Genetically edited foods might pose unpredictable health risks and should be regulated as genetically modified products, advocates and lawmakers said yesterday, demanding that the government be more strict about such products.
At a news conference in Taipei, the Homemakers United Foundation demanded that the Food and Drug Administration propose regulations for genetically edited foods, saying they should be regarded as genetically modified organisms (GMO).
It also called on the US government not to regard the nation’s regulations on GMO foods and their exclusion from school lunches as trade barriers.
Since the global campaign “March Against Monsanto” targeting GMO products of US-based agrochemical corporation Monsanto was launched in the US in May 2013, local opponents of GMOs have held events to echo the campaign in May every year, National Taiwan University agronomy professor Warren Kuo (郭華仁) said.
People should support non-GMO foods and collectively make sure the nation produces crops that are not genetically modified, Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chen Man-li (陳曼麗) said.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lee Yen-hsiu (李彥秀) called on lawmakers to work together to include genetically edited products in the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法), which stipulates that product labels should reveal any GMO ingredients.
While domestically produced soybeans are more expensive, the Council of Agriculture (COA) is encouraging rice farmers to grow other grains by providing subsidies, COA Agriculture and Food Agency section head Cheng Yung-ching (鄭永青) said.
The agency is to promote organic soy milk at local schools, possibly starting with milk made of black beans, because they are cheaper, she said.
As genome editing is a relatively new domain, the department is still collecting information about it, COA Department of Science and Technology Deputy Director-General Kuo Kun-feng said separately.
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) on March 28 said that it has no plans to regulate plants bred through genome editing techniques if the result could have been achieved through traditional breeding and “as long as [the genomes] are not from plant pests or developed using plant pests.”
Kuo said that council officials did not broach the issue of genome editing during their annual conference with USDA officials last month.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
‘SPEY’ REACTION: Beijing said its Eastern Theater Command ‘organized troops to monitor and guard the entire process’ of a Taiwan Strait transit China sent 74 warplanes toward Taiwan between late Thursday and early yesterday, 61 of which crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait. It was not clear why so many planes were scrambled, said the Ministry of National Defense, which tabulated the flights. The aircraft were sent in two separate tranches, the ministry said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday “confirmed and welcomed” a transit by the British Royal Navy’s HMS Spey, a River-class offshore patrol vessel, through the Taiwan Strait a day earlier. The ship’s transit “once again [reaffirmed the Strait’s] status as international waters,” the foreign ministry said. “Such transits by
RSS