Chef Moonen vs the GM Salmon

Posted on September 15, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

Chef Rick Moonen (writing for CNN) wants you to Say no to genetically engineered salmon

…I was alarmed to learn early this month that the Food and Drug Administration announced with “reasonable certainty” that a new genetically modified Atlantic salmon awaiting approval posed “no harm” to humans who might soon have the opportunity to buy it and eat it as though it were a fish from nature. The announcement brings this “Frankenfish” one step closer to your table….

Just a couple of quick comments:

First, it’s hard to take Moonen seriously when he signals, in his very first sentence, his apparent unwillingness to do things like look at evidence or adapt to changing circumstances. Moonen’s opening salvo:

I am and always will be completely against any food that has been altered genetically for human consumption.

Welllll, ok then. He will “always” and “completely” be against “any” food that has been genetically altered. No matter how useful the modification? No matter how much evidence is marshalled in the future to demonstrate safety, and so on? That’s the kind of statement that — if taken seriously — signals that the writer just isn’t trying to form an opinion based on things like facts. It signals instead an attachment to ideology.

(And, it’s worth noting that while Moonen’s article gives reasons why he doesn’t like the idea of GM salmon, he gives no reason at all why he will “always” and “completely” be against “any” food that has been genetically altered.)

My only other point is about business and economics. Moonen runs a successful restaurant, so it’s reasonable to think he knows something about business. So, what does he have to say about the business side of GM salmon?

The creation of this fish is just another tactic for big industry to make bigger, faster profits with no consideration for the impact it will have on our personal health and the health of our environment and ecosystem.

Two points need to be made, here. One has to do with profits. You can be sure that, yes indeed, AquaBounty (the company that developed the new GM salmon) is interested in profits. They are, after all, a corporation, and not a charity or a government agency. But so what? There’s nothing evil about profit. And the way companies make a profit is by providing something someone wants to pay for. GM salmon that grows faster will reduce costs for salmon farms, and in a competitive environment that will lead to lower salmon prices for consumers.

The other point has to do with motives. Moonen claims that GM salmon is “just” another industry tactic, and that the company in question has “no consideration” for anything other than profit. Seriously? Moonen really thinks that the human beings — they could be your neighbours, your cousins, someone you respect — care about nothing other than money. On what grounds does he say that? Heck of a presumption. Personally, I know just about as much about AquaBounty’s CEO Ronald Stotish as I do about Rick Moonen — i.e., next to nothing. I certainly don’t have any reason to think Mr. Stotish is any more of a slave to the bottom line — or any more willing to sacrifice customers’ health to make a buck — than Mr. Moonen is.

(See also this recent blog posting: Will Chefs Serve GM salmon?)

Posted in aquaculture, biotechnology, ethics, fisheries, genetic modification, GMO | 1 Comment

The Junk Food Diet (Stunt)

Posted on September 15, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

[Spoiler: no, this is not a new miracle diet.]

Hey, guess what! You can lose weight by eating junk food.

Huh?

Lose weight by eating junk food? No, it’s not the latest nutty tabloid headline; it’s an experiment that an American professor of nutrition is conducting on himself.

See this story by Francine Kopun, Losing weight in the Twinkie of an eye:

For three weeks, nutrition expert Mark Haub has been eating Little Debbie Pecan Spin Wheels for breakfast, Hostess Twinkies for lunch, birthday cake for supper and Doritos for dessert.

He’s lost 10 pounds. His bad cholesterols are down, his good cholesterols are up. … So is it a healthy diet? That’s the question Haub, 41, wants everyone asking….

Now, no one who knows anything about diet and nutrition is going to be surprised that Haub has lost a few pounds. As the story points out, he’s restricting his overall calories, so he’s going to lose weight. And it’s not even shocking that his (short-term) health is OK. Humans can survive on a truly amazing range of diets. (Think, for example, of the traditional diet of the Inuit peoples of Canada’s north. Historically, the Inuit got about 75% of their calories from fat.)

Of course, Haub’s short-term experiment doesn’t speak to the long-term effects of his junk-food diet. I’m guessing it’s not something to be optimistic about. And Haub, for his part, isn’t at all recommending his diet to anyone else. It’s just a way to grab attention, and to get people thinking about (among other things) what it really takes to lose weight — and, in particular, whether one has to switch to a whole-grains-and-green-leafy-vegetables type of diet in order to do so.

