Search Results for: food

BY MONICA DOBIE
ASK most people what they do with maple syrup and the majority will reply they use it to drizzle over pancakes in the morning. Maple syrup producers in Quebec, the world’s leading producer of the sweet treat, are trying to change that.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
SOME sensible words were spoken recently by the EU’s agriculture commissioner Franz Fischler on the way forward for farmers. His starting point was the quality of farm produce. Noone is going to say that quality has ever been far from farmers’ minds, but until recently it wasn’t really the first consideration.…

Keith Nuthall
THE DRINKS industry is being asked by the European Commission whether it would like the EU rules governing the size of bottles for wines and spirits to be liberalised. At present, wines may only be sold in the EU in 25, 37.5, 50, 75 cl bottles and a few more units of one litre or more.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
THE UNITED States Food and Drug Administration has warned three online pharmacies that sell nicotine impregnated lollipops and lip-balm via the Internet that that it considers their products illegal and that their sale must stop immediately.

In its explanation of the decision, the FDA said it acted because they are dispensed without a doctor’s prescription, contain a form of nicotine called salicylate that is not used in FDA-approved smoking cessation products, and because confectionary-like products present a risk of accidental use by children.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A TASK force of world food standards body Codex Alimentarius has agreed detailed draft guidelines on how to assess the safety of genetically modified foodstuffs and on how to trace and remove from sale any product that is subsequently shown to pose a hazard to human health.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
AT FIRST sight, the European Commission’s new proposals for guarding against future outbreaks of foot and mouth disease, and tackling them if they do, occur seem eminently reasonable from the farmer’s point of view. Not a lot of detail is yet known, and in any event ministers will have their say, but it seems the Brussels authorities have learned the right lessons from last year.…

BY PHILIP FINE

BOTOX can now be sold as a temporary wrinkle remover in America, after the popular injection received approval as a cosmetic by the US Food and Drug Administration. The product, which short-circuits electrical messages from the brain to facial nerve endings, is derived from a purified form of the toxin that causes botulism.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has banned on the EU of jelly mini-cups containing the food additive konjac (E 425), which take time to dissolve and have lead to the deaths of several American and Canadian children through choking.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
IN an interesting recent analysis of the problems facing livestock and other food producers in Europe, the European Union agriculture commissioner Franz Fischler suggested that one way forward could be through contract farming.

Instead of producing in the traditional way for the open market, he said, producers might consider linking with retail groups or the meat processing industry and delivering precisely what was needed in terms of both quality and quantity.…

BY PHILIP FINE

AMERICAN food manufacturers will in the long term see a fall in prices if a US$45.1 billion US farm bill becomes law next week, says the European Commission, but not before world markets are glutted with foods. The bill calls for an increase in crop and dairy subsidies to farmers and for mandatory country-of-origin labeling for meat, fruit, vegetables, fish and peanuts.…