9 Nasty Truths About Your Favorite Foods
Famous Death Row Last Meals
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| New laser labels. Photo: ARS/USDA. |
The FDA is expected to approve laser-etching of fruits and vegetables in the next month or so, paving the way for produce "tattooed" with product information to hit store shelves, an official with the USDA tells Slashfood.
"We figure maybe next month or the month after it will get FDA approval," says Jan Narciso, a research microbiologist with the USDA's Citrus and Subtropical Products Laboratory in Winter Haven, Fla.
But will these new labels affect the taste of your fruits and vegetables?
"Not at all," Narciso says. The laser beam penetrates the outer layer of the fruit or vegetable's cells, exposing a bit of the pith. "What this does is just penetrates the few cells of that colored layer and exposes the underlying layer. So it doesn't go anywhere near the part of the fruit that you eat. It's just on the peel."
To make sure the technology was safe, Narciso's lab tested it on foods painted with pathogens and disease organisms to see if they would infect fruit that had been labeled with lasers; they didn't. The laser "zaps the tissue, and it makes kind of like a callus, so that nothing gets through there," she says. "It's really very, very clean, and you can eat it."
The technology was invented by Greg Drouillard, the director of research technology for laser development for Sunkist Growers Inc., in Sherman Oaks, Calif., according to the Packer, a trade publication for the packing industry. Time called it one of the best inventions of 2005.
"It can print anything," Drouillard tells the Packer. "The criteria of what determines what you're printing are how fast the product is moving on the packing line and how big the product is. How much of the tomato do you want to cover with information?"
Narciso says their tests of the technology shows that it can print on just about any fruit and vegetable.
"We determined you can use them on just about anything except leafy greens, which we don't stick labels on anyway," she says.
The new labels could hit shelves as early as late autumn.
What do you think of the new labels? Let us know in the comments below.
| Yes. | |
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| Not sure. | |
| No way! |
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9-13-2009 @2:06AM Amber said... I think most of you need to take a chill pill about this. If you don't like it, don't buy it. Gosh, that was simple, wasn't it?
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9-14-2009 @6:12AM Rich said... Why can I imagine in three years, a headline stating "Laser Printing On Produce Causes Cancer".....
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9-14-2009 @7:41AM Joe P. said... It seems like a waste of time and money unless it has uses other than what is described in this article.
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9-14-2009 @4:01PM El said... We thought homosexuality was unnatural. At least that's found in nature. Tattooed food isn't.
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9-14-2009 @9:03AM Berwyn Rob said... It's about time!
I thought of this idea a year ago but instead of using a laser, the labeling should be printed on with a laser jet printer using tinted biodegradable food "soap." That way the produce can be dampened then cleaned with the "soap." This eliminates those pesky paper labels AND the markings are gone after the produce is washed.
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9-14-2009 @8:49AM Jo said... It's just a way to track the fruit/vegetables. Putting a permanent code on them makes it easier to recall if there is tainted food. They're doing this to be more efficient at recalls and all you people are doing is bitching. I hope you all get infected with E. Coli.
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9-14-2009 @9:19AM Susan said... I think that some foods, such as apples and tomatoes, should not have this laser done to them. Other food, that we do not eat the skin on, would be all right to tatoo.
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9-14-2009 @9:33AM Richard said... Someone mentioned eating apples with the skin on. I did this until I worked at an apple packing company for a few months. The owners ALWAYS peeled their apples and then I noticed that after ever rain the orchards were sprayed by men wearing SCUBA gear. My favorites are peaches and strawberries two of the top ten polluted fruits, so I peel peaches after a good washing and wash the berries several times with running water. And for the gentleman who advocates a micro-chip insertion for identification (the so called 'tattoo' mentioned by someone reading a very modern hip Bible - the original said "a mark IN the forehead or In the hand" not ON as a tattoo would be) well I have helped build transistors so small they were invisible to the naked eye. Once this future identification system is in place all people can be tracked everywhere. Incidentally early indications are this RFID chip causes cancer in some dogs and I suppose it will in some humans too. No, the future ain't what it used to be, as Yogi Berra once said.
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9-14-2009 @9:39AM Cookie said... I'm concerned that peppers, peaches, etc will have a much shorter time before they become too ripe.
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9-14-2009 @10:03AM Norman Palosky said... "So it doesn't go anywhere near the part of the fruit that you eat. It's just on the peel."
How many of you peel nectarines, plums, dinosaur eggs, grapes, tomatoes (for slices)? Give us a break. I don't know if this is dangerous or not, but I know dumb marketing statements when I see them!
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9-14-2009 @10:14AM Lyn said... Mim Song..thank you! I needed that! :-D
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9-14-2009 @10:20AM Fritzv said... How long will it be before they start etching ads on my food?
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9-14-2009 @11:03AM Ginger said... Lisa,
Just where in the bible does it talk about our vehicles?
Get a grip!
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9-14-2009 @10:28AM Louise said... And in no time at all we'll see commercials: "Enjoy the fresh taste of this TOMATO in a jumbo squeeze bottle of farm-fresh Heinz ketchup!" Are there really that many people who can't identify common fruits and vegetables????
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9-14-2009 @10:29AM uurs said... we should tattoo our diplomats and trillionaires so when they die we can get a free party sent to us to rejoice..!
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9-14-2009 @11:02AM Ginger said... Thank you!
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9-14-2009 @11:03AM Reanna said... What a waste of money and time.
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9-14-2009 @11:04AM Reanna said... thats awesome- you're right.
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9-14-2009 @12:47PM Diane said... I will stick to shopping at Whole Foods for the next 10 or so years until they find our the side effects.
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9-14-2009 @1:15PM Ian said... As long as they include the product code so they can be rung up at the U-Scan lane without having to go through the list, I'm all for it! Maybe the technology will be there so they can actually bar-code them eventually!
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