Unite in Purchaser Power for Human and Animal Welfare and Health. Read Labels. Choose Critically. Waving Cheque and Card with Credit Within the Shop and Store Unfurls the Banner of Overdue Reform.

If a good wine needs no bush, a good whisky or beer surely needs no—albeit “safety-tested”- colorants to tart it up. Artificial additives are used widely in various hues to alter the appearance, flavor and texture of many foods and beverages, as well as pet-foods (in some cases for the satisfaction of owners rather than for the preferences of the animals), and in the formulations of pharmaceuticals. Indirect effects may be exerted by substances added to feeds so that the flesh of fish or the yolks of eggs accord with commercial perceptions of market demand. Some of these additives find use with the FD and C numbers in toiletries and household goods and — perhaps in a purer form — with E-numbers in the food industry.

Food production is part of the industries in which health and safety at work regulations apply and the modern farm’s equipment includes stores of chemical pesticides, growth boosters, and drugs in a veritable laboratory store of potential mischief to consumers of crops and feeds and of harm to the ecology and environment. “Scares” over foodstuffs, beverages, and water supplies have intensified calls for tests to establish the safety of these substances and practices and their corollaries. Live animals are the victims in these experiments “for non-medical purposes.”

It was mainly veggie campaigners who instigated actions to oust the use of leather, furs, and wool for clothing and footwear and of dubious ingredients and tests used for commercial toiletries and household goods. The pioneering efforts of Beauty Without Cruelty led to increasing momentum as Body Shop reinforced the campaign ultimately to almost general sales as supermarkets and major factors, including the press and the fashion industry itself, espoused these aspects of the cruelty-free cause. In those early days veggies could enjoy offerings of toiletries fit to eat and the campaigners succeeded in budging an obstinately secretive industry and stodgy governments into disclosures on labels of the ingredients in the formulations. It is difficult to believe now that bans on testing with animals of ingredients intended for cosmetic purposes or of final formulations are being implemented or introduced in the UK and in European countries; however, these restrictions don’t apply to imported products. The momentum that drove those campaigns must now roll on to eliminate similar cosmetic tricks in the bigger and more important industry selling us our food and drink.

The band of veggie campaigners plotting in the offices of the Vegetarian Society perceived objections to the array of cosmetic food additives with E numbers that were earning disquiet over putative ill-effects on consumers’ health and behavior. Tests on animals were many and troublesome in various ways. No scientific or medical purposes could be adduced for them: the additives could be omitted, they served only a commercial end to market meretriciously cheap food and beverages, and they entailed avoidable and offensive tests on animals. Here was another challenge to the forces of the cruelty-free world. We didn’t duck it.

Tricks with Caramel

Caramels focussed our attention. Caramelization has for years been a mainstay of the cook’s chemical wizardry. Not for nothing are cooking and confectionery generic words in English for the preparation of foods and meals even when they arrive on the table from the kitchen serving raw foods. Chemical changes well beyond the analysis of white-coated scientists and technicians have gone unremarked in many cuisines, and have probably been acknowledged as a means of overcoming threats of bacterial and viral contaminations arising from unhygienic practices while retaining or developing acceptable tastes and textures. Grandparents of today may recall delights they were expected as children to esteem, among them “milk pure and white and warm from the cow.” Tuberculosis and memories of school milk with clots and rapid development of a sour, off-white “nose” changed all that: pasteurization, sterilization, UHT, evaporation, and condensing were accepted with, ultimately, little demur (and even by a compulsory ban in Scotland and health warnings on commercial sales of milk in England and Wales); the chemical significances of the processing (which could be more drastic than irradiation) drew complaints only on “cardboardy” taints, and the dairy-industry managed to alter concepts of the milk of human blindness by doorstep deliveries almost at sunrise and latterly cooler still from the chiller or fridge in the supermarket or shop. However, somewhere along the line distancing bottle and carton from the cow’s warm udder heat-processing and the corresponding chemical reactions had been introduced—and as recently remarked by the Food Standards Agency, inadequately—to overcome the transmission of dangerous microorganisms as a result of unhygienic and unsavoury practices on the farm and dairy.