I do wonder about the wisdom of this stunt, though, mostly because I worry about how it will be reported in the media. I can’t fault Haub’s interest in stimulating debate. I’m a professor myself, and sometimes a professor’s job includes doing something outlandish to get people to reconsider something they’ve taken for granted. All in all, I suspect the benefits of Haub’s stunt outweigh the risks. Sure, a few people might stop reading at the headline, and conclude that they, too, can lose weight by eating Doritos. But then again, I’m not sure the state of public education about nutrition can really get any worse. And it does seem useful to help people see that there are many kinds of healthy (or semi-healthy, or reasonably healthy) diets, and many kinds of feasible weight-loss diets. And — and this is crucial for people for whom obesity is a key health issue — that you don’t have to live on alfalfa sprouts and quinoa in order to lose weight.

Posted in diets, junk food, nutrition | 1 Comment

Peter Singer & the Reasons for Protecting Animals

Posted on September 14, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

Here’s a recent piece by philosopher Peter Singer, in Forbes magazine:
Animal Advocates Surpass NRA In Political Influence.

…With wider public support, animal advocates gained serious political clout. By 2015 Humane USA eclipsed the National Rifle Association in the influence it wielded on politicians. That led to a wave of other changes: stricter controls over the use of animals in research; a crackdown on puppy mills, new incentives for people to adopt animals from shelters rather than buy from breeders; a national school lunch program that promoted vegetarian meals; expansion of live webcams in slaughterhouses, factory farms and other places where animals were susceptible to abuse….

The sub-title of the article claims that “Farm animals will enjoy more rights than ever before.” But though some of the changes referred to are in fact entrenched in law and hence imply a kind of legal right for animals, it’s not generally clear that the moral notion of a “right” is the best or only way to understand the changes that are afoot. It’s worth noting the philosophical complexity (and divergence) lying below the consensus that Singer refers to.

There are many possible reasons to think that animals deserve protection, many different arguments that might lead to the conclusion that, for instance, animals raised for food ought not to be treated brutally. Some will think in terms of reducing suffering, others will think in terms of the nobility of conscious creatures or the sanctity of living things. Certainly not all will think in terms of (moral) rights. Singer himself, for example, is philosophically speaking not a proponent of “animal rights”. Singer is a utilitarian, and utilitarians typically focus on the moral imperative to improve well-being (or happiness or ‘utility’). Utilitarians typically aren’t big on the notion of rights (for anyone) — though some are happy to acknowledge rights (or maybe “rights”) as handy rules of thumb or as mechanisms for the protection of important interests.

Of course, some people will agree with the conclusion that animals deserve some protection without having thought much about the reasons. They might not have reflected much on the matter, but still be willing to acknowledge, at some gut level, that animal abuse “just ain’t right.”

Do the underlying reasons matter? For some purposes, likely not. Even if there are lots of different reasons supporting the conclusion that “animals matter, ethically,” it’s important to note that those reasons do point in the same direction. But it’s also worth acknowledging that different people, relying on different kinds of arguments, are very likely to support different rules about the care of animals, and different kinds of limits on how humans treat them. A ‘right’, for example, is typically taken as an argument stopper. If I have a right to something, it is generally unethical for you to violate it. Period. Rights are (typically) not to be weighed and balanced against other interests. A utilitarian focus on wellbeing, on the other hand, is typically understood as a balancing act — we can’t all enjoy maximal wellbeing (there are cases where my interests conflict with yours) and so we should do what we can to balance interests, to trade them off, and (arguably) to maximize happiness while minimizing misery. But promising to try to minimize an animal’s misery is pretty different from promising to respect its rights.

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Footnote:
In case you haven’t heard of him, Peter Singer is the philosopher most likely to be nominated as the godfather of the modern animal welfare and vegetarian movements. His book Animal Liberation is one of the ‘bibles’ of the movement. But he is also — even setting that aside — among the most prominent and respected philosophers of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Even those professional peers who don’t agree with him acknowledge that he’s a force to be reckoned with. My own very first scholarly publication was a review of the revised version of Singer’s book, Practical Ethics. I disagree with most of what’s in that book, but it’s an important book in the field and Singer is not a thinker to be taken lightly.

