I recently found out that someone I know is allergic to soy, and apparently soy is in many many things. So, out of curiosity, I started reading labels myself, and it turns out soy is in many many things. But the most annoying thing I discovered was "soybean and/or canola oil". I've seen this on multiple products, and it must be so annoying for people with allergies! Basically they're saying "this product may or may not contain the thing you're allergic to."
But how does this even happen? How does it even occur to someone to not use the same ingredients every time when mass-producing food? And what circumstances lead them to have to change oils so frequently and unpredictably that they can't change labels at the same time?
6 comments:
They want to keep their options open. You see it in country of origin labeling also, especially when it comes to orange juice. "from US and/or Mexico and/or Brazil" etc. I'm guessing the prices of these two particular commodities have a way of crossing each other on the graph. I don't know how much money keeping their options open saves them, but every time increased disclosure requirements come up, Big Food argues that changing food labels, and meeting food labeling requirements is redonkulously expensive. Part of the game, I assume, you're breaking Eric Cartman's balls, etc. Things they should invent: Internet as way to deliver information that used to be on product labels. Punch in the lot number and get ingredients list for that batch. They'd probably fight that tooth and nail too. Information is power, my friend.
Food regulations give producers the right to label either/or, then use whichever is less expensive at the time of production.
I've never seen this done with country of origin.
I can see country of origin varying because of different growing seasons, but I'd be very surprised that the relative prices of different oils vary so much that they have to keep switching for short periods and on short notice.
I don't pay much attention to country of origin labelling, but I did one see a product labelled with something like:
Italian Capers
Product of Pakistan
Made in Taiwan
(They probably weren't capers and I don't remember what the countries were, but that's the general idea.)
Just today at the dupermarket I saw Atlantic salmon from Chile. A few weeks ago on Headlines, Jay Leno displayed package art for Atlantic salmon from Washington state. Josie told me Atlantic refers to the species, not the habitat.
If laura's still in the room, I got a peace'n'justice question: Is it ethical to buy bananas from Guatemala? Is it ethical to buy bananas at all? I usually buy if from either Ecuador or Costa Rica (seems only organic bananas are grown in Ecuador, at least for USA market), otherwise, yes, I have no bananas.
Lorraine, unfortunately I know very little about the ethics of fruit from specific countries.
I know that most farm workers are treated like shit, and that the US once invaded Guatemala and took over the country for US Fruit Corp. But I don't know the current state of agriculture there. I'm sorry about that (for myself as much as because I can't help you).
Imp, apparently the pricing on these oils changes quite a lot. The difference might be pennies per pound, but they're making these products by the hundreds of tonnes.
Which oil they use might also fluctuate based on labour conditions or political turmoil. If people are (eg) fighting back against forest destruction, companies can simply buy oil elsewhere.
Re country of origin, one of the only (maybe the only?) good things the Harper Govt has done is tighten up food labelling, so now we see "produced in Canada with important components" or "product of China, processed in Canada".
When we were in Newfoundland in 2008, we saw a former fish processing plant that now handles only the final boxing of fish from China. Until very recently, that company still enjoyed the marketing benefits of the "made in Canada" label. Supposedly that has ended - although the labelling is very small, and consumers have to be taught how to decipher it.
US Fruit Corp
* United Fruit Company
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