Those grandparents knew caramel as a confection made in the kitchen in a saucepan (“a brown color by heating sugar above its melting point; permitted additive to foods. Also known as Black Jack,” according to a Dictionary of Nutrition and Food Technology). Sugar was taken to mean sucrose from cane or beet, in some form. In general brown was a coloring that enhanced a food, bestowing a sense of warmth and good cooking, although the context had to be judged carefully to avoid associations with waste products. A sludgy brown windsor soup would not feature among the prime offerings of today’s supermarkets or restaurants, and no health-professional nowadays would treat patients, as subjects on the panel suffered before the NHS, with dispensed Saccharum Ustum — burnt sugar — for complaints the doctor could only describe as God-knows. For years and years caramel, varied in preparation and composition as it was, passed like many of the processes of cooking and food technology — as “safe” and, at least, “harmless.”

Whatever variations might be perceived in the contents of hot granny-saucepans, food technology demanded greater versatility from such starting materials, extending the range of hues and developing other properties, such as the effects on textures of manufactured foods and beverages. Growers of sugar-producing crops and, more generally, of suitable pentoses and dextroses obtainable from other starchy waste-products also took note of possibilities from further browning effects visible in the chemistry conducted in the oven or under the grill rather than over the bunsen burner.

Color Without Cruelty

Reactions between sugars and nitrogenous substances such as proteins yield so-called Maillard compounds, which are usually brown and confer colorings associated with attractive foods from toffee to sauces and from ales, stouts, beers, porters, and lagers to bakery, meat and vegetable products. Ammonia and urea are the cheapest sources of nitrogenous compounds, and their addition to the heated sugars augmented the utility of “simple” caramels, but took the food-technology into the realms of heterocyclic chemistry and even more deeply, when additions of ammonium sulfite complicated matters of analysis and possibly adverse effects, such as toxicity, even more. The chemist could perceive likenesses with some heterocyclic compounds associated with the carcinogenicity of smouldering tobacco and of overcooked and barbecued meat (actually, some tobacco is colored with artificial caramels).

The simple, complacent allocation of food-additive number E150 to caramel had become inadequate and 4 or 5 sub-categories were defined. Analysts and toxicologists set to work and food technologists experimented with variations to avoid problems with neurotoxins in the “chemicalized” and “ammoniated” caramels that stayed approval by the authorities of the use of new forms, notwithstanding the food industry’s impatience to incorporate them in a wide range of comestibles and pet foods. These tests involved a number of procedures on rats and mice. One set of tests was considered invalidated because adverse effects on the rats were attributed to deficiency of vitamin B6 in their diets.

Palate and Palette

Manufacturers and retailers exploit the caramels, like other synthetic colorings, to impart standard attractive hues to products with “naturally” brown (or other) colors and tints such as soft drinks, soups, sauces, beers, pies, yeast extracts, and spirits. Retailers demand the additives for cosmetic reasons to allay any consumers’ misgivings of even minor batch-to-batch variations, especially if these can be noticed by easy comparisons in stock displayed on the shelf or obvious in collections in the kitchen cupboard. For some materials variations may be disguised by the material of the container or, if it is glass, by the coloring of the bottle, as for beers. Spirits sold in clear bottles are tinted with caramels to the distiller’s or vendor’s standard on the color chart; this practice is applied even for noble whiskeys.

All this panders to a dedication to uniformity and obliteration of what a discerning customer would accommodate in choices of naturally-derived products. For beers, wines, and spirits exemptions in the labelling regulations in the UK permit sales with no descriptions of the ingredients and processing aids used in manufacture, and merchants persist in taking advantage of a loophole that is due for early closure (but belated) to satisfy EU regulations. This practice of disguise is not new in other applications: white sugar was sold in cartons and bags colored blue to conceal traces of brownness remaining from incomplete refining, and in the days before detergents were formulated with optical whiteners clothes were rinsed with water containing blue bags to enhance whiteness and overcome dinginess when the soap had failed to restore pristine brightness.

Scrutiny, Labels, Choice

Discerning shoppers can generally make choices, scrutinizing labels; many would avoid luridly-colored soft-drinks anyway. There are yeast-extracts to be had without added caramels, as well as some veggie alternative “meat”-products. In some supermarkets the refreshing own-brand summer ginger beer comes with added caramel, but maybe not market leaders that don’t stoop to such tricks. Some meat-products are extended with textured vegetable protein and colored with caramels to add to the many other plow-to-plate objections that might be levelled at these commodities.

