, former director of the FDA's
>office of biotechnology. Current genetic engineering is just an extension of
>cruder engineering done through breeding for centuries, he said.
>
>That's been the argument companies using biotechnology have made for new food
>products like corn and cotton that produce their own insecticide and soybeans
>that are resistant to a common herbicide. Flamm said the FDA is not bowing to
>large multinational firms like Monsanto.
>
>
>------------------------------
>
>Date: Fri, 29 May 1998 11:36:49 EDT
>From: Twittman@aol.com
>Subject: newsweek article on organics
>
> Is Organic Better? by Laura Shapiro
>Newsweek, June 1, 1998
>
>'Organic' food labels can mean many different things--or nothing. National
>standards are in the works, but they still won't guarantee you the best,
>safest food.
> By Laura Shapiro
>
> Shiny red delicious apples are stacked in two separate heaps on the produce
>counter of a Manhattan supermarket. They look remarkably alike, but the second
>heap, labeled "Organic,'' costs $1.79 a pound--40 cents more than the first
>heap. Increasingly, Americans believe that the premium is worth paying: sales
>of organic foods have jumped about 20 percent a year since 1991 and are
>expected to total more than $4 billion this year. But what are all these folks
>actually buying?
> To many people, the word "organic" promises that the food is cleaner, safer
>and closer to nature. "I think organic farmers really love the land and want
>to bring good, healthy products to people," says Lori Sutherland of Portola
>Valley, Calif. Genuinely organic food is indeed grown without toxic chemicals,
>using agricultural methods that do the least damage to the environment. But
>the label "certified organic" means only that one of 44 certifying agencies
>around the country, all with different standards, vouches for the farm or
>processing facility that produced the food. And less than half the organic
>food on the market is certified; the rest you buy on faith. Finally, no matter
>how high an agency's standards are, buying organic is no guarantee that the
>food has better flavor, more nutrients or complete freedom from pesticides.
> What are we getting for our money? Right now, farmers, retailers, chefs,
>corporate executives and government officials are engaged in a massive
>struggle over just how to answer that question. Last December the U.S.
>Department of Agriculture issued a long-awaited proposal for national,
>comprehensive standards governing the use of the word organic. Last month the
>USDA yanked the proposal back for a rewrite after it took an unprecedented
>public beating. Some 200,000 people wrote, faxed, e-mailed or spoke up at
>public hearings to let the USDA know they overwhelmingly rejected the
>standards, especially if they allowed what became known as the Big Three to be
>sold as organic: genetically engineered food, irradiated food and food grown
>in municipal sewage sludge. A USDA staffer says officials were "awestruck" at
>the size and fury of the protest. "It never abated, it just grew," says the
>staffer. "We underestimated the strength of the commitment to the term organic
>that exists out there." According to Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman, the
>USDA will now make "fundamental revisions" to the proposal. The Big Three will
>be jettisoned, and a new draft will be issued later this year.
> No matter how the USDA eventually defines organic, the word will never mean
>that you're buying the safest, most scrumptious apples. The best an organic
>label can do is improve the odds. In fact, to understand what you're getting
>when you buy organic, you have to forget fruits and vegetables for a moment
>and think about dirt. "The whole concept of organic is that you feed the soil,
>not the plant," says Jim Riddle, coordinator of the Independent Organic
>Inspectors Association, which trains inspectors to certify organic farms and
>processors. Feeding the soil starts with crop rotation: organic farmers plant
>a field with different cash crops for a few years, then give over the field to
>alfalfa or clover for a season or two. Tilling under that "cover crop" makes
>the soil rich and fertile. "Those plants are food for the earthworms, the
>fungi, for all the soil-dwelling bacteria and all kinds of beneficial
>organisms," says Riddle. "When you have healthy soil and healthy plants, pests
>aren't attracted to them as much."
> All this TLC tends to make the labor costs in organic farming several times
>greater than on conventional farms. Hence the price of the food. Tari Delisi
>of Oak Park, Ill., often buys organic but drew the line recently at organic
>lettuce costing $6 a pound. She scrubs conventional produce with a brush "to
>get the guck off." Many organic experts predict national standards will
>attract more customers, more farmers and more funding for research, ultimately
>lowering prices.
