July 15, 2003
Hungry?... Let's take five with Moira Gunn. This is "Five Minutes".
I have a friend who spent several years at boarding school, and as a result, he eats no food that isn't served in what he calls its "original packaging." That means potatoes have to be potatoes - not mashed or scalloped or hash-browned. And he's one of the few people I know who looks for nutrient labels everywhere.
Think you can tempt him with a chicken nugget? He sees them as "foam chicken bombs," sharing engineering methodology with particle board, infused with industrial-strength FDA-approved food chemicals. To tell you the truth, he actually might accept a chicken nugget ... just to get it out of circulation.
His passion is not fueled by some in-depth study of nutrition, but rather by lack of trust, a trust regularly breached in the boarding school cafeteria. And it's the same lack of trust which colors our current crop of international food issues.
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Let's look at some of the players. Two large groups of food consumers are the Americans and the Europeans, as well as their representative governments - the United States and the European Union. Then there's agribusiness, both American and worldwide, as well as the huge multi-national corporations which buy a sizable portion of the world's food.
American agribusiness has led the way by reaping huge harvests of genetically-modified foods, which it enthusiastically wants to sell to Europe. But there's a hitch: European consumers have essentially wanted none of it - that is, until recently. New E.U. legislation will permit genetically-modified foods if they have detailed tracing records and are labeled with the message: "This product contains a genetically modified organism."
So, is this a breakthrough? The answer turns out to be "No."
The US government calls this new law anti-trade and downright illegal, while American agribusiness considers it completely unworkable. But from the European side, this is new territory: It's been five long years since genetically-modified foods have even been permitted in seven European countries.
Could this be a chasm which can't be bridged?
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Before you get the idea that this is merely a matter of international relations, consider global corporations - the ones who buy vast quantities of food, and thus control the markets and the growers which supply them.
A few weeks ago, McDonald's, the world's largest restaurant chain and one of the largest buyers of meat, made a simple corporate decision. It informed its worldwide meat suppliers to phase out a number of practices, including the use of growth-promoting antibiotics, which are both widespread and certified as safe by the F.D.A.
Agribusiness sustained a shock. A spokesman for the American Meat Institute huffily remarked to the New York Times, "This is not a decision motivated by science but by market research."
To me, this is more a question of big money hiding behind science. The fact is there is no time to wait for the science - genetic food technologies have been implemented so fast, science has no choice but to play catch-up.
The good news is that corporations like McDonald's can dictate what they want from the world's food growers, quickly and decisively. And when McDonald's speaks, agribusiness listens. The clear call is for consumers to lean directly on these global corporations - then who knows what is possible.
It makes me think of my friend. He always says, "When I pick up an apple, I'd love to see a nutrient label stuck to it."
Yes, I bet he would.
I'm Moira Gunn. This is Five Minutes.