Some years ago Marks and Spencer put on sale tinned peas without artificial colorings (which would have undergone tests of toxicity, just as the caramels have). The hue of tinned peas and of many served in restaurants was — and still is — achieved in the main by additions of two coal-tar dye-stuffs, one blue, the other yellow, to override the dingy greens from unadulterated food preparation. The experiment was a commercial failure: probably it was before its time, the likely customers were not adequately informed and inspired, animal welfarists intent on campaigns over what can only be rated as frivolous testing of cosmetic effects in toiletries missed an opportunity and, anyway, many of the shoppers with scruples bought fresh peas or frozen. However, this example has not been forgotten: Sainsbury have introduced mushy peas with no cosmetic tarting up, in defiance of the lurid competition in other supermarkets, branded versions, and in chippies. VEGA recently sent back a vividly dyed chana masala in a Brummy balti, because the cook had obviously added liberally to nature’s palette with “permitted” (i.e. tested on animals) E numbers from the chemistry laboratory. This is a not uncommon coloring exuberance.

Chemical Caramels Color the Cola

Manufacturers and retailers of cola drinks were the main driving force behind the preparation and testing of chemicalized caramels. In the British Isles a factory making the colorings fed straight into the cola plant. Hardly any commercial brand of cola drinks now on sale in Britain doesn’t contain chemicalized caramels—and in gram quantities in average consumption by children: they would be consuming continuously quantities comparable to intakes of drugs administered under supervision (for adverse effects) and for occasional and short courses. The authorities’ anxieties have understandably prompted recourse to much testing on animals, and some restrictions on foods and beverages intended for babies and toddlers (not necessarily excluding some intakes of adult versions) have been applied. The caffeine and sugar and acidity contents are further causes for concern.

Notwithstanding the fatuous testing on animals for the safety of these cosmetic nutrients, doubts over adverse reactions and hyperactivity and behavioral disturbances linger. E numbers in general have acquired a bad reputation : some labels evade the opprobrium by disclosing only apparently less offensive descriptions, of which caramel is, misleadingly, one.

When the protracted experimentation and delays over acceptance of the caramels in their various versions had come to a head, vegetarian campaigners—who were motivated by imperatives of both human and animal welfare—sought to rally support from various interests who would recognize that testing for cosmetic tricks in foodstuffs was as deplorable—or even more so—than similar practices involved in and behind the toiletries industry and provoking growing reaction expressed by the entry of cruelty-frees and beauty-without-cruelty in the market. These are issues on which the power of the purchaser and leverage on retailers can demonstrate most effectively the extent of public disgust, prompt reform, and engage even the costive scientific establishment in efforts at disengagement from embarrassing involvement in experimentation for non-medical products and avoidable commercial purposes.

Veggie Might E150 OUT

The veggie campaigners pursuing Green Plan ploys had the confidence that the “lostest cause since the flat earth” (a dismissal once published in the Sunday Times) could be turned into a success like the planners’ Campaign for Real Bread (CAMREB), which had mobilized a great body of support and, a little later, such enthusiasm from the Sunday Times that it more or less appropriated CAMREB for its own. This was a time when Beauty Without Cruelty was enjoying appreciable success and influence, and a vehicle for promotion of a campaign to do for foodstuffs what BWC and Body Shop and various animal welfare organizations were doing was offered in the year when the car with the number-plate E150 OUT would carry a message to stir animal welfarists, foodies, and critics of junk-foods into concerted and redoubled endeavor in the common good.

VEGA urges exercise of purchasing power augmented by critical communication with manufacturers and retailers, awarding praise and complaint as appropriate. Tell us too of the results, please.

Blatant withdrawal of custom works. Coca Cola’s attractions are waning in the USA, and Sunny Delight and its presentation have faltered in the UK. Purchaser-power means meeting with a closed purse the lures of the soft-drinks industry and other advertisers who shamelessly aim their temptations at children and stimulate the consequent pester-power on parents.

Unfortunately the Vegetarian Society’s establishment was rock solid, full stop. Doubts over the origins of soaps in the cloak rooms and kitchens were matched by the certainty of Coke and Pepsi prominent in the offices—the very embodiment of the devil in beverages in the style of the McDonaldization of the High Street, then and still. Many organizations share VEGA’s objections to these harmful agencies and particularly their corruption of children’s appreciation of food and drink, and thus of their parents’ concern. At the moment the Dairy Council regards soft-drinks as offering competition more significant than the nutritionally-preferable cruelty-free drinks at last making their mark in the trade in beverages.

