Trade war threat over genetically altered soya

US lobby insists unmodified beans cannot be processed separately

Breads, biscuits, salad dressings and margarines made from genetically modified soya beans will go on sale in British supermarkets later this year without special labelling, despite earlier promises by the companies that such labelling would always be employed.

The supermarkets, including Sainsbury's, Tesco and Safeway, are angry at having been driven into this position - which is the result of the powerful lobby of the American soya bean producers, which have refused to separate out the genetically modified beans in this year's crop.

And the move could lead to a low-key trade war between the US and Europe.

A number of scientists have warned that genetically modified foodstuffs could pose unknown risks to those who eat them, because the regulatory structure for these types of foods is less tight than those for genetically modified animals.

"Living systems are so complicated that you can't think that new genes won't interact with existing ones," said Dr Mae-Wan Ho, of the department of biology at the Open University.

"But the regulators just ask if the foreign gene is present, and whether it produces what the makers say that it does. But they don't check for byproducts."

Two other scientists have also accused advisers to the Government of "oversimplifying" the case in favour of genetically modified foods. "The process of introducing a gene into an organism is very, very imprecise," said John Fagan, a molecular biologist who in 1994 turned down a $600,000 grant to develop genetically modified products in the US. "It can produce new allergens or toxins, or reduce the nutritive value of the food altogether."

Michael Antoniou, a British-based researcher into clinical genetics, said "There's always the possibility that we're not going to pick up on something that is dangerous."

There have been problems with genetically modified foods in the past: in one case, a protein from brazil nuts was introduced to soya beans to improve their quality as a foodstuff. But people who were allergic to brazil nuts were allergic to the soya beans.

"We have been forced to accept that we won't be able to label them separately," said a spokeswoman for Sainsbury's - which last February issued a customer leaflet with a genetically engineered tomato products that said: "If Sainsbury's are to sell further products developed with the aid of genetic modification, these will be labelled."

The new foodstuffs will probably come on sale in November, following the harvesting and processing of the beans, which will happen over the next few weeks.

The result is that it could be virtually impossible to feed the family without buying something made with the altered soya beans, which have been engineered by the chemicals group Monsanto to be resistant to a herbicide called Roundup - also made by Monsanto.

The powerful American Soybean Association (ASA) insists that it is not possible to separate out the genetically modified soya beans, which will make up about 2 per cent of the final US crop, comprising hundreds of thousands of tonnes of soya.

The beans all go into the same processing plants, it said, so that the genetically modified beans are distributed throughout the final product, such as soya oils and flours.

The ASA was backed last week by Gene Moos, the US under-secretary of agriculture, who said that separating and labelling the modified beans was unnecessary and would be impossible.

Paul Drazek, who is a senior trade adviser to the US Department of Agriculture, said "To separate or label these soybeans makes no scientific sense."

A number of German food producers, angry at having the altered beans forced on them, have warned the United States that they may switch to using rape oil rather than soya oil, or seek out European soya producers in preference to American ones.

Last week EuroCommerce, a group which represents food retailers and wholesalers in 20 countries, said that American farmers could risk losing their European markets if consumers decide to boycott soy products.