WASHINGTON, 18 January 2008 — Fears over genetically modified foods have failed to make much impact in the United States where consumers and the US media are less fired up about the issue than Europeans.
“The media don’t talk about these issues, there is more apathy,” Michael Hansen, a biologist with the major New York-based Consumers Union, said.
“When the public is asked in the survey, a high percentage wants food labels, they just don’t realize the extent to which certain food such as corn or soybean are genetically engineered, and often they have not heard of any of these food safety concerns.” French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Friday banned the only genetically modified crop grown in France, the Mon 810 maize produced by the US agriculture giant Monsanto.
“It simply means that with the principle of precaution at stake, I am making a major political decision to carry our country to the forefront of the debate on the environment,” the French leader said.
GM foods have also sparked a US trade dispute with the European Union, after the World Trade Organization ruled that an EU moratorium on the authorization of GM products between 1999 and 2004 broke world trade rules.
The European Commission on Friday failed to meet the WTO deadline to comply with the September 2006 ruling and normalize trade.
But European concerns have largely gone unnoticed here, except by the biotech industry body, the Biotechnology Industry Organization, which denounced France’s decision as unnecessary and not based on scientific fact.
Hansen said the US government must bear the blame for American apathy for simply failing to address the issue. “The government has ignored public opinion polls for over 10 years saying that the public want labeling,” agreed Ronnie Cummins, head of the Organic Consumers Association, a private group of organic food producers.
“Most people don’t know the food they are eating has at least trace levels of genetic, in soy and corn.” Supermarket tests have revealed that at least 70 percent of all foodstuffs contain GM products, he said.
If there was compulsory labeling fewer GM components would end up in the products on the shelves, added Hansen. “Because they have blocked any kind of labeling, it’s widespread out there in the US.”
The same consumer apathy however does not apply to meat and diary products from cloned animals. A survey carried out two years ago by the International Food Council found that 65 percent of Americans were opposed to eating such products — a level of concern matched in Europe.
Despite the opposition though, the US food safety authority on Tuesday approved meat and milk from cloned animals, clearing the way for them one day to appear on store shelves.
Europeans have cast doubts about the use of meat and milk from cloned animals. In comments published yesterday, the European Group on Ethics in science and new technologies (EGE) said: “Considering the current level of suffering and health problems of surrogate dams (mothers) and animal clones, the EGE has doubts as to whether cloning animals for food supply is ethically justified.”
The group, which was commissioned by the European Commission, gave its opinion late Wednesday. The group added that it “does not see convincing arguments to justify the production of food from clones and their offspring.”
The latest opinion from the ethics group comes after the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) said last week that meat and milk from healthy cattle clones were probably safe for human consumption. However, Commission spokeswoman Nina Papadoulaki had played down the EFSA conclusion as a “preliminary report” and said: “We will ask Europeans what they think about cloning before giving our opinion in May 2008.”
The European Commission vowed Monday to consult with consumers about meat and milk from cloned animals, eager to avert a crisis over so-called “Frankenfoods.”