Color of the Tests

So is it too late to visit the issue again? The Research Defence Society’s appraisal of the Home Office’s latest statistics (for the year 2000) on the research and testing of laboratory animals reports that 6% of the 2.7 million scientific procedures carried out in Great Britain were for safety-testing of non-medical products used in the home, agriculture, and industry (none for cosmetics or toiletries after 1998). The rest comprise the claimed purposes shown here and statistics from Switzerland can be seen here.

These data apply only to the UK and ignore tests done elsewhere for substances sold and consumed in the UK. Most of the procedures were performed on rats, mice, and fish, which are hardly representative of the major consumption of food for human beings or their pets. Scientists like, in their cool and objective way, to persuade the lay public that at least few experiments are performed on animals such as the usual pets, horses, farm species, or primates, although no refereed publications on comparative readings on standardized painometers are adduced (VEGA has gone so far as to remind the Farm Animal Welfare Council of its responsibilities in the destruction of the commensals in modern agriculture—vermin such as rodents, foxes, badgers, and birds, whose expressions of natural instincts put them beyond the pale for compassionate treatment by scientists and by the great and good in the dominance of human affairs; even then, the Geneva Convention was recognized to accord respect and freedom from torture to the vanquished enemy in war).

FRS - Follower of Received Sophistry?

Scientists pose as arbiters on ethical issues and, then, when the challenge gets tense, abdicate these responsibilities to politicians, whose decisions they are wont nonetheless to deride. The present controversy over hunting illustrates these shifts and dilemmas; worse, on the basis of one bad turn deserves another, scientists can be found excusing almost any assault on the animal kingdom by mentioning the relentless exploitation in providing food and clothing. The kind and merciful reaction from them would be vigorous response in the form of disengagement, example, and search for alternatives. Many esteemed scientific advances entail humiliatingly crude practices and tardy recognition of misgivings that the unscientific are trying to communicate. The leverage that the likes of us can bring to bear on the competitive and enterprising markets offer opportunities as never before, if only the radicals and reformers demonstrate in the supermarket and at the tills that they scrutinize labels and open their purses cannily. Scientists are now content with changes in the testing of cosmetics and toiletries, where only a few decades ago they were contemptuous and dismissive. The trend in searches for alternatives must capture their energy and example ever more powerfully.

The 6,000 scientific procedures for the year 2000 compare with nearly 11,000 in 1991, the decline being bumpy, but with an increase of about 16% in the last year. However, this figure for 2000 is nearly double the toll for procedures 10 years before for cosmetics and toiletries. If that fomenting campaign finally ousted testing in the UK to allay objections to offensive practices and products, a campaign bids fair to succeed in ridding foods and beverages of unnecessary ingredients with an undue flavor of evil. Let's agitate for it!

Manifest victory in this campaign will strengthen the resolve in coping with demands from a body of consumers in the UK and Europe generally expecting assurances of safety on the consumption of foods and many household goods and conniving at the increase of testing that organizations such as the Food Standards Agency and Ministries will feel obliged to meet. (In the Irish Republic the FSA is actually defined as a Food Safety Agency, and the European Food Safety Authority has recently come into being). Misunderstandings over the value of such tests and connivance over the unnecessary cruelties are factors commissioning bureaucrats may blink in forms of dubious political protection. This is a trend that we hope a well-versed commercially effective population of customers can influence in a kindly and persuasive way.

Alternatives

If in doubt, leave it out: the market is rich with alternatives to ingredients and practices of ill repute. Advances in biological sciences now offer refinements that can replace experiments on live animals. These are used already in the pharmaceutical industry to screen collections of substances with potential therapeutic value: lack of toxicity to a battery of 30 or so essential and carefully chosen enzymes denotes substantial safety and is probably of higher validity than interpretations of results on other living species in other circumstances than would be apt for human consumers and users.

Effective participation in this campaign will demand well-publicized abstention from cola drinks, for which untainted cruelty-free alternatives are few. This boycott and sacrifice will manifest to the food and catering industries that purchasing power in the interests of human and animal welfare and health is a force they must recognize and can profitably serve. Let's drink to that, and appropriately encourage producers who demonstrate the desirable possibilities!

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