The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) has issued a report urging the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to ban several food dyes that allegedly pose “risks of cancer, hyperactivity in children, and allergies.” According to a June 29, 2010, CSPI press release, “Dyed foods should be considered adulterated under the law, because the dyes make a food ‘appear better or of greater value that it is’—typically by masking the absence of fruit, vegetable, or other more costly ingredient.” CSPI has charged FDA with failing to enforce “a stricter standard of safety for color additives than other food additives,” despite a five-fold increase in per capita consumption of dyes since 1955. It has specifically asked the agency to prohibit (i) Red 3 and Citrus Red 2 “because they caused cancer in rats,” (ii) Red 40, Yellow 5 and Yellow 6, “which are tainted with cancer-causing contaminants,” including benzidine and…
Category Archives Other Developments
The National Research Council (NRC) recently issued a report titled Toward Sustainable Agricultural Systems in the 21st Century, which reviews farming practices, technologies and management systems that seek to promote environmental, social and economic sustainability. According to NRC, “the scale, organization, enterprise diversity, and forms of market integration associated with individual farms provide unique opportunities or barriers to improving their ability to contribute to global or local food production, ecosystem integrity, economic viability, and social well-being.” The report apparently evaluates agricultural systems on whether they are sufficiently productive, robust and efficient in their efforts to meet these four goals. It also proposes “two parallel and overlapping efforts to ensure continuous improvement in the sustainability performance of U.S. agriculture: incremental and transformative.” The former approach “would be directed at improving the sustainability of all farms, irrespective of size or farming system type,” while the latter “would apply a systems perspective to…
A website that specializes in geek gear has reportedly drawn the ire of the National Pork Board (NPB), which apparently sent the company a cease-and-desist letter for marketing unicorn pâté as “the other white meat.” ThinkGeek.com offered the fake product as an April Fool’s prank, but later received a 12-page legal missive claiming that advertisements for “Radiant Farms Canned Unicorn Meat” infringed and diluted the board’s trademark rights. “Laughs aside, the attorneys were doing their work that they do to protect the trademark,” an NPB spokesperson was quoted as saying. Rather than oppose the cease-and-desist warning, ThinkGeek.com has since issued a public apology to NPB on the company blog. “It was never our intention to cause a national crisis and misguide American citizens regarding the differences between the pig and the unicorn,” stated Geeknet, Inc., CEO Scott Kaufman in a June 21, 2010, press release. “In fact, ThinkGeek’s canned unicorn…
Several environmental, health and women’s organizations have called on the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) to consider “all relevant studies” on bisphenol A (BPA) as the safety watchdog prepares to present its opinion on the chemical next month. Signed by approximately 20 scientific experts and 40 non-governmental organizations, the June 23, 2010, letter states that “any objective and comprehensive review of the scientific literature will lead to the conclusion that action is necessary to reduce the levels of BPA exposure, particularly in groups at highest risk, namely young infants and pregnant mothers.” Drafted by Breast Cancer UK and University of Missouri-Columbia Biological Sciences Professor Frederick vom Saal, the letter claims that EFSA relied on a “few flawed studies” to declare BPA safe in prior risk assessments. “Many scientific studies are now calling into question the safety of BPA,” maintains the letter, which cites a body of recent research that includes bio-monitoring…
Shook Of Counsel Jim Andreasen has been appointed by the ABA Section of Environment, Energy, and Resources leadership to chair the section’s Agricultural Management Committee. His one-year term will begin at the conclusion of the section’s 2010 annual business meeting to be held August 8 during the ABA’s annual meeting in San Francisco. As committee chair, Andreasen will be responsible for appointing committee vice chairs, developing a committee action plan and leading the vice chairs in implementing the plan. He previously served as the committee’s programs vice chair. To view the committee’s web page, please click here.
Book author Anneli Rufus recently explored claims made about food ingredients that stimulate the purported “fifth taste” promoted by, among others, Ajinomoto, a Japanese company that manufactures monosodium glutamate (MSG), which was created in the early 1900s as the essence of ingredients that purportedly give food a richness and savoriness identified as umami. Ajinomoto-funded researchers have apparently fueled a food fad that has been gathering steam over the past decade by claiming that umami stimulates particular taste buds, much as sweet, sour, salty and bitter do. Rufus discusses ongoing debates about the safety of MSG; anecdotal evidence allegedly shows that MSG in foods can cause migraines, obesity, asthma, and brain damage. While the Food and Drug Administration requires that food producers include MSG on product labels, the agency does consider MSG as GRAS (generally recognized as safe). Still, other ingredients, such as yeast extract and hydrolyzed vegetable protein also contain…
The American Medical Association (AMA) has adopted new public health policies concerning the reporting of fats on nutrition labels and obesity reduction. During its June 14, 2010, annual meeting, AMA urged the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to adopt more “precise processes” to measure trans and saturated fat content in foods. Under current FDA guidelines, trans and saturated fat content can be listed on nutrition labels as zero if the food product contains less than 0.5 grams per serving. AMA claims that products labeled “trans fat free” or “zero trans fat” could supply in one serving as much as 25 percent of the recommended daily allowance of trans fats. Claiming that “it’s difficult to make dietary changes if food labels are unclear,” AMA board member Edward Langston urged FDA to use “clear, concise and uniform labeling” and list the most accurate information. AMA also adopted a policy supporting efforts to…
An organic industry watchdog has released a June 7, 2010, letter that urges the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to increase the transparency of the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) appointment process. “The Cornucopia Institute, and other organic advocates, have long been concerned that representatives from corporate agribusiness have obtained a disproportionate influence on rulemaking at the USDA,” states a June 8 press release, which claims that in the past, “many eminently qualified candidates . . . did not have the political clout to be appointed.” According to Cornucopia, USDA has continued “the Bush administration policy of keeping secret the nominees and the related corporations or organizations they work for or represent.” The group alleges that NOSB positions reserved for consumers or organic farmers have previously gone to specialists employed by corporate agribusiness or only the largest organic marketers. It has thus asked USDA to make public “the name of…
Consumers Union (CU) has issued the results of its investigation into protein drinks, concluding that many products are at best superfluous and at worst unsafe. Published in the July 2010 edition of Consumer Reports, the findings allegedly support the watchdog’s position that Food and Drug Administration (FDA) oversight under the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act “is inadequate to ensure that protein drinks and other dietary supplements are consistently low in heavy metals and other contaminants.” CU apparently conducted outside laboratory tests on 15 protein powders and drinks purchased in the New York-metro area, in addition to reviewing government documents and interviewing health experts and consumers. According to CU, “All drinks in our tests had at least one sample containing one or more of the following contaminants: arsenic, cadmium, lead, and mercury.” In three cases, consumers who drank more than three servings per day purportedly risked exceeding the U.S. Pharmacopeia’s…
Public health attorney and author Michele Simon has authored an article that calls disingenuous at least one food company’s promise to support first lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move campaign to end childhood obesity. Simon targets PepsiCo, which has publicly supported the campaign and also makes sweetened beverages, energy drinks and salty snack foods. The company’s CEO has reportedly indicated that it is investing in new sweeteners and salt-reduction technologies to improve its products. According to Simon, this means “the company is hard at work trying to engineer healthy Cheetos.” She concludes, “PepsiCo makes processed food, which is no basis for proper diet in any culture. Nature provides true nourishment in the form of whole grains, fruits, and vegetables, and no corporate mantra can improve on that.” See AlterNet, June 2, 2010.
