Umweltverbrechen multinationaler Konzerne - Greenpeace

Range of damage,
amount of loss
because the Bt (Bacillus Thuringiensis) Cry9C gene it contains could
trigger allergic reactions in consumers 200 . The EPA only allowed
StarLink to be grown and used in technical processes or in animal
feed.
This GE maize should certainly not have been grown and allowed to
enter the environment and food chain at all.
The StarLink contamination illustrates the difficulty of keeping GE
and conventional grains separate. The reasons include crosspollination,
contaminated machinery and commingling during
processing.
Besides the possibility that StarLink might cause allergies to
humans, scientists and environmentalists have pointed out that
engineering Bt into maize, cotton and other crops and releasing them
into the environment could lead to insects developing a resistance to
Bt, impacts on populations of non-target organisms and the creation
of superweeds.
The StarLink case created chaos in the US food and grain industry
and hurt American farm exports.
A few days after the contamination was made public, tens of millions
of Taco Bell taco shells were voluntarily recalled by their
manufacturer, Kraft Foods. StarLink maize was subsequently
discovered in Safeway and Western Family brands taco shells and
Kellogg’s Morningstar brand corn dogs, prompting more recalls from
grocery stores. Altogether, 300 kinds of taco shells, tortillas, chips
and tostadas have been recalled from US grocery stores and
restaurants because of StarLink contamination.
Several companies temporarily halted milling operations after
StarLink was found in their facilities. Kellogg’s, for instance, was
forced to shut down production at one of its US cereal plants.
Even though StarLink was grown on less than one percent of US
maize fields, the harvested maize was mixed with vast quantities of
other maize and millions of bushels were commingled into the food
chain.
The maize also turned up in Japan - the top foreign buyer of US
maize - where this GE maize has no approval for use as food or
animal feed. Costs of US maize exports to Japan increased due to
the additional testing and handling costs. In 2001, Japanese imports
of US maize fell by about 1.3 million metric tons due to the StarLink
issue 201 .
The recall of StarLink GE maize cost companies all along the food
chain – from grain elevators and food processors to grocery stores –
200 The US EPA has two stated reasons for worrying about potential allergenicity of cry9C : stability to heat denaturation and
resistance to enzymatic digestion; characteristics that are not common to the other Cry proteins used to date. Moreover,
because cry9C is not one of the Bts that's been commonly used as topical insecticides for the last two decades, there is no
circumstantial evidence of safety.
201 USDA, Japan Grain and Feed Annual report, 29 March 2002.
96