Posted in animal rights, animal welfare, ethics, meat, public policy, values, vegetarianism | 5 Comments

Will Chefs Serve GM Salmon?

Posted on September 12, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

grilled salmonWill chefs at your better restaurants serve the genetically-modified salmon that is very likely soon to be approved by the FDA and that will likely be available for purchase by 2010? Interesting question!

For a hint at the answer, see this story by Laura Canter at Food & Drink Digital: Chefs weigh in on genetically modified salmon.

I have to admit, if I were a chef, I’d be hesitant too — but not for ethical reasons. I’m not a chef, and I’ll be among the first to buy GM salmon if & when it becomes available — assuming it is offered at a good price. But if I were a chef, I’d be hesitant simply because many of my customers are going to be hesitant about eating GM fish.

But it’s interesting to read the reasons given by professional chefs. For instance:

“It goes against my principles,” said Andy Arndt, executive chef of Aquariva Restaurant in Portland, Ore. He argued that the practice of genetically engineering fish wouldn’t be necessary if fisheries were better regulated.

What principles? (I can imagine principled objections, but what are Arndt’s?) And as for the bit about regulation — huh? I agree with the idea that fisheries need to be better managed (and ideally better regulated), but it’s not at all clear that that’s at all relevant here. The fact is that the fisheries have not been well-managed, and that’s not likely to change much any time soon. And farmed salmon are very likely part of any sane protein-production system of the future. And it’s very likely that AquaBounty’s growth-accelerated GM salmon are very likely to be popular among salmon farmers. And if that ends up translating (as hoped) into lower prices, then high-end restaurants may be able to forego the savings, but ones that serve more cost-conscious consumers will not.

Posted in aquaculture, biotechnology, ethics, genetic modification, GMO, restaurants | Comments Off on Will Chefs Serve GM Salmon?

Silk’s Non-Organic Soymilk

Posted on September 10, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

Here’s an interesting piece about the delicate matter of marketing products at the (apparently) fragile intersection of terms like “organic” and “natural” and “GM-free.”

By Melanie Warner, for Bnet: How Silk Soymilk’s Cost-Cutting Dis of Organic Backfired

Back in early 2009, Silk, the leading brand of soymilk, quietly stopped using certified organic soybeans and removed the word ‘organic’ from its labels in favor of the more malleable term ‘natural’. For a long time, nobody noticed.

After swapping out the key ingredient in its product, Silk didn’t bother to alter its packaging (except to yank the word organic) or the SKU number, giving some customers the impression that the move was deceptive. … Shunning organic also diluted the value of Silk’s brand, which was built upon the idea of health and wholesomeness….

Was it unethical of Silk to stop using organic soy without being more up-front about the change? Well, to begin, those who think that only organic agriculture is ethical will believe that the change itself is unethical, nevermind the way the change was(n’t) advertised. But assuming that use of non-organic soy is at least permissible, how should Silk have handled the transition? It’s pretty hard to imagine labels screaming “Now With Non-Organic Soy!” But as Melanie Warner’s article implies, Silk could have signalled the change more subtly by, say, redesigning their package. Of course, it’s not clear that such a change would have resulted in consumers also noticing the change to non-organic soy.

FYI, as I write this, I happen to have sitting on the kitchen counter a container of Silk Original Light Fortified Soy Beverage (I don’t drink it, but another member of my household does). No mention of organic ingredients. Prior to reading Warner’s article, I had already been amused (and had my curiosity aroused) by the claim on the side of the carton that “Silk Light begins with natural soy, grown without genetic engineering right here in North America.” Why would I find that significant? Well, first, it is incredibly rare to find products in a major Canadian grocery store proclaiming themselves to be GM-free. In fact, this is the first time I’ve seen it. I even emailed the grocery chain (Metro) to find out if they have a policy about that. They do not. Second, I’m surprised to see a food producer able to claim (presumably truthfully) that its key ingredient is GM-free without it also being organic. For many purposes (including for many consumer purposes) the two often go hand-in-hand.

