Sludge Watch ==> Dioxin Analysis - Exposure - Total Diet FDA

[maureen.reilly at sympatico.ca]

Sludgewatch Admin:

I have been watching Ontario farmfields get spread at massive applicaton 
rates with paper sludges from the Atlantic Packaging recyling mills.  The 
sludge is about at 3.4 PPT TEQ dioxins.

While that isn't a very high level of dioxin, it is much higher than the 
mean levels in Ontario's agricultural soils.  It is about 500 times higher.

The levels of dioxins in Toronto sewage sludge is as much as ten times 
higher than in the paper sludge.  but then, we've already noted that farmers 
essentially refuse to take Toronto sewage sludge....(a scant 6.9% is spread 
on farmland..the rest goes to landfill in Michigan).

I have heard sighs of complaint from the Canadian Food Inspection 
Agency...the group that oversee the sale of both animal feed and fertilizer 
in Canada. They say that the Ontario government keeps urging Ontario 
industries to 'recycle' their industrial waste as fertilizer and animal 
feed.

So the federal feed and fert officials have to daily take calls from pissed 
off industrial tycoons who have been led to believe that their poxy waste 
streams should be able to avoid waste disposal costs by calling their wastes 
'products'.

We saw it with Domtar Fine Papers (now closed may they rest in peace) who 
insisted that their dioxin laden sludge could be animal feed despite the 
fact that toilets in the plant were part of the sludge contents.  Domtar got 
quite hot about it when both their feed and fertilizer bids were thwarted by 
the requirement that they meet Canadian safety standards.  But still sending 
rendered animal meal to feed recycles the persistant toxic compounds into 
our food chain.  Look at the high levels of toxins in farmed fish if you 
want to see a stark comparison. The farmed fish with it pharm and rendering 
plant heavy feeds has dramatically higher levels of persistant organic 
pollutants (POPs).

Below is the report on dioxins in American food.  For cheap waste disposal, 
North America has chosen to compromise its health and the safety of its 
food.





.............................................................

Dioxin analysis results/exposure estimates -- Updated June 2006


03.jul.06
CFSAN/Office of Plant & Dairy Foods
United States Department of Agriculture


The complete document is available at: 
http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~lrd/dioxdata.html


Dioxin and chemically-related compounds (referred to collectively as 
dioxin-like compounds or DLCs) are a group of environmental contaminants 
found throughout the world. Studies have suggested that exposure to DLCs may 
lead to a variety of adverse health effects including reproductive and 
developmental problems, cardiovascular disease, increased diabetes, and 
increased cancer. Because DLCs tend to accumulate in the fat of 
food-producing animals, consumption of animal-derived foods (e.g., meat, 
poultry, eggs, fish, and dairy products) is considered to be the major route 
of human exposure to low levels of DLCs.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has been concerned about DLCs and has 
been monitoring food and animal feed with the goal of identifying ways to 
reduce dietary exposure to these ubiquitous environmental contaminants. In 
2000, FDA developed a strategy for DLCs. The purpose of FDA's dioxin 
strategy, which significantly expanded FDA's Dioxin Monitoring Program, is 
to develop the science to support appropriate risk management actions. 
Specific goals for FDA's Dioxin Monitoring Program are to obtain baseline 
data for DLC levels in food and animal feed ingredients susceptible to DLC 
contamination and to determine opportunities for DLC reduction by 
identifying contamination sources that can be eliminated or significantly 
reduced.
To obtain more general information on dioxin, see Questions and Answers 
about Dioxin. The Interagency Working Group on Dioxin (IWG) prepared the 
questions and answers. The Dioxin IWG is composed of U.S. federal agencies 
that address health, food, and the environment and are working together to 
ensure a coordinated federal approach to issues related to DLCs.
Dioxin Analysis of Total Diet Study Samples

As part of FDA's Dioxin Monitoring Program effort to obtain baseline data 
for DLCs, FDA analyzes food and feed for DLCs from both targeted sampling 
and food collected under its Total Diet Study (TDS). The TDS is FDA's 
ongoing market basket survey of approximately 280 core foods in the U.S. 
food supply to determine levels of various pesticides residues, 
contaminants, and nutrients in foods and to estimate exposures of these 
substances in representative diets of specific age-sex groups in the U.S. 
Four market baskets are generally collected each year, once in each of four 
geographic regions of the U.S. (i.e., West, North Central, South, and 
Northeast). For each market basket, food samples are collected from grocery 
stores and fast food restaurants in three cities within the region, prepared 
table-ready (i.e., as they would be consumed), and composited for analysis 
(See General notes about preparation of TDS foods prior to analysis). 
Therefore, each data point reported for a TDS food represents a composite of 
three samples of a table-ready (i.e., cooked, if required by TDS recipes) 
food type.

For more information see the Total Diet Study Overview.

FDA's Dioxin Monitoring Program analyzed selected TDS samples from one 
market basket each year in 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2004 to determine 
levels of polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxin (PCDD) and polychlorinated 
dibenzofuran (PCDF) congeners. Collection year and site for each market 
basket analyzed are listed in Table 1.