Germany - Food Safety: : Aldi stops selling eggs in Germany over food safety scare

Discount supermarket chain Aldi is withdrawing all eggs from sale at its more than 4,000 stores in Germany as a precaution, it said on Friday, as a scare over the possible contamination of eggs with insecticide spreads.

Traces of insecticide fipronil were found in eggs in Belgium and the Netherlands last month, which has led to the temporary shut-down of some poultry farms and to supermarkets halting the sale of Dutch eggs. 

Investigators suspect the chemical may have gotten into eggs through contaminated detergent against mites that is used to clean barns. 

The detergent was also supplied to farms in the northern German state of Lower Saxony, from where eggs are distributed across the country, Germany's food and agriculture ministry has said.

Aldi is the first major retailer to take all eggs, regardless of origin, off its shelves.

Read more: Aldi stops selling eggs in Germany over food safety scare

EFSA: Food safety – politics and science simply cannot mix - by Martin Banks.

Trying his best to sound non-partisan, the former president pointed out that the waves of refugees coming to Europe could be linked to conflicts caused by food shortages brought on by climate change. Which is why, Obama argues “[We need] better seeds, better storage, crops that grow with less water, crops that grow in harsher climates,” especially since “I let the science determine my attitudes about fFood production and new technologies… It’s okay for us to be cautious about how we approach these new technologies but I don’t think we can be close-minded to it.”

President Obama’s speech comes at a crucial time, as the safety of the food chain has come under the spotlight again in Europe, raising profound questions about the interactions between science, politics and new technologies, interactions that can be so toxic that they actually yield results that are harmful to consumers.

Just look at the wrangling currently unfolding over formaldehyde, a naturally occurring compound commonly used to keep fowl (and humans) from contracting food poisoning. The European Commission is having a hard time re-approving the use of the substance as a feed additive due to strong opposition from activists and certain member states.

The deadlock over formaldehyde shouldn’t have happened: the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) concluded that the compound does not cause cancer could be authorized as a feed additive as long as worker protection measures were taken.  In 2014, the agency concluded that “there is no health risk for consumers exposed to the substance through the food chain.”  Its conclusions are in line with the world’s leading scientific bodies, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the U.S. and the World Health Organization (WHO).

Even so, the conclusions of the widely-respected EU agency have been called into question by, among others, the Health, and Environment Alliance (HEAL), a Brussels-based NGO, which managed to persuade Poland and Spain to take unilateral action and stop putting the substance in chicken feed.

The consequences were quick to follow. Weeks after Poland gave its order, a widespread salmonella outbreak – traced to a Polish farm – led to the deaths of two people, a 5-year-old in Croatia and another person in Hungary. Soon afterwards, EFSA reported that 218 confirmed cases and 252 probable cases of salmonella sourced from Polish farms were recorded between May 2016 and the end of February this year.

The formaldehyde debate shows the serious health repercussions that happen when science and politics clash. Another good example is that of the herbicide glyphosate. Originally marketed under the trade name Roundup, glyphosate accounts for about 25 per cent of the global herbicide market. In the EU, glyphosate-based herbicides are used for weed control for a wide range of crops including cereals, oilseed rape, maize, beans and sugar beet. Several European countries, including Germany, use glyphosate herbicides on almost half of their total crop area.

However, despite the fact that EFSA, the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), the EPA, a joint WHO/FAO committee and a swathe of other regulators concluded that glyphosate was not carcinogenic, a barrage of criticism seeking to discredit these institutions’ competence as scientific bodies followed. At the forefront of the attack on EFSA were the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) and Italy’s Ramazzini Institute, which both continued to actively promote the alleged glyphosate-cancer link.

Read more: #EFSA: Food safety – politics and science simply cannot mix : EU Reporter

Pesticides and GMO's: What Grocery Stores Don’t Tell You about the Stickers on Produce

You know those stickers that can be found on most fruits and veggies in grocery stores worldwide? If you’ve ever bought produce from a grocery chain, you’ll recognize the ones we’re talking about. I’m sure for some of us who used to or currently work in a grocery store, those stickers are burned into our minds .

They usually have a a bar code on them for scanning and a PLU code, which helps your friendly neighborhood cashier identify what type of produce you’re buying.

But these unassuming stickers are more telling than you’d think. While the PLU is the “price lookup” number and identifies the fruit or veggie, it also helps to identify something else: how the produce was grown. By correctly reading this code, you can tell if the fruit was genetically modified, organically grown or produced with chemical fertilizers, fungicides, or herbicides

The story behind where your fruits and vegetables actually came from has been right under your nose all along! You just have to know how to analyze the labels and the PLU number. It’s actually a lot easier than you’d imagine

Here’s the basics of what you need to know about the truth behind PLU codes.

    1) If there are only four numbers in the PLU, this means that the produce was grown conventionally or “traditionally” with the use of pesticides. The last four letters (or only four, in this case) of the PLU code are simply what kind of vegetable or fruit you’re buying. An example is that all bananas are labeled with the code of 4011.
   
