NZ activists: ban high GE levels SA foods

Wellington-based environmental organisation asked the country's Ministry of Agriculture to withdraw some genetically engineered (GE) foods imported from South Africa - as well as tightening up food-testing.

GE-Free New Zealand says independent tests on some South African products such as infant foods and gluten-free maize meal have revealed high levels of GE maize and soy, Radio New Zealand reports.

Test results show that New Zealand's food safety system is flawed, as there is no record of the genetically-engineered varieties in the products, GE Free spokesperson Claire Bleakley said, adding that this makes it difficult to check whether the products have been approved by the Australia/New Zealand Food Standards Authority. According to Radio New Zealand, Bleakley warned that independent tests done by South Africa's Free State University showed high levels of GE organisms in the corn meal, she also noted that the specific forms of GE corn used were not disclosed.

Blog-based content aggregator Voxy.co.nz reports that the African Centre for Biosafety (ACB) sent samples to the University of the Free State's independent GMO testing facility. GMO found that Bokomo's Wheat Free Pronutro was found to contain both GE maize and GE soya: 90.36% GE maize and 71.42% GE soya. Impala/Springbok maize meal was found to contain 66.18% GE maize. This maize is erroneously labelled as Free of Additives and Gluten Free.

Read the full article on www.radionz.co.nz.
Read the full article on www.voxy.co.nz.