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Update (Sept. 15, 2010)…
I just found out that this issue does not apply equally across boarders. I’m currently looking at a carton of Original Silk Fortified Soy Beverage — and it is made with organic soybeans. So, here in Canada, the complaint discussed above just doesn’t apply, apparently.

Posted in ethics, genetic modification, labeling, organic | 7 Comments

GM Foods and PLU Codes

Posted on September 9, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

Can PLU (Price Look-Up) codes help concerned consumers avoid genetically-modified foods?

No.

The idea that a 5-digit PLU beginning with “8” is a reliable guide to the genetic characteristics of a piece of produce has spread around the internet like wildfire.

Trouble is, it’s false. Now, it’s a falsehood rooted in fact: the numeral “8” (in the 1st position of a 5-digit code) has in fact been set aside, (by the International Federation for Produce Standards) to designate GM foods. But the code is entirely voluntary, and no one is actually using it.

So, in theory, a 5-digit PLU starting with 8 (if you ever saw one) would imply that the product in your hand is genetically-modified. But the absence of that 8 tells you absolutely nothing at all.

(For a longer version of the explanation, see PLU Codes Do Not Indicate Genetically Modified Produce, by Jeffrey Smith.)

I have just a couple of things to add.

First is that this kind of thing just adds to my concerns about the power of labelling to inform consumers. (See my blog entries, Does it Matter if Consumers Understand Food Labels? and Are Labels the Answer (to Everything)?) But now we see even more reason for concern, if labels that are not aimed at consumers (and that don’t tell them much of anything) are liable to be taken up and misinterpreted.

Second is that the confusion over PLU codes suggests that advocates who are concerned to inform the public should be very careful, not just in gathering facts but also in thinking through the logic of what they’re saying. Part of the problem, here, is that most people are bad at conditional reasoning. The fact that an 8 implies GMO does not logically mean that the absence of an 8 implies non-GMO. Advice for consumers needs to be framed in a way that minimizes both false positives and false negatives!

Posted in biotechnology, certifiction, ethics, genetic modification, GMO, labeling, organic | 19 Comments

Meat Production and Utopian Fantasies

Posted on September 8, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

Meat production is perhaps the big ethical issue in the realm of food. Not that long ago, vegetarianism and veganism were the domain of hippies and university undergraduates, but not any longer. Now that the ecological impact of meat production is becoming clearer, meat is being critiqued by mainstream authors and editorialists and thinkers of all political stripes. James McWilliams, author of Just Food, calls meat “the new caviar.” And food guru Michael Pollan advises us, famously, to “Eat food, not too much, mostly vegetables.”

But not everyone is so sure. Author George Monbiot says he’s recently been convinced to change his mind about meat, after reading Simon Fairlie’s book, Meat: A Benign Extravagance [which I myself have not yet read].

Here’s Monbiot’s essay about it, in The Guardian: I was wrong about veganism. Let them eat meat – but farm it properly

In the Guardian in 2002 I discussed the sharp rise in the number of the world’s livestock, and the connection between their consumption of grain and human malnutrition. After reviewing the figures, I concluded that veganism “is the only ethical response to what is arguably the world’s most urgent social justice issue”. I still believe that the diversion of ever wider tracts of arable land from feeding people to feeding livestock is iniquitous and grotesque. So does the book I’m about to discuss. I no longer believe that the only ethical response is to stop eating meat….

Monbiot and Fairlie think that meat consumption can be ethical, under certain circumstances. How? Simple. Change just about everything about how meat is produced. First, stop raising so many cows (which need to be fed grain in large quantities, and are inefficient at converting grain into meat) and switch almost entirely to pigs. Then change how pigs are raised and fed:

If pigs are fed on residues and waste, and cattle on straw, stovers and grass from fallows and rangelands – food for which humans don’t compete – meat becomes a very efficient means of food production….

Clearly, there are a lot of “ifs” in this scenario, a lot of changes to make to some very entrenched practices.

But the key weakness is this: In his conclusion, Manbriot says we (each, individually) could with a clear conscience eat meat “if we were to adopt” (and presumably that’s “we”, collectively) the kind of system he & Fairlie advocate. But notice that there simply is no “we” of the second kind, in the absence of a planned economy. “We” (via government) can push & nudge the food system in various directions, but “we” cannot “adopt” a food system, as a working whole.

