North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[road's end farm <organic101@linkny.com>]

On Thursday, December 18, 2003, at 05:17 PM, Bill Russell wrote:

> From: "Bill Russell" <shaman@pennswoods.net>
> Date: Thu Dec 18, 2003  05:17:51 PM US/Eastern
> To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
> Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Fruit Labels
> Reply-To: Bill Russell <shaman@pennswoods.net>, North American Fruit 
> Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
>
> Right, irradiated foods do not store radiation. But one of the effects 
> are
> destruction of beneficial enzymes. That's why irradiated fresh foods 
> keep
> longer. I have also been told that it is illegal to label foods as
> irradiated because "it will only confuse the public."
>
> Comments?
>
> Bill
I believe the nutritional quality is also changed -- drop in vitamin 
content -- and compounds may be created that don't naturally occur in 
the food. This can also occur in other forms of processing; but when 
food has been canned, cured, etc. you can tell by looking at it, and 
decide for yourself whether you want canned peas or fresh ones.

Fresh should mean something more than just "not rotten yet".

Truth is sometimes confusing. But lies are always meant to be. 
Concealing the fact of irradiation, done for that reason, would be a 
lie. If they thought it would sell better, they'd be happy to label it. 
(I don't know that it's illegal to label it; I think the question is 
whether it should be illegal not to label it.) Some people might not buy 
it for the wrong reasons; but that should be up to them. If I don't like 
celery in my soup, I don't have to get soup with celery in it, because 
the ingredients have to be on the label. I might have good, bad, or 
entirely crazy reasons for not wanting celery; but it's supposed to be 
my choice.

-- Rivka