Democrats: recall shows need for firm biotech rules

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- The recall of Taco Bell shells containing unapproved gene-spliced corn was seized upon by Democratic senators on Tuesday as proof that U.S. biotech regulations must be tightened while Republicans said the only change needed is more public education.

The voluntary recall by Kraft Foods has sparked a fresh debate over the safety of bioengineered foods at a time when the Food and Drug Administration is preparing new rules aimed at boosting consumer confidence without making any major changes.

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"The irony of this controversy is a growing wariness on the part of consumers about food that, to date, government, academia and some consumer groups have declared safe," said Sen. James Jeffords, a Vermont Republican and chair of the Senate Health committee. The panel held a hearing on Tuesday to look at consumers' concerns.

Kraft, a unit of Philip Morris Cos. Inc. , announced the recall Friday after it confirmed the presence of StarLink gene-altered corn in some packages of taco shells. The company also urged the government to take somewhat stricter measures in approving future biotech crops.

StarLink is one of several so-called Bt corn varieties engineered to repel pests before being harvested for animal feed. But it is the only one that the Environmental Protection Agency refused to approve for human food use because agency scientists suspected some people might be allergic to it.

The EPA, FDA and U.S. Agriculture Department share responsibility for regulating gene-spliced foods.

Joe Levitt, director of the FDA's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, defended the agency's regulations.

"While the FDA investigation is still continuing, Kraft's rapid response was a prudent action that clearly put the interests of consumers first," he told the panel.

The FDA is preparing to publish regulations that would convert its voluntary consultation process for biotech developers into a mandatory one. The agency also is working on guidelines that food manufacturers can use if they want to label a product as containing or being free of a genetically altered ingredient.

Both measures are aimed at boosting consumer confidence in the FDA's procedures, rather than significantly changing any rules, Levitt said. "The FDA stands behind the safety of these products and wants the public to have the same confidence we do," he said.

Mandatory labels on biotech foods would not have prevented the Taco Bell contamination, Levitt said.

Government-mandated labels -- like those required in the European Union, Japan, China, New Zealand and other nations -- have been fiercely opposed by foodmakers as costly and implying the foods are less safe.

Two Democrats -- Barbara Boxer of California and Dick Durbin of Illinois -- said it was time for stricter rules to prevent another unapproved biotech ingredient from slipping into the food supply.

"We simply don't have a system in place to catch the misuse of genetically modified ingredients," Boxer told the panel. "We don't even have a system that requires mandatory safety tests."

Her legislation would require biotech companies to perform prescribed safety tests and to indicate on a food label if it contained genetically-altered ingredients. The bill has little chance of passage this year with Congress hurrying to complete its work during the next two weeks.

Durbin said he planned to introduce a bill that would require the FDA to monitor foods from the farm to store shelves to ensure that biotech foods were not "inappropriately" entering the food supply.

"We should not have to rely on public interest groups to conduct this screening for us," Durbin said, referring to the environmental group Friends of the Earth, which initially detected StarLink in taco shells.

Republicans on the panel said existing FDA, EPA and USDA regulations already work well to protect consumers.

They endorsed the biotech industry's $50 million campaign now underway to educate Americans about the safety of the food through brochures, Web sites and television advertising.

"As we have seen in Europe, the public's lack of knowledge about this technology can create a reactionary, anti-biotech sentiment based more on alarmist rhetoric than sound science," said Senator Tim Hutchinson, an Arkansas Republican.

Senator Christopher Bond, a Republican from the farm state of Missouri, said environmental and activist groups were trying to eliminate biotech foods, not just make them safer.

"Please do not underestimate the sophistication of the activists because they are smart enough to know that labeling kills the technology," Bond told the panel.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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