The Food and Drug Administration has ruled that genetically engineered salmon are safe to eat, paving the way for the first altered animals to eventually reach supermarket shelves.
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Opponents of the technology have taken advantage of increasing consumer concern about genetically modified foods and have urged several major retailers not to sell it.
AquAdvantage, produced by Massachusetts-based AquaBounty, is an Atlantic salmon that contains a growth hormone from a Chinook salmon and has been given a gene from the ocean pout, an eel-like fish. Although the potential benefits and profits are huge, a few people have ethical qualms about manipulating the genetic code of other living creatures. The FDA maintains that “there are no biologically relevant differences in the nutritional profile of AquAdvantage Salmon compared to that of other farm-raised Atlantic salmon”. “The only difference that the Food and Drug Administration could determine was that the salmon grows faster”, said Dr. Richard Besser, chief health and medical editor of ABC News.
In a news release, the company’s CEO Ron Stotish called the product, AquAdvantage Salmon a “game-changer”.
To meet its responsibility as to labeling and because the FDA recognizes a few consumers are interested in knowing whether food ingredients are derived from GE sources, the agency is issuing two guidance documents that explain how food companies that want to voluntarily label their products can provide this information to consumers.
In the face of the FDA approval, they have changed tactics and have secured commitments from a few of America’s largest food outlets – including Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods and Target – to refuse to sell the modified fish.
The agency separately denied petitions asking it to require labeling of genetically engineered salmon, which the agency approved on Thursday. The FDA has specifically granted approval for the company to produce genetically modified salmon in only two facilities in Canada and Panama.
A few consumer groups have opposed the fish, saying it could be unsafe to human health and may pose risks to other fish if it were to escape into the environment.
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Alison Van Eenennaam, an animal geneticist at the University of California, Davis, said the FDA decision was “long overdue”. AquaBounty has said its fish are all female and sterile, making it impossible for them to breed with other salmon, even if they somehow were to escape their landlocked production facilities.
