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What's Next for Food?

Nanotechnology. Cloned animals. Transgenic fish. Enviro-friendly pigs.

Those are just some areas of the food industry that could have a deep impact on agriculture and consumer diets. What will be the key steps to successful adoption of such new technologies?

The tricky part won't be in producing new food items, but rather, in how they are introduced to consumers, says Greg Jaffe, biotechnology director at the Center for Science and Public Interest (CSPI), a food and nutrition advocacy organization in Washington D.C.

"These are all on the horizon," he says. "It's not how fast they are brought to the market, but whether there is knowledge by the public about them being brought to the market, and whether the government has the proper expertise to oversee bringing those things to the market."

CSPI is unique - it takes no government or industry funding. It is funded solely by subscribers who pay for its newsletters, along with individual and philanthropic group donations. It focuses on advocacy and education based on the best available scientific evidence.

Because CSPI focuses on science it supports biotech crops, and it's gotten some heat over it. "A lot of consumers don't know what's out there when it comes to biotechnology," says Jaffe. "Consumers are fairly ignorant about where their food comes from and that leads to a problem. All of a sudden you learn about biotechnology and don't put it in context over time, and it gets scary for them."

So what's in the food pipeline now? Two transgenic animals exist today, but there may be more down the road. One is not even grown for food. It's a glowfish, a pet that glows in the dark. The other is a herd of 'biotherapeutic' transgenic goats, grown for biologically active genes. There are 200 of them on a farm outside of Boston, with several levels of containment.

"In the future we will have fast growing salmon, cows resistant to mad cow disease, and the 'enviro pig,' a pig that produces much more environmentally friendly waste so it's less smelly for people who live near pig farms," Jaffe says.

Cloned animals are coming, too. Unlike embryo splitting, already common in cattle, somatic clones and their offspring take a different kind of cell from the parent and produce a clone in a different generation; so now mother and father and son and daughter are identical.

The European Union recently banned cloned animals for food. The EU already bans the planting of all genetically modified crops except for one kind of corn.

Nanotechnology may also play a bigger role in future food. A nano is a billionth of a meter, says Jaffe. "Scientists have found atoms or substances that have different properties at that scale, and they may be useful and beneficial in both food and food packaging," he adds. "But it's very hard to find out if there are products being commercialized yet, or if their claims are real."

Consumer safety is key

According to Jaffe, the road to acceptance for any new food product starts with safety.

"We've had many issues, from mad cow to E. coli, and there are people out there worried about safety," he says. "They want independent safety determination by government agencies. They also want mandatory pre market approval, a process that is transparent and with public participation. "

That's where the government needs to reform how it engages in the food industry, says Jaffe. "FDA looks only at food, not the process of growing the food," he says. "There is no GE (genetically engineered) approval process. They set up a voluntary consultation with companies providing GE food."

Why is that critical? "Most consumers don't believe a voluntary consultation is sufficient," he says. "That means the consumer has to rely on Monsanto for example, instead of FDA, for safety determination. It's not consistent with how other countries ensure food safety, or how environmental issues are addressed."

FDA should update its regulations to include a mandatory pre market approval process, he says, and the industry should get behind it.

For transgenic animals, only FDA has oversight – not USDA or EPA. The regulation is under the 'new animal drugs' provision of FFDCA (Federal Food, Drug & Cosmetic Act). "It fits, but it's not intuitive, so it could be a problem with consumers," he says.

For FDA to grant approval of a transgenic animal, it must assess safety and efficacy of the drug, safety to the animal, safety from anything eaten from the animal, and compliance with NEPA (National Environmental Policy Act). That's different from GE crops.

"Basically we are applying an old statute to a new technology," Jaffe says. "The problem with this is that there's a lack of transparency and public participation. And because FDA is not allowed to tell us about how many genetically altered animals are pending – due to laws that protect pharmaceutical research – we don't know what's coming."

What's the take home message?

• The food industry really needs to embrace mandatory, reasonable government oversight of their products, in an open and transparent system. Voluntary systems are not sufficient. "If something's hidden, consumers ask why," says Jaffe. "They fear a cover up."

• Consumers want to know why the food industry needs to adopt new technology, since we have an abundance of food in the U.S. "I hear this from consumers all the time," says Jaffe. "The answer is, potential. There may be indirect consumer benefits, like reduced harm to the environment, reduced animal disease, improved livelihood of farmers, production advantages, or direct safety consumer benefits in price, safety and taste. So we need to be honest and have evidence to support claims from independent sources. Consumers are smart, so if we get information out there, that would go a long way toward acceptance."

• Acceptance is about education and information. Consumers need to know how food is produced. Consumers need information about new technologies. And the food industry is responsible for educating its consumers.

"When you give consumers information about how food is produced, it's generally accepted," concludes Jaffe. "They look at it as part of a continuum of the things they are learning, in an ongoing basis."