GE Free New Zealand
In Food And Environment Inc.
PO Box 13402, Wellington, NZ
23/02/14
Lack of Responsible Oversight Leaves Everyone at Risk
Parliament's Regulatory Review committee has tabled its report on the complaint by GE-free NZ regarding the approval of
the GE soybean resistant to 2,4-D. [1] They have found that the complaint did not meet standing orders for the
Regulatory Review committee and therefore have dismissed it, leaving no further avenues for scrutiny of the risk to
public health.
The Regulatory Review committee decision reveals a systemic gap in oversight that puts all consumers at risk and leaves
nobody responsible for allowing potentially serious harm.
Over the last two years GE-Free NZ raised grave concerns regarding soybeans engineered to tolerate the chemical 2,4-D
which have been given approval by our Food Safety Minister despite a total absence of scientific studies to show if food
made from the beans is safe to eat or not.
Further reasons for concern are that the USDA has declined planting of the soybean due to lack of safety evidence and
Australia has banned the use of 2,4-D in agriculture due to high dioxin levels. Agent Orange was made up of 45% 2,4-D,
and has also had long lasting deleterious effects on the health of people.
"Food safety is the responsibility of officials at FSANZ in Australia, the Ministry of Primary Industries and the
Minister of Food Safety in New Zealand, and consumers are reliant on their decisions. It is shocking that our
governmental bodies who we trust to keep us safe are overlooking a serious issue of food safety," said Claire Bleakley,
president of GE-Free NZ.
"The system is allowing approval of a new GE food that is intrinsically reliant on toxic pesticides, without conducting
safety studies that are vital to assure consumers it is safe to eat. This is a dereliction of a duty of care to protect
public health.”
Assumptions used by FSANZ to justify approval without safety testing are no longer supported by the most current
scientific evidence.
Dr. Bohnet alin the journal Food Chemistry [2] has confirmed that GE foods are nutritionally depleted and contain high levels of
toxic metabolites compared to their conventional and organic counterparts. Since the introduction of GE crops use of
chemical herbicides has tripled, and there is added concern that the toxic components of the herbicide may be
concentrated in the edible part of the plants.
To legitimise the increase chemical spraying officials have approved an arbitrary increase of herbicide residues up to
200 times the levels that Authorities allowed in food ten years ago.
The increase in chemicals and novel DNA sequences in GE food carry new levels of risk. Dr. Spisaket alhave just published a study [3] that has identified DNA molecules large enough to carry complete genes but avoid
degradation in the gut to be fully absorbed into the blood stream, then distributed to various organs in the body. Other
international studies on the epigenetic effects of the survival of DNA have shown that the maternal diet can affect the
child’s lifetime health [4] . Canadian studies found that DNA of Bt insecticidal genes and metabolites of herbicides
used on GE crops had crossed the placental barrier and were found in fetal blood [5].
FSANZ has approved 78 different varieties of GE foods largely relying on industry assurances of safety and assuming DNA
cannot survive digestion to be absorbed into the blood stream, which is now shown to be wrong. FSANZ have also refused
to study the synergistic effects of the GE foreign genes and pesticides that are present in the foods by saying the
pesticides are not part of the GE assessment process.
Public health is at serious risk as FSANZ continues to fail to ensure that scientific risk assessments are used in the
approval of genetically engineered (GE) food.
"There are lessons to be learned from history. The FSANZ assessment process has a direct parallel to assessments of
smoking, DDT, thalidomide and PCB where the minimum of testing was done. In those examples officials approved the
products as safe, leaving the next generation to clean up the effects," said Claire Bleakley, “and it's happening
again”.
References
[1] Complaint regarding the New Zealand (Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code) Food Standards 2002, Amendment No 53http://www.parliament.nz/resource/0002181747
[2] Bøhn T., Cuhra M., Traavik T., Sanden M., Fagan J. and Primicerio R. (2014) Compositional differences in soybeans on
the market: Glyphosate accumulates in Roundup Ready GM soybeans.Food Chemistry, Volume 153,Pages 207–215
[3] Godfrey KM, Sheppard A, Gluckman PD, Lillycrop KA, Burdge GC, McLean C, Rodford J, Slater-Jefferies JL, Garratt E,
Crozier SR, Emerald BS, Gale CR, Inskip HM, Cooper C, Hanson MA. Epigenetic gene promoter methylation at birth is
associated with child's later adiposity.Diabetes. 2011; Vol: 60(5):1528-34. doi: 10.2337/db10-0979.http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21471513
[4] Aris A, Leblanc S. Maternal and fetal exposure to pesticides associated to genetically modified foods in Eastern
Townships of Quebec, Canada.Reprod Toxicol. 2011; Vol:31 (4):528-33. doi: 10.1016/j.reprotox.2011.02.004.http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21338670
[5] Spisak S, Solymosi N, Ittzes P, Bodor A, Kondor D, et al. (2013) Complete Genes May Pass from Food to Human Blood.PLoS ONE 8(7): e69805. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0069805
ENDS