Have you ever heard of acrylamide? Me neither. But if California has its way, we might become all-too familiar with the word.
That’s because the state government wants to put warning labels on foods containing a certain amount of the stuff, which may be found in baked and fried foods that contain plenty of starch, such as potato chips and French fries.
California is in the midst of a gubernatorial recall election. I don’t know how that will play out, but I’m starting to hope it’s possible to recall this silly proposal.
The Golden State’s market is so huge that any labeling mandate is tantamount to a federal requirement--big food companies will slap the warnings on just about everything they produce, no matter where they sell it.
Scientists are currently studying acrylamide. Some of our finest researchers are at work on the matter, as they should be. Protecting our food is their job. So far, however, we must recognize a fundamental fact - there’s no evidence that acrylamide is a danger to people.
This is the problem with so many warning labels: They give consumers information they can’t really use and inspire dread where there may be nothing to fear.
If acrylamide is dangerous to people, products that contain too much of it shouldn’t bear warning labels. Instead, they should be taken off the shelves. We expect our food regulators to protect us from harm, not to scare us about unproven possibilities.
Labels need to be based upon real science, not superstition. Henry Chin of the National Food Processors Association put it well recently in response to the acrylamide proposal, “The State of California is at odds with the course of sound science being followed by other health organizations involved in this global issue, including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the World Health Organization.”
Until more is known about acrylamide--where it comes from, how it shows up in food, and precisely what effect it has on the human body--we can’t make any kind of proper determination. We should allow science to perform its proper function and give us the facts. Requiring labels when we don’t have these data is a panicked reaction, not a reasoned one.
Unfortunately, reason has not always dominated these debates.
There’s a push in several other places to put labels on other types of products, such as biotech foods. Last year, Oregon voters considered a ballot initiative that would have required all sorts of products to be identified as “genetically engineered.” This would have included not only tortillas made from corn—perhaps genetically-modified --but even items that have only the loosest of connections to the latest advances in agricultural technology. Under the Oregon proposal, a cake mix containing no GM ingredients would have had to carry the label if the chicken that produced the egg white in the mix had once consumed a few kernels of bt corn.
This is madness, and the people of Oregon were wise to overwhelmingly reject Measure 27, as the referendum was called. Reason did prevail--thank goodness. Yet the professional anti-science activists who demanded the labeling haven’t given up. They’ll probably run more initiatives in more states soon, spreading misinformation about the nature of biotech foods.
The problem isn’t confined to the United States. It’s actually worse abroad. The European Union may start to require labels for GM foods--even though there isn’t a scrap of evidence anywhere suggesting the biotech crops are anything but perfectly healthy.
When we know more about acrylamide, we will make responsible regulatory decisions--something we can’t possibly do right now.
Truth About Trade and Technology (www.truthabouttrade.org) is a national grassroots advocacy group based in Des Moines, IA formed by farmers in support of freer trade and advancements in biotechnology.
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Have you ever heard of acrylamide? Me neither. But if California has its way, we might become all-too familiar with the word.
