Codex takes some steps to tighten GM food safety tests

by Chakravarthi Raghavan

Geneva, 6 July 2001 - - The Codex Alimentarius Commission, a joint FAO/WHO body that sets food safety standards that countries could adopt has taken some initial steps to tightening up the ease with which genetically modified foods are put on the market globally.

The Commission, 165-member joint subsidiary body of the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization and the Geneva-based World Health Organization sets ‘voluntary’ standards that countries can adopt, and generally do with the laws in some countries providing for automatic application of Codex standards. But countries could also put in place higher standards.

But this leeway has been complicated after the entry into force of the WTO, where while countries could adopt higher standards, they have to show it is based on scientific assessments. Otherwise the codex standards become a yardstick to judge restrictions on health and other grounds put in place by countries in terms of international trade rules.

In terms of trade disputes, the Codex standards have become reference points or yardsticks in disputes, more so when secretariat chosen scientific expertise is called in, and views both supporting the codex and the higher standards are presented, with the panellists making judgements on this basis.

The controversies over the genetically modified foods, and their safety, and such products being put on the market through the socalled equivalences - a normal tomato and an genetically modified tomato looking more or less the same, and thus the safety of a GM tomato could be judged on the basis of tests done on a normal tomato - have been challenged by biological and health experts.

Even more the concerns have hit the consumer confidence in the entire global system of food safety.

The meeting of the Codex commission has agreed on a process that sometime in 2003 could result in a Codex guidelines that countries could use and incorporate in their laws for testing such GM food products from health and safety considerations.

In the meanwhile, unfortunately, the GM products put into the market and international trade by countries following the old lax standards would continue to flourish.

This week’s meeting, FAO and WHO announced in a press release, had agreed on the first global principles for the safety assessment of genetically modified (GM) foods, on maximum levels of certain food toxins and on guidelines for organic livestock production.

In terms of current public concerns, the meeting has not as yet reached agreement on banning use of bonemeal and other ingredients (that were known to have caused the onset of the BSE), nor on clear guidelines and rules for testing, from health and food safety point of view, of GM foods before being put on the market or on the questions relating to GM labelling - beyond an accord that where a GM product has unintended allergens, these should be identified in the labels, so that consumers allergic to it may avoid it.

This week’s meeting showed the Codex is still far away from any consensus or decision on the problems of ‘traceability’ for example, or on how to move from the general principles of GM safety assessment to actual guidelines and what happens in between.

At a press briefing Friday afternoon to announce the outcome of the current session (where decisions were taken on the GM food issue, as also on a range of other issues including maximum levels of environmental contaminants, particularly lead, cadmium and aflatoxin found in food (such as fruit juices, cereals and milk) the Codex and WHO officials attempted to provide answers that would not set off more scares.

But in doing so, they may in fact have contributed to it - as for example, when a question relating to GM products and plants was answered in terms of the safety of bio-technology which has been around for some decades now or distinguishing between GM labelling (agreement limited now to allergens, and not the general labelling requirement demanded by many consumers) as a consumer measure and the issue of food safety where mere labelling would not suffice.

At the meeting this week, the Codex Commission agreed in principle that the safety of food derived from GM organisms should be tested and approved by governments prior to entering the market, and that in particular the GM foods should be tested for their potential to cause allergic reactions.

Hitherto, such GM food products, whether it be soya or tomatoes or other agricultural food and vegetable crops have been authorized to be put on the market, particularly in the US and elsewhere, on the basis of socalled equivalence and tests carried out by those producing these products. The testing has often resulted in approval on the basis that if a naturally occurring tomato does not cause safety problems, a GM modified product, modified by injecting genes from another plant or species to have particular characters (freshness, or longer shelf life etc) could also be considered safe.

However, biological and health experts have challenged this view on the ground that a gene situate in a particular place in the DNA, when taken from there and injected (the genetic engineering is really a random effort) and lodged in the DNA of another plant, its actual effects could depend upon the place in the DNA where it is lodged, on its site in relation to the ‘promoters’ of that characteristic, and other elements of which science is still is not fully aware of.

While some have taken the view as a result that GM products should be banned, others have taken the position that enough is not known, but that there should be complete health and safety testing, for a long enough period, to assess the real impact before such a product is cleared for marketing.