—
Thanks to SB for showing me this story.

Posted in consumerism, ecosystems, environment, farmers, meat, public policy, vegan, vegetarianism | 5 Comments

Should Grandma Drink Bottled Water?

Posted on September 4, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

Here’s a thought about health warnings related to foods and food packaging.

A few months ago my grandmother told me she had stopped drinking bottled water. Why? Because she had heard on the news that there are chemicals in plastic water bottles that can give you cancer. That, of course, is crazy. No, I’m not saying that it’s crazy to think that there might be a link between phthalates and various illnesses. What’s crazy is for someone who is 92 to worry about it. And in point of fact, we (her family) had strongly recommended to my grandmother that she buy and drink bottled water, because we know (based on her own reports) that when tap water was the only water available, she just wasn’t consuming enough fluids. She only drinks enough water when it is a) very cold and b) very convenient. So, for my grandmother, refrigerated bottled water was an excellent solution. Sure, there may have been other solutions, but this one worked and the concerns over the long-term health effects of phthalates just don’t matter much, in comparison, to someone who is 92. Like I said, her decision to stop buying bottled water was crazy.

But my grandmother is not, in fact, crazy. She had merely been scared unnecessarily by a news story. Now, I didn’t see the news item she saw, so I have no idea whether the reporting was good or bad. So the point is a much more general one, namely that with few exceptions (“Don’t eat beef that smells off!“), health advice needs to be tailored to the individual in order to be really useful. I can understand entirely why many parents don’t want their kids exposed to phthalates. I don’t usually buy bottled water, myself. But I believe my grandmother ought to.

The challenge, of course, is that different people may have very different needs, but health experts get only a tiny slice of the public’s attention, and need to use that slice to get their message out as quickly and efficiently. The same goes for reporters. They typically aren’t permitted the airtime (or column inches) to give a long list of exceptions. And besides, neither health experts nor reporters can anticipate the many and varied needs of everyone watching or listening. There’s no way the experts and reporters my grandmother was relying on could be expected to anticipate her special needs, or to do a personalized cost-benefit analysis for her. But it’s worth remembering, for all of us involved in debates (or just personal decisions) about food nutrition and safety: for every generalization about what’s good or useful or healthy, there must also be a list — even if usually unstated — of ifs, ands, or buts.

Posted in consumerism, elderly, kids, labeling, media, safety, science, water | Comments Off on Should Grandma Drink Bottled Water?

Dangers of Hotdogs

Posted on September 2, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

This blog is relatively new, but I’ve been blogging about certain kinds of food ethics issues on my Business Ethics Blog for years.

Here’s a topic that has been on my mind recently: hotdog safety. The basic problem is that kids sometimes choke on hotdogs: they’re just about the perfect size to seal a child’s throat. Hotdogs are not a huge risk, over all, but among foods they represent a higher-than-usual risk.

Rather than repeat what I’ve said before, I’ll just point you to these 2 previous blog entries of mine:
Are Hotdogs Unreasonably Dangerous?
and
Labelling Dangerous Foods (for Kids)

Posted in ethics, kids, labeling, safety | Comments Off on Dangers of Hotdogs

Military-Grade Nutrition

Posted on August 31, 2010 by Chris MacDonald

Over at the Authenticity Hoax blog, Andrew Potter just posted this interesting commentary, America’s New Age Army, about a story from yesterday’s NYT, Making Soldiers Fit to Fight, Without the Situps.

It’s a story, Andrew says,

…about the sorry state of today’s recruits. The short version is that recruits today are fat and slow, with poor bone density caused by eating too much junk food and spending too much time playing video games. As a result, they are getting injured during basic training at a much higher rate than even a few years ago.

Much of the piece is about physical training, but part is about nutrition, too. Andrew notes:

They’ve gone and re-did the mess hall as well. More vegetables and less fried food. They’ve even put signs near the fries labelling them “Performance Limiting Foods.”

The NYT story quotes Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling, the man responsible for overseeing basic training for the Army. According to the General, “This is not just an Army issue. This is a national issue.”

So, now that the U.S. military has declared nutrition to be a national problem, can we expect a major effort from the US government to improve national nutrition standards?

Posted in Uncategorized | 5 Comments