> Whatever you pay for organic, you can't be sure that dinner will be
>pesticide-free. Consumer Reports recently tested organic and conventional
>produce and found pesticide residues on both, although the organic samples had
>much less, and its residues were from less toxic chemicals. "We're doing the
>best we can, but the rainwater here in the Midwest contains herbicides," says
>Riddle. "There are pesticide residues in dust particles, in snow. So residues
>will show up sometimes." Whether the residues on conventional produce pose a
>health risk is much debated. "It's difficult to make the case for organic
>produce being safer than conventionally grown produce," says Carl Winter, a
>food toxicologist at the University of California, Davis. "While you can
>detect residues in [conventional] food, the levels we are exposed to are far
>below those that would trigger any health concerns." On the other hand, the
>EPA now acknowledges that its pesticide policies must be made more stringent
>to protect children.
> With all that rich, healthy soil to grow in, organic food ought to be more
>nutritious, but the evidence just isn't in. The studies to date have been too
>small to take into account the many variables that affect nutrient levels.
>Flavor differences are equally hard to judge. Great taste is more likely to be
>associated with seed variety, ripeness and buying locally than with pest-
>control methods per se. "As a general rule, organic products have better
>flavor," says Odessa Piper, chef-owner of L'Etoile in Madison, Wis., which
>features mostly local, mostly organic food all year round. "But the flavor of
>an organic product shipped from California may be inferior to a nonorganic
>product grown here in Wisconsin."
> So is there any reason at all to pay extra for organic? Sure. Turn on the
>tap for a glass of water in, say, White Hall, Ill. Tests conducted by the
>Environmental Working Group, a research and advocacy organization, found six
>pesticides in one sample of the town's drinking water. "Virtually every river
>and reservoir in the Midwest that's used for drinking water is contaminated by
>corn fertilizers," says Brian Cohen of the EWG. A USDA report documents
>numerous examples of the environmental threat posed by farm chemicals,
>including the destruction of fish, wildlife and beneficial insects. Farm
>workers who apply pesticides and herbicides have disproportionately high rates
>of some cancers--and so do their children, according to Aaron Blair of the
>National Cancer Institute. "In terms of health, food safety tends to be our
>central concern, but the environmental impact of pesticides is a greater
>concern," says Winter. Kathy Davis of Mequon, Wis., doesn't mind paying a
>premium for organic to protect the earth. "The environment is for my
>children," she says.
> And from an environmental point of view, the lower price tag on
>conventional produce may be deceptive. Catherine Greene, an agricultural
>economist at the USDA, says our food supply only seems cheap because its real
>costs aren't represented by supermarket bar codes. "Water with pesticide
>residues, water that has to be tested for chemicals and treated--those are big
>costs,'' she says. "They're not quantified, but they're costs we pay as a
>society."
> Once the USDA's revised regulations are in place, perhaps by 2000, shoppers
>who choose organic will know for the first time exactly what they're buying.
>What won't change is their emotional investment in the choice. "Buying, eating
>and seeking out organically raised food has become my religion," writes food
>critic Patricia Unterman in the San Francisco Examiner, and as the USDA has
>learned, she speaks for thousands of true believers. But the real test of
>their faith is yet to come. With the new regulations, business will boom--and
>fresh produce is just the beginning. "The big growth area will be frozen and
>prepared [organic] foods," says Katherine DiMatteo of the Organic Trade
>Association, an industry group. Already, supermarkets carry products that look
>suspiciously like organic junk foods. For longtime devotees of organic food,
>the good news is that abundance and lower prices are on the way. The bad news
>is that they're bringing frozen organic breakfast burritos with them.
> With Mary Hager in Washington, D.C., Karen Springen in Chicago and Thomas
>Hayden in New York
>
>Newsweek 6/1/98 Lifestyle/Is Organic Better?
>----------------------------
>4:19:48 EDT
>From: "John Henning, Eco-echo, McGill U., Montreal, Ca" <INF3@musicb.mcgill.ca>
>Subject: CODEX meeting in Ottawa
>
>This is a VERY brief report on the CODEX meetings in Ottawa
>during the past week.
>I am sure there will be more news during the next few days
>
>The CODEX committee on food labelling has been considering draft
>standards for organically produced foods. As of Wed., the
>committee had found substantial consensus regarding parts of
>document that had caused problems last year.
>
>The organic standards have been moved along to STEP 8,
>with one exception (Section 5. Requirements for inclusion of
>in Annex 2 .... ) This will be discussed further next year.
>This progress relates basically to the crop production
>standards.
>
>Regarding the livestock standards:
>
>- - these remain at STEP 6
>- - a document will be circulated to the committee by September,
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