Global Courant 2023-05-03 13:55:57
The food and beverage industry is battling over a bill making its way through the California legislature that critics say could negatively impact the taste and cost of some of America’s favorite snacks.
California Assemblyman Jesse Gabriel, a Democrat, introduced AB 418 earlier this year, legislation that would ban the sale, manufacture and distribution of products containing five specific and commonly used food additives in the Golden State: red dye 3, potassium bromate, propylparaben, titanium dioxide and brominated vegetable oil. These ingredients, all approved for consumption by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), are used in several popular foods, especially candy.
The bill, which initially contained no enforcement mechanism, was recently amended to say that a first offense would be punishable by a fine of up to $5,000, and any subsequent offense would result in a fine of up to $10,000 — a change that critics say , means taxpayers’ money would be allocated to fund “candy cops”.
“They’re literally creating candy cops in California. If it wasn’t all so serious, it would be hilarious,” a candy industry executive told Fox News Digital. “This is not well thought out and the implications for business are real and widespread.”
California Assemblyman Jesse Gabriel, a Democrat
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The executive explained that the food industry is focused on lobbying to stop Gabriel’s law, but said it hopes to “get to the table” with advocates who support the measure to discuss “practical and pragmatic perspectives”. That said, the executive characterized the legislation as arbitrary and ultimately counterproductive.
“There is no scientific basis for this bill. A California councilman with no regulatory expertise sat in his office and came up with a list seemingly at random,” the executive said. “All ingredients are considered safe and acceptable for food. Banning them has significant implications for the food industry.”
When asked to explain, the director said it would take a significant amount of research and development to find a replacement “if that’s even a possibility” and that many of these ingredients relate to “function , but function is important for flavor and texture.”
“There are favorite ingredients and flavors,” said the director. “If you’re proposing to ban some of these, those formulas have to change, which is ultimately going to be important for consumers.”
The National Confectioners Association recently signed on a coalition letter with other organizations representing manufacturers, distributors, and retailers of food and beverages describing how both the federal government and the state of California have different laws and regulations requiring chemicals to be removed from foods, warning labels to be affixed, and alternatives to be monitored if those are food additives be considered unsafe or expose consumers to allergies. They argue that a blanket ban would undermine the regulatory review process for several chemicals, including some targeted by Gabriel’s bill.
This Wednesday, June 1, 2016, photo shows Skittles, in New York. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)
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“The food safety process is active and should be allowed to proceed with proper assessment of
these five and all additives,” the letter stated. Scientific supervisors go through these processes and make decisions to establish recognized safe thresholds. Then, where appropriate and supported by peer-reviewed scientific evaluations, they require additional labeling or removal from the market…These regulatory bodies with scientific professionals are responsible for all food additives, and these science-based regulatory processes must be able to continue without question their results.”
Gabriel, however, took a very different view of the additives, arguing that they are dangerous to consumer health and that a ban would have far less impact on business than critics claim.
“These five are the worst of the worst,” Gabriel told Fox News Digital. “Each has very well-documented scientific links to cancer and other significant health harms. Plus, all five are non-essential ingredients, used primarily to improve things like the appearance of food.”
In 2015, for example, research published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature concluded that titanium dioxide can accumulate in a person’s bloodstream, liver, spleen and kidneys.
Research of three years earlier links artificial colors to DNA-damaging genotoxicity, and in 2020 the Environmental Protection Agency reported that children who consumed the dye were more likely to be hyperactive and inattentive.
A column of candy, left, seen in TikTok videos is shown at the It’Sugar candy store, Wednesday, October 6, 2021, on New York’s Upper East Side. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)
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Gabriel has publicly used Skittles, which uses titanium dioxide, as an example of a product he wants to change, noting that major brands have started removing some of their own additives, such as Pepsi removing brominated vegetable oil from Mountain Dew in 2020 He also pointed out that three of the five substances are already banned in the European Union.
“They can’t really say with an honest face that they can’t make these products because companies in Europe are making the same products with substitutes and people are still buying them,” said Gabriel. “It doesn’t feel like a fair argument to me. This bill received bipartisan support in committee, and we don’t believe banning these chemicals will increase the cost of finding substitutes.”
The FDA recently concluded that the “available safety studies demonstrate no safety concerns associated with the use of titanium dioxide as a color additive,” noting that European Food Safety Authority studies “contain test materials that are not representative of the color additive, and some tests including routes of administration which are not relevant to human dietary exposure.”
However, Gabriel argued that the “real story” here is that the FDA approval process is suspicious and contains loopholes.
“I always assumed the FDA was watching us,” Gabriel said. “But I learned as advocates discussed this issue that most new chemicals put into food go through a loophole where they are not independently reviewed.”
The US Food and Drug Administration (Reuters/Andrew Kelly/File Photo)
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The California Democrat said he’s not trying to get products off the shelf, but rather to ensure consumer safety — a point the candy manager didn’t buy into.
“What has been lost here is that the US food system is the safest in the world, the envy of the world in terms of the strictness of our regulatory system,” said the candy executive. “In general, consumers don’t have to worry about food safety here, unlike in other countries. There are a lot of comparisons with products in other countries, but it just doesn’t make sense.”
Gabriel countered that he suspects part of the motivation behind the opposition to his bill is “inertia” as the ban would require the food industry to put in the time and effort to come up with new recipes and negotiate new contracts.
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“We can still make the foods we love, but with substitutes,” he said. “The idea is to have these companies make very small changes to their ingredients, like in Europe.”
Aaron Kliegman is a political reporter for Fox News Digital.
