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European Union controls on the labeling of genetically modified foods and ingredients |
J. R. BLANCHFIELD, Institute of Food Science & Technology (IFST), 17 Arabia Close, Chingford, London, E4 7DU, England Contrasting with the FDA position that distinctive labeling of production method is unnecessary for products which have been determined as GRAS, in the EU and particularly in the UK, there has always been an insistence on distinctive labeling of GM foods and ingredients, to provide for informed consumer choice. Initially this was made extremely difficult by the failure to segregate GM soya and corn from their non-GM equivalents. While the EU Commission was securing agreement of all Member States to detailed provisions for labeling regulations, distinctive labeling was operated voluntarily by industry, and then increasingly by more and more comprehensive legislation. From January 1999 a pre-planned intensive orchestrated activist campaign directed at a public susceptible as a result of BSE, engineered a major shift in public opinion, and this, accompanied by intimidation of major retailers and manufacturers, resulted by mid-1999 in a widespread move to exclude GM foods and ingredients and to make labeling and advertising claims about non-use of GM (there is as yet no legal basis for claiming "GM-free"). Mandatory distinctive labeling significantly increased public awareness of GM foods and susceptibility to scare campaigning, and to retailers' and manufacturers' decisions to exclude GM products rather than having to label. Thus the paradox that measures intended to enable freedom of choice contributed to elimination of freedom of choice. More recently, EU labeling legislation has extended from GM ingredients to GM-derived additives, etc, requirements for traceability of ingredients, and, in the UK, to labeling / identification of GM materials in foodservice. The anti-GM activist campaign has continued unremittingly, and has led to retailers requiring exclusion of GM materials from feed for animals used to provide meat and poultry in their stores. In a rapidly developing regulatory situation, the latest state of play in EU GM labelling will be presented.
Session 41, Developments in international regulations and labeling requirements for materials derived from biotechnology
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