    2) If there are five numbers in the PLU code, and the number starts with “8”, this tells you that the item is a genetically modified fruit or vegetable. Genetically modified fruits and vegetables have been tampered with in an unnatural way; essentially, produce that has been genetically modified was created in a lab or over decades of artificial selection, and cannot be found in nature. A genetically engineered (GE or GMO) banana would be: 84011
   
    3) If there are five numbers in the PLU code, and the number starts with “9”, this tells you that the produce was grown organically and is not genetically modified. An organic banana would be: 94011
   
    Interestingly enough, the adhesive used to attach the stickers is considered food-grade, but the stickers themselves aren’t safe to consume.

If you’re looking to be hyper aware of what fruits and vegetables have been treated with pesticides and other chemicals and which have not, you’ll want to check out the homepage for the Environmental Working Groups. The EWG has compiled two lists to help consumers identify which produce is generally cleaner and which produce is generally tampered with; the Clean Fifteen and the Dirty Dozen.

The Top 5 for the “Clean Fifteen” produce are:

    1)Avocados
    2)Sweet Corn
    3)Pineapple
    4)Cabbage
    5)Sweet Peas (Frozen)

The Top 5 for the “Dirty Dozen” produce are:

    1)Strawberries
    2)Apples
    3)Nectarines
    4)Peaches
    5)Celery

For the full lists, food news, and additional food rankings, make sure to check out the EWG online.

Read more: What Grocery Stores Don’t Tell You about the Stickers on Produce | TipHero

US Food Safety: A Remarkable Triumph of Democracy Over Corporate Power, GMO Labeling Has Finally Arrived in the U.S. -- by Andrew Kimbre

GMO' Labeling: Corporate Hypocrisy On Steroids

For the last 15 years, numerous organizations and legislators have been battling to require the labeling of genetically engineered foods. During that time 64 other countries have mandated this labeling, but not the U.S. Many of us in the food movement have said that it was not a matter of if we would join with these countries and have GE labeling, but when. Well, it looks like when may have finally arrived.

Over the course of just a few days, several major companies have announced they will label GE products, including Kellogg’s, ConAgra, Mars and General Mills. Earlier this year, Campbell’s announced it would label. What caused this wave of GE labeling? It certainly hasn’t been a sudden realization that more than 90 percent of Americans want labeling, which polls have shown for many years. And these companies have never been pro-labeling. Just the opposite. Each has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund massive PR campaigns opposing various state GE labeling initiatives.

This sudden turnaround was actually triggered by a remarkable triumph of democracy over corporate power that took place last week in the U.S. Senate. That vote involved an attempt to pass what many call The Deny Americans the Right to Know (DARK) Act. This bill introduced by Senator Pat Roberts (R-KS) was specifically designed to rescind all state laws requiring labeling of GE foods. Of special concern was Vermont’s labeling law, which is scheduled to go into effect July 1, 2016.

Feeling the pressure of the Vermont deadline, the Grocery Manufacturers Association, Monsanto and other large chemical and industrial ag companies put enormous pressure on the Senate to pass the DARK Act. Against this array of powerful companies were tens of millions of Americans involved in the food movement.

Most mainstream media outlets predicted an easy victory for corporate power. But the companies soon realized they were in a serious battle. Their primary argument that labeling was going to raise the cost of food got shot down when the study they relied on turned out to be bogus, and food companies such as Campbell’s said the costs would be minimal. Their other argument was that without the DARK Act they would be confronted with a “patchwork” of different GE labeling laws. That argument also failed when it was demonstrated that Vermont’s requirements were the same as those in Connecticut and Maine, the only other states having voted for labeling.

Then they introduced a supposed “compromise” version of the DARK Act that would allow them to voluntarily indicate whether a product contained GE ingredients via QR codes, websites and call-in numbers. This proposal quickly ran into trouble when research showed millions of Americans could not even read QR codes. Half of low income and rural Americans do not own smart phones, nor do two-thirds of the elderly. This grossly discriminatory scheme would also force shoppers to triple or quadruple their shopping time to find out about GE ingredients. They would have to call in to inquire about a product, or take a picture of each product with their phones and upload them, assuming they were able to get on line.

The DARK Act was an obvious attempt to hide non-labeling under the guise of labeling. Senator Barbara Boxer correctly called the bill a “sham and an embarrassment.” Then it came down to the vote. By Senate rules, Monsanto and the big food companies needed 60 votes in the Senate to get the DARK Act to a final vote. Despite predictions, they didn’t even come close: the final vote was 49-48 against the bill. Democracy defeated corporate power. The right to know of Americans won. At that point several major food corporations saw that they were not going to be able to bully the Senate into erasing the Vermont law or those of other states. Within hours the dominoes began to fall as one corporation after the other announced they would comply with the Vermont labeling mandate.

Is the battle over? Hardly. Chemical companies, including Monsanto, and some major food companies will no doubt fight on, and try to find some other way to convince the Senate to circumvent Vermont and other state labeling requirements. It will be a hard sell. Will the Republicans in the Senate really allow a second vote on GE food labeling when they won’t even allow one vote on a Supreme Court nominee? Will they continue to listen to Monsanto when the company has already announced its plans to attempt to merge with a foreign company to avoid paying taxes in the U.S.? Whatever the corporate powers decide they can be sure of one thing: they will once again come up against a strong food movement. We must remain vigilant in defending our right to know. 