The codex secretary, Mr. Alex Randell, agreed at the press conference that in the process of genetic engineering, some unintended effects may be created, and that in safety assessments there need to be effective guidelines to assess these unintended effects. The guidelines for these were still in the process of being developed and those with scientific backgrounds were trying to deal with these questions.

The Codex secretariat had produced a paper for this session on the issue of ‘traceability’, but the codex executive committee provided some general guidelines and felt that more work needed to be done.

On GM labelling, there was now an agreement on need to clearly identify the presence of substances that could cause allergens, so that those susceptible to it could avoid them. In practical terms, claimed Randall, there were very few allergens that got transferred from one plant to another due to GM.

But while the Codex had agreed on some general guidelines to move the work forward on the more general issue of labelling of GM products and bio-technology, the Commission felt additional work needed to be done, and these would need to take account of the Cartagena protocol on bio-safety.

A WHO expert tried to get the discussions (at the press conference) away from the GM controversies, and focus on general problems of food safety and presence of organisms in food - such salmonella etc.

However, later asked whether the way the debate was being steered would not in fact lead to the public even less confidence in the food safety, and the multilateral organizations and their systems, the WHO representative said that it was now agreed that the substantial equivalence standards used for labelling and marketing could not be considered sufficient for food and health safety assessments.

The Codex and experts were now trying to assess the standards and tests used in some national systems to assess food and health safety, and see whether guidelines could be set so that other countries could either follow or set up their own systems, or accept products moving in trade where they have bene tested in accordance with safety guidelines in other systems.

While Codex was still working on GM safety and other issues, it was true that such products have been put on the market and are being traded internationally, with some countries accepting it without knowing or being aware that they GM products. But the Codex is hoping to finish its work in 2003, and thus will come up with guidelines in four-years time.

The FAO/WHO press release announced that the commission had approved a series of new maximum levels of environmental contaminants, particularly lead, cadmium and aflatoxin found in food such as fruit juices, cereals and milk. The commission has set maximum levels of aflatoxin in milk and milk products , with a new maximum level of aflatoxin limit in milk at 0.5 micrograms per kilograms.

The WHO/FAO communique said that at the meeting some countries argued for a stricter aflatoxin limit of 0.05 micrograms, but the majority of the countries agreed that the higher limit was more feasible for developing countries, and setting a 0.05 standard could result in children not getting milk at all.

The Commission agreed to review the standard once there is new scientific evidence on aflatoxin health risks.

“Given the amount of dairy products that are consumed worldwide - especially by children - it was crucial to set a global standard for aflatoxin,” said Tom Billy, Chairman of the Codex Commission.

The responses at the press conference brought out that in terms of carcinogenic effects in population numbers, the difference between setting a 0.5 and 0.05 microgram level, was so small, and the costs of the 0.05 level and the chances of depriving milk for children in developing countries so high that it was considered unnecessary and infeasible.

Aflatoxins are chemicals with carcinogenic effects, excreted by certain fungi or nematodes, found mostly in humid tropical climates, and could get into animal feeds etc, particularly when they are stored without close controls and safeguarding from humidity etc. They are known to be present in peanuts or maize, and in some crops that are fed to animals, and could move into the food chain via milk.

The standards set today relate to these.

But the World Bank in a report recently raised the very high standards set on aflatoxins in the EU and other industrial nations (in respect of peanuts, maize etc) and the very high costs that developing countries have to incur in ensuring the absence of such aflatoxins, and whether the very small risk that is sought to be avoided could be balanced by the costs involved.

At the recent UN-LDC3 Conference in Brussels, where the World Bank President Wolfensohn posed this question, in terms of the costs to the developing country exporters, and the very minute actual incidence of any carcinogenic effects, the EU development commissioner agreed that this would need to be reassessed.

The commission also agreed to set new guidelines for organic livestock production. According to these, organic livestock farming should aim to use natural breeding methods, minimise stress in animals, prevent diseases, and progressively eliminate the use of certain chemical veterinary drugs, including antibiotics. Animals should mainly be fed with high quality organic food, not meat and bone meal, although fish and milk products are acceptable, Codex said. The use of growth hormones is not permitted. – SUNS4931

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