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Issue in Brief:
Standards need to be developed for adventitious presence of biotech products
The term "adventitious presence" refers to the unintentional and incidental commingling of trace amounts of one type of seed, grain or food product with another. Adventitious presence is an unavoidable reality of plant biology, seed production and the distribution of commodity crops. There are a number of factors that contribute to commingling of approved biotech products in nonbiotech products: Pollen flow; volunteerism; mixing during harvesting, transport, storage and processing; human error; and accidents can all play a role in adventitious presence.
While adventitious presence can be minimized, as a practical matter it cannot be eliminated entirely and is not unique to crops enhanced through biotechnology. As a result, allowances for adventitious presence have been recognized in laws, regulations and standards that establish allowances for these materials. In the United States, for example, 5 percent of corn seed is allowed to be off-types for labeling purposes. No. 1 grade corn may contain no more than 2 percent foreign material; for No. 5 grade corn, it is 7 percent. Even USDA's organic standards allow up to 5 percent nonorganic substances.
Adventitious presence of biotech products does not compromise food safety. Nevertheless, the large-scale planting of biotech crops has raised the issue of adventitious presence and its impact on international trade. Currently, there are no international standards for allowable trace amounts of biotech products in non-biotech products. Instead, some countries piecemeal have started to set standards for adventitious presence. In most cases, the biotech product thresholds being discussed are unrealistically low (usually from 1 to a fraction of a percent) compared with existing allowances. Such low thresholds are driven more by the increasing sensitivity of sampling and detecting technologies and, in some cases, protectionist trade policies than by safety.
Sound, science-based regulations are needed to recognize trace amounts of approved biotech material. The lack of clear international standards has disrupted the flow of trade in seed, agricultural commodities and food. Adventitious presence has been the subject of discussion in the Codex Alimentarius, the international food standard-setting body. Internationally recognized standards will be especially important in establishing the criteria for "biotech free" foods under a voluntary labeling regime. (For more information on labeling, click here.)
The biotechnology industry remains committed to working within Codex and other international venues to establish realistic standards for trace amounts of biotech products. In the meantime, BIO believes that the U.S. government should adopt a science-based policy on adventitious presence that could become an international model. Without such a policy, the United States could find it increasingly difficult to persuade other countries to adopt similar measures, and U.S. farmers could be vulnerable to arbitrary restrictions on U.S. exports. In August 2002 the Office of Science and Technology Policy proposed new federal actions to establish a science-based policy for adventitious presence.
Resources:
- Report of the Thirteenth Session of the Codex Committee on Food Labeling Halifax, Canada (May 6-10, 2002).
Access the meeting agenda here.
Access previous meeting reports and agendas here.
- Proposed Federal Actions To Update Field Test Requirements for Biotechnology Derived Plants and To Establish Early Food Safety Assessments for New Proteins Produced by Such Plants
- FDA, Guidance for Industry, Voluntary Labeling Indicating Whether Foods Have or Have Not Been Developed Using Bioengineering, Draft Guidance (January 2001).
- Elise Golan, Fred Kuchler, Lorraine Mitchell, Cathy Greene and Amber Jessup. Economics of Food Labeling, USDA Economics Research Service, Agricultural Economic Report No. 793 (January 2001).
- Pew Initiative on Food and Biotechnology, Knowing Where It's Going: Bringing Food to Market in the Age of Genetically Modified Crops (September 11, 2001). Proceedings from a workshop sponsored by the Pew Initiative on Food and Biotechnology and the USDA Economic Research Service.
- World Seed Industry Organization
Read the position papers on adventitious presence and other topics here.
For more links, click here.
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