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Wednesday, February 11, 2004
Carcinogen fears rock RP seaweed industry
By Jessica B. Natad
THE country’s seaweed industry is now conducting meetings in anticipation of a crisis that will soon confront the global seaweed industry.
This, after studies conducted by a group under the Department of Health of Ireland suggested that carrageenan or processed seaweeds contain semicarbazide (SEM), a substance reported to be carcinogenic.
According to Seaweed Industry Association of the Philippines (Siap) international consultant Harris Bixler, the country’s seaweed industry must not wait for the European Commission (EC) to formally declare carrageenan carcinogenic and ban the product from entering the European market.
“We don’t have a life-threatening situation. But before the problem faces the industry, before the EC issues a directive, we must be ready. Siap will face the problem head on,” he told the press after his meeting with Siap board members at the Montebello Villa Hotel Monday.
Siap president Benson Dakay said this issue will have a negative impact on the country’s seaweed industry, which is one of the country’s dollar earners.
Exports
Some 30 percent of the country’s total carrageenan exports go to the European market, he said.
Bixler said the issue of carrageenan containing SEM surfaced after the group from Ireland discovered, after testing, that poultry imports from Thailand contain SEM.
In the group’s attempt to trace the origin of the substance, the group found out that Thailand uses seaweeds to feed its chicken.
This brought carrageenan, a gum extracted from seaweeds, into the limelight, Bixler said.
Carrageenan is used as stabilizer for products such as pet food, meat, ice cream, milk, health and oral care products and pharmaceutical products.
Bixler said seaweed itself does not contain SEM. The substance develops after the protein in seaweeds reacts with the chemicals used in the process, especially during the bleaching process, of refining seaweed into carrageenan.
Bixler encouraged seaweed processors in the country to conduct experiments to find
out if eliminating the bleaching process will affect the quality of carrageenan.
He said the Marinal, an international organization of seaweed processors, is also conducting its own studies.
Siap press relations officer Pete Borja said Siap will ask the help of the government in facing the crisis.
He also said Siap will pass a policy that will mandate its members to minimize, if not get rid of, the bleaching process to assure the international market of the safety of Philippine carrageenan.
(February 11, 2004 issue)
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