Public comments on GE food labelling.
Here is another example (as if more are needed) about the government abusing it's power to protect the industry at our expense. Why we are even having a debate and/or a discussion on the straight forward labeling of GE foods is beyond me. The fact that they have to go to these lengths, is indirectly admitting potential risks hence reason enough to identify unknown food products. Supposedly we elect governments to look after the constituents interests and safely... Yet the government repeatedly wastes resources at the expense of their mandate (to protect us) and ends up protecting the industry with our tax money to boot.
Please write to your MP ( they can be found here: Members of the House of Commons) and demand that they not make a mockery of the system. Ask them to support the labelling all GE foods without exception.
Refusing to label GE foods can only further diminish public confidence in the regulatory agencies of the Canadian government, such as the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA).
Remind them to support Bill C-287, which calls for mandatory labelling, is due to come before the House of Commons in early October for a vote on whether to send it to committee for public hearings or not. Your MP should be urged to vote for the bill to go to the committee. This is also a vote for democratization.
Alert them not to fall for the industry scam on reversing the tables of the burden of proof of injury from GE foods on the users - point out that it is the industry who has to prove the safety of GE foods and not the other way around. Lack of injury today is not proof of safety - waiting to see if GE foods will produce injuries before labeling or restricting GE foods is not acceptable. Regardless - all GE food labeling must be mandatory. We will decide on what we want to eat!
Closed door meetings, and reducing the opportunity for public input is not they way to look after our interests.The totally inadequate public notice period for public comment is telling on its own and must be extended. On a matter of such great public concern, the minimum notice should display ads in all the daily newspapers. Information about what is being sold as food is not a matter simply for pro-biotech experts. A new 60-day public comment period should be started after adequate public notice has been given.
Please pass this on to all for action as soon as possible. This rigged (as inadequately short), puplic input period will end on Oct.17, 2003.
Thanks,
Chris Gupta
Public comments called for on the Draft Standard for "Voluntary Claims About Foods That Are and Are Not Products of Gene Technology"
The Canadian General Standards Board has posted a draft standard, which is
available at
http://www.pwgsc.gc.ca/cgsb/032_025/draft-e.pdfor by contacting the CGSB committee secretary, Marian Gaucher:
phone: 819-956-1594 (note, this is NOT a toll-free number),
fax: 819-956-5740
mailto:marian.l.gaucher@pwgsc.gc.caThe CGSB is required to allow a 60-day period for public comment on this
standard. With almost no public notice, this period began on Aug 17 and
closes Oct 17.Please look at the draft standard and send your comments to Marian Gaucher,
CGSB, Ottawa, K1A 1G6,
or to: ncr.cgsb-ongc@pwgsc.gc.caComments do not have to be lengthy or complicated. A simple statement that you demand mandatory labelling of all foods derived from genetic engineering or genetic modification would be useful. If you would like to say more, here are some suggestions of points you might wish to make:
Comment Suggestions
1. Public notice of the comment period was totally inadequate. On a matter of such great public concern, the minimum notice would be display ads in all the daily newspapers. Information about what is being sold as food is not a matter simply for pro-biotech 'experts.' I/we think you should start over with a 60-day public comment period after adequate public notice has been given.2. A voluntary standard for non-GE foods is meaningless, useless and insulting. I/we demand mandatory labelling of GE food.
3. The standard uses a term "gene technology" that is used nowhere else in the world. This language is simply confusing. Please call it what it is: genetically engineered food.
4. 5% tolerance for GE in any and all foods, including those labelled non-GE, is totally unacceptable. It suggests that the biotech industry intends to continue to contaminate our food system with their GE products. No more than .1% contamination with GE should be permitted.
5 Any standard for the labelling of GE foods must include livestock feeds, veterinary biologicals and processing aids, which the draft standard explicitly excludes.
6. In spite of appearances of balanced requirements for positive ("product of") and negative ("not a product of") labelling, it is obvious that the industry intends to place the 'burden of proof' of labelling on non-GE foods. The companies that are putting GE foods on to the market must be made to label their products.
7. Canada's labelling standards should be in conformity with those suggested by Codex Alimentarius and those of the majority of Canada's trading partners. This standard seems to be following the US which is the chief agent of the biotech industry.
8. For reasons of public health, traceability is being steadily implemented in the Canadian food system. Refusing to label GE food makes traceability impossible and goes against the direction of current practices in the food industry. It also means that the biotech industry escapes liability.
9. Refusing to label GE foods can only further diminish public confidence the regulatory agencies of the Canadian government, such as the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA).
10. We will decide what is good for us. We do not trust agencies or industries that want to hide from us what they are doing, particularly to our food.
* * *
If the Draft Standard is meaningless and useless, what is the alternative?1.Mandatory labelling of all foods, food ingredients, processing aids, livestock feeds, and veterinary biologicals containing, produced through or derived from genetic engineering/genetic modification. Mandatory labelling is an 'enabling technology' to rid the food system of genetic engineering. This labelling may make an allowance of 0.1% contamination for the transition period to GE-free agriculture.
2. Implementation of mandatory traceability from seed to supermarket as a means of enforcing truthful labelling and monitoring and evaluating the consequences of the genetic engineering already engaged in and loose in the market and the environment.
3. Bill C-287, which calls for mandatory labelling, is due to come before the House of Commons in early October for a vote on whether to send it to committee for public hearings or not. Your MP should be urged to vote for the bill to go to committee. This is also a vote for democratization.
Letters can be sent to your MP postage-free, at: House of Commons, Ottawa, K1A 0A6.
http://www.fooddemocracy.org/action_alert.html
posted by Chris Gupta on Saturday October 4 2003
updated on Saturday September 24 2005URL of this article:
http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/chris/2003/10/04/public_comments_on_ge_food_labelling.htm
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