Read more: In a Remarkable Triumph of Democracy Over Corporate Power, GMO Labeling Has Finally Arrived in the U.S. | Alternet

EU-US Trade Deal Lets Corporate Interests Steamroll Food Safety, Groups Warn - by Andrea Germanos

An EU-U.S. trade deal currently being negotiated behind closed doors puts corporate profits and trade interests above fair and safe food for consumers, a trio of groups charged Wednesday.
Friends of the Earth Europe, Minnesota-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), and UK-based Compassion in World Farming outline their concerns in a letter (pdf) sent to EU Trade Commissioner De Gucht because, they write, “the European Commission has failed fully to appreciate European and US civil society concerns.”
The letter begins:

We are writing to respond to claims by the European Commission (EC) that there is “no contradiction” in the US – EU trade talks with the “enforcement of high safety standards” in food. We disagree. Fair, sustainable and safe food could permanently be damaged by the transatlantic trade deal on the table.

Sparking their warning was a draft (pdf) of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) chapter on Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) issues, which covers food safety measures and animal welfare in the trade deal, leaked last month by IATP.

Read more: EU-US Trade Deal Lets Corporate Interests Steamroll Food Safety, Groups Warn

Organic Foods: Food Labelled 'Organic' Is No Guarantee of Safety—Shocking Levels of Heavy Metals in Imported Food Highlight the Danger

Heavy metal pollution makes no distinction between how crops are grown. Irrespective of whether farming practices are organic or conventional practices are used, if the likes of cadmium, arsenic, lead, nickel and mercury are in the soil, water or air they can contaminate food and poison the people who consume it.

With enough exposure, heavy metals can build up in the body, causing chronic problems in the skin, intestine, nervous system, kidneys, liver, and brain. Some heavy metals occur naturally in soil, but rarely at toxic levels, while human activities like mining, manufacturing and the use of synthetic materials like paint, and even some agricultural chemicals, can release heavy metals into the air and water, and from there they find their way to the soil. And once in the soil, heavy metals are virtually impossible to remove.

China acknowledged last April that a staggering one-fifth of its arable land is seriously polluted with heavy metals, thanks to decades of aggressive industrial development. China’s Environmental Protection Ministry looked at data sampled between 2006 and 2013 and described the situation as “not optimistic.” The most commonly found heavy metals were cadmium, nickel and arsenic. The revelation came after months of speculation about the report, which at one point was not going to be released as the results were considered to be a “ State Secret.”

Read more: Food Labelled 'Organic' Is No Guarantee of Safety—Shocking Levels of Heavy Metals in Imported Food Highlight the Danger | Alternet

The Netherlands - Food quality: "Meat safety in Netherlands cannot be guaranteed" - by Karin Bosteels

Consumers cannot derive too much safety from meat that is offered for sale in the Netherlands. That is the remarkable conclusion of the newest report from the Dutch Research Board for Safety.

Companies believe economic reasons to weigh out on the safety of a product, that is the damning conclusion of the "Risks in the meat chain" report", published by the Dutch Research Board for Safety. It appears that hygiene rules are often ignored, because of a lack of education or a lack of time. 

Meat fraud is ever-present, the Board stated. Meat can suddenly change composition on paper and waste meat can be "turned into" meat for human consumption all of a sudden. The horse meat security has not been guaranteed because of this fraud sensitivity, the Board says clearly.

The Netherlands do have an official office that has to assure food safety, called the Nederlandse Voedsel- en Warenautoriteit, but it has "under-performed a lot".

The Research Board believes this to be the result of "constant reorganizations and cutbacks", leaving little means to actually have an impact on the meat industry. "This is why the NVWA has lost authority", a claim to which the organization stated that it is working on "structural improvements of its oversight capabilities".

Read more: "Meat safety in Netherlands cannot be guaranteed" | Retail Det

Food Safety: Reaching Out to Europe on Food Safety - Michael R. Taylor

After trips to the Pacific Northwest and New England to connect with growers and state partners on produce safety, I traveled last week to Europe to talk with our regulatory counterparts and others about what the proposed rules under the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) mean for countries that export food to the United States.

In Europe, the focus was on all four of the rules we have proposed so far, including two rules proposed in July that implement the Congressional vision of achieving greater importer accountability for food safety.

Food safety is a critical issue for all of us in today’s global food system. For consumers in the U.S., there’s a good chance that the food they are eating is imported. Fifteen percent of all the food we eat each year comes from other countries and the percentage is much higher for certain commodities, like fruits and vegetables, seafood and spices.

American consumers want to know that imported food is as safe as food produced here.
U.S. food producers and processors also have a stake in the safety of food and ingredients from overseas and rightly want to know that there’s a level playing field – that imported food would have to meet the same safety standards as food produced in the U.S. under the new food safety rules.

And it makes sense that European firms and governments are interested in the FSMA requirements we are developing because they want to maintain market access in the U.S.

Read moreReaching Out to Europe on Food Safety | FDA Voice