RE: Impossible Foods seeks EU and UK approval for its GMO “fake meat” bleeding ingredient
TAFC ClipBoard: That’s the Brits for you, always trying to stall a process, any process, until they give the okay. Supremacy at its worst. The plant is okay and the beans derived from the plant, but not the root?
It’s a game of politics that needs to end if anybody really does want to save the planet and all life forms on it.
Did you test carrot roots and tops? How about that genetically modified corn everybody says is safe? Who did you test it on? People? Other animals?
Corn has roots, why not test those? Don’t think that roots don’t get ground up and used for some purpose. Did they test those roots?
China could tell you if the roots are safe, but then we’re not very good at sharing, only taking and remaking everybody and everything on the planet.
Did you think about the soil it’s grown in; to test that? The soil effects the roots, thus the plant from head to toe. You’re going to use ‘fake’ soil to do the testing for ‘fake’ meat? All you’re going to create is a ‘fake’ process.
So that’s it; you’re going to hit the animal welfare system to knock them off their feet.
The best thing since sliced bread, the IMPOSSIBLE Meat line of animal-free meats.
What, you can’t handle its success? Uppity share holders want to turn IMPOSSIBLE MEATS into a cash cow before the UK and/or the EU pounds the hammer striking a blow to the animal-free industries?
Whoa. Let’s really get them this time. Listen for the squeals from angry vegans world wide when they test their revered animal-free burger on live animals till they die an excruciating death. Go ahead. You sure you want to do that, when everybody knows the entire soy plant is safe? You mean your scientists haven’t even designed the tests yet? Why not? What bad tip were you operating from?
Soy roots have already been tested. Soy of all forms have been tested after somebody discovered they had an allergy to it. Do the research. I’ve known a lot of people and no one was ever allergic to soy. Who eats it? Not many people; even the vegans demonize it – more because it’s processed, like that ever mattered before. There’s even talk that some vegans are campaigning to list all processed animal-free foods as non-vegan. So, it appears that vegans are not fans of IMPOSSIBLE MEATS.
The Slaughter Industry uses every part of any animal, the entire cow, pig, chicken, lamb, goat…, including waste, without hesitation, in a multitude of foods and non-food products. The way scientists conduct studies and experiments these days, if they want to ban the substance leghemoglobin, they have a clandestine way to do it.
If a person is allergic to leghemoglobin, the plant equivalent of animal hemoglobin, then maybe they’re also allergic to animal hemoglobin. Why are transplant patients required to take an anti-rejection drug for the rest of their lives?
Everybody wants to put off the inevitable, until it’s good for everyone.
I don’t like being the bearer of unwanted news. If the world waits until everyone is on board, it’s too late.
PICK UP THE PACE. THIS IS A RACE.
I say that countries shouldn’t have made the animal industries the basis of their economies. Who voted on that? Not the people. Laws are passed without any input from the populace, even when it affects them directly. And it does. We have all consumed these products.
Why make the plants resistant to pests by genetically altering the DNA or RNA of the seeds that grow them, when you failed to assure that the process was safe for all animals to consume? You just assumed it was? Somebody told you it was safe and you WANTED to believe it?
Now comes a solution and you’re all geared up to test it’s worthiness because some people are allergic to soy? And one very wealthy person who manipulates the planet as if he owns it, wants to help the people who can’t eat soy to eat it again via the root nodules?
All this hold up for one person? I wouldn’t do it. That person who claims to have a soy allergy will not eat anything coming from a soy plant, even if the ‘fake’ science shows it not to be an allergen. I would also find it hard to believe that the roots of the soy plant were hypo-allergenic to the same people who have a soy allergy.
Tell the truth to the world about the animals they consume and what it actually does to every organ.
It’s strange how GMWATCH would classify IMPOSSIBLE MEATS as fake, but don’t classify the animal meat as fake. Fake what? Plants aren’t fake. The process used wasn’t fake. What’s fake about it?
Real plants vs real animals.
