EPA, FDA to Review Data Before Deciding on Taco-Shell Recall

Government regulators moved quickly Monday to investigate reports that a type of bioengineered corn not considered fit for human consumption had made its way into Taco Bell brand taco shells, but a product recall does not appear imminent.

The Environmental Protection Agency and the Food and Drug Administration plan to review the analysis done by Iowa testing laboratory Genetic I.D. before making a decision on whether to pull the product from the market.

If the product does test positive, efforts will also be made to track the corn to its supplier. The corn, called StarLink, is licensed for use only in farm animal feed.

“If we find there was any infraction, we are going to come down very, very hard on those responsible,” said Dave Cohen, EPA spokesman.

The product’s distributor, Kraft Foods Inc., also said it will not pull the shells from supermarkets until further testing is done. “We need to find out if this did indeed happen,” said Michael Mudd, Kraft spokesman. “If if it did, we’ll recall and recall immediately.”

No illnesses have been reported from the product, and Kraft says it does not plan to test its other products that contain corn.

The news comes as the Clinton administration is completing guidelines designed to tighten oversight of the approval process for new genetically engineered crops.

Environmental and consumer groups have said the U.S. government does not provide adequate regulation of genetically engineered crops or enough independent testing to determine the long-term impact on human health and the environment.

“This contamination shows what the FDA hasn’t been doing,” said Larry Bohlen of Friends of the Earth, which is calling on the FDA to recall these products and test other corn-based products.

Taco Bell brand taco shells are made for Kraft by chip maker Sabritas at a plant in Mexicali, Mexico, with corn flour from a mill in Texas. Sabritas also supplies shells for the Taco Bell restaurant chain, Mudd said. Friends of the Earth said it will test samples of these products next.

Taco Bell, based in Irvine, said it is relying on Kraft to “take all appropriate action” if the FDA determines that its supermarket products contain StarLink corn.

StarLink, which contains a substance that repels pests, was not approved for human consumption when it was introduced in 1998 because it contains a protein that may not be easily digested by humans, EPA officials said. Other varieties of genetically engineered corn do not contain this protein and have been approved for use in human food.

Only 300,000 acres of StarLink corn are grown in the U.S., about one-half of 1% of the corn planted this year.

Friends of the Earth, a member of the coalition known as Genetically Engineered Food Alert, commissioned the tests on concern that StarLink was not being segregated from other corn at grain elevators.

Altogether, 23 food items made from corn were sampled, including frozen food, cereal and tortilla chips. However, only the Taco Bell taco shells were found to contain the bioengineered corn, and only 1% of the sample tested contained the StarLink corn.

Food industry officials say the case illustrates how hard it is to police their supply chain for genetically altered ingredients.

“It’s pretty clear that in the U.S, there is so much commingling particularly in processed foods that it would be quite difficult to separate [genetically modified ingredients],” said Mark Cohen of the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington.

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Times wire services were used in compiling this report.