USDA Report Critical of France’s Proposed BPA Ban

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) Foreign Agriculture Service
recently issued a Global Agricultural Information Network (GAIN) report
concluding that a French proposal to prohibit all food packaging and materials
containing bisphenol A (BPA) would “very likely… impact and jeopardize
U.S. processed and other food exports to France.” Introduced after a French
National Agency for Food Safety and Occupational and Environmental Health
report questioned BPA’s safety, the legislation apparently reflects “strong
political pressure from environmental and consumers’ groups,” as well as
public distrust of the regulatory system following “the mad cow scandal, the
Mediator diabetes drug scandal and even the PIP breast implant scandal.”
As a result, the French food industry has evidently expressed concern that a
BPA ban is unavoidable “in a short to medium term” even if the current bill is
challenged at the EU level.

The GAIN report warns U.S. companies that the proposed measure would
require them “to adapt and change the composition of their packaging with
a new component at a higher cost,” which could prove prohibitive to smaller
suppliers who export to France and Europe. The law would primarily affect
beverages, “notably the Florida orange and grapefruit juice using plastic
container[s],” as well as imported beer, frozen seafood and meat products,
dried fruits and legumes, and “any product that contains a plastic packaging
or a plastic component.”

In particular, USDA cites industry experts who have reportedly criticized the
bill for failing to distinguish between direct-contact food packaging and
food packaging in general. “No other country is undertaking such drastic
legislation such as the one proposed in France,” notes the agency report. “The
existing proposal seems to include even over-packaging such as films which
are not in contact with food. The question of inks containing BPA on food
labels was not clarified either.”