FOOD ADDITIVES:
Finch Outlines Options Food additive makers had barely begun digesting the contents of "The Chemical Feast"—Nader's Raiders' scorching indictment of the Food and Ding Administration's regulation of the food industry—when the Government served up two regulatory dishes for industry action and comment. In one step considered before (but published after) release of the Nader report (C&EN, April 13, page 8) FDA revoked informal status opinions on certain food "additives" