Health Canada noted in its news release that “given that no health and safety concerns were identified, there are no special labelling requirements for AquAdvantage Salmon”.
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AquaBounty salmon is the first genetically modified food animal to be approved for sale in Canada.
Asked whether they’d eat the GMO salmon, Philpott and Agriculture Minister Lawrence MacAuley both said they would.
After “thorough and rigorous scientific reviews” Health Canada has determined the AquAdvantage Salmon “is as safe and nutritious for humans and livestock as conventional salmon”, the department and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency said Thursday. “Alongside the approval by the FDA in November 2015, there are now two independent reviews by two of the most sophisticated and demanding regulators in the world and both have come to the same conclusion”.
The first genetically modified food animal has been approved for sale in Canada. Environmentalists sued United States health regulators this year to try to overturn the decision.
“GM foods that have been approved by Health Canada have been consumed in Canada for many years, and are safe and nutritious”, the agency said.
The salmon (read GLP’s primer on the fish here), made by Massachusetts-based AquaBounty Technologies, is an Atlantic salmon that has been modified to possess a growth hormone gene from the Chinook salmon.
“It’s a decision for the committee”, he said, adding he expects a report back by the parliamentarians on the issue by the end of the year.
However, Health Minister Jane Philpott told reporters that a parliamentary committee will be studying how Canada deals with GMO foods over the next year and could discuss the issue of labelling.. Some are concerned they may pose risks to the environment or to health.
“If it is safe. then labelling should not be an issue”.
“And, I fear that Health Canada and the ministry has put the needs of the industry above the rights of consumers to know what they’re ingesting”.
Halifax’s Ecology Action Centre has similar concerns.
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AquaAdvantage has a plant in the community of Bay Fortune, in eastern Prince Edward Island. The company has also argued that its GM salmon, originally developed by a group of Canadian scientists at Newfoundland’s Memorial University more than 25 years ago, could help curtail the over-fishing of Atlantic salmon and lessen the pressure on stocks of wild salmon. The company has said the fish, which are gown from sterile eggs, will be raised in tanks.