Nobody but those who design the processes knows what is really in and on the animal meat the world consumes.
Why not? The consumer deserves to know.
Article: Impossible Foods seeks EU and UK approval for its GMO “fake meat” bleeding ingredient
Impossible Foods’ GMO “fake meat” ingredient, soy leghemoglobin (SLH for short), is currently being considered for approval for food use in the EU and the UK.
This summer, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) asked the company to provide more information that was clearly missing from its application, including details on possible toxicity and allergenicity.
The company submitted its application to EFSA in September 2019. EFSA recently asked the company to provide the EU’s GMO detection lab with additional information on SLH.
If EFSA issues a favourable opinion on SLH, the matter then passes to the EU Member States for a vote. If they vote to approve the GMO, it will be allowed to be used in Impossible Burgers, which Impossible Foods wants to market in the bloc. If, as is virtually always the case with votes on GMOs, no qualified majority is reached, the Commission can approve it unilaterally (but undemocratically) via a process called comitology.
The GMO SLH is the key ingredient that make the fake meat burgers “bleed” a red substance that resembles the blood that oozes from rare beef.
SLH in its natural state exists in the roots of soybeans and has never been a part of the human diet. So it does not have a history of safe use in food. In addition, Impossible Foods’ SLH is derived from a genetically engineered strain of Pichia pastoris yeast. Pichia pastoris, whether GMO or not, also has no history of safe use in food.
Allergenicity and toxicity information requested
In June this year, EFSA asked the company to provide additional information on a number of important aspects of SLH, including compositional analyses, identity of the genetically engineered yeast strain that is used to produce it, and SLH’s nutritional value, allergenicity, and toxicity.
It is worrying that Impossible Foods has to be prompted to supply this information, which should form a standard part of any application for a GMO authorisation in the EU.
We don’t have the benefit of seeing the precise wording of EFSA’s requests, which remain confidential. At first glance it seems that EFSA asking the right questions to form a sound preliminary assessment of the risks to consumers. However, the full risks will not be known until the product has been out there in the marketplace for some time and enough consumers have tried an Impossible Burger.
Anecdotal reports communicated to us informally in the US suggest that some people can suffer toxic or allergenic reactions to the Impossible Burger, though we don’t have the evidence needed to endorse or refute this possibility. Any consumer reactions that do occur would need to be recorded and published in a peer-reviewed study to stand a chance of being taken seriously by regulators.
Impossible Foods should use non-GMO ingredients in the EU – law expert
A report for Bloomberg quotes Katia Merten-Lentz, a partner at regulatory law specialists Keller and Heckman LLP in Brussels, as saying that due to EU consumers’ hostility to eating GM foods, it may make more sense for Impossible Foods to use a non-GM ingredient in the EU.
“The spirit of the European countries is not really against innovation, but, for sure, not in favour of GMOs,” she said. “A GMOs [sic] ingredient which appears on the ingredients list could be a bad start in terms of marketing. If I were Impossible Foods, I would do my best to change the heme ingredient.”
Indeed, analyses show that the market for plant-based fake meat products – the GMO issue apart – has peaked and is now in decline. Reasons cited include disappointing taste and high prices.
But Arlin Wasserman, founder of food strategy consultancy Changing Tastes, primarily blames “the long list of ingredients with unfamiliar names for making the product look like highly processed food and acting as a barrier to repeat purchases”. He said, “Consumers may buy it once, but after reading the label, slow down their purchases.”
Plant-based meat is commonly made from proteins processed from various plants (including fungal spores), colouring, flavouring, texturing agents, binders, and added vitamins and minerals that are naturally present in real meat.
Given these trends, the Impossible Burger may go down like a lead balloon in the EU. Impossible Foods should withdraw its application to EFSA and change its business model to focus on healthy, minimally processed foods with a transparent provenance.
Read this article on the GMWatch site and access linked sources:
https://gmwatch.org/en/106-news/latest-news/20096
AFC BULL MARKET KITCHEN™ FREEDOM ON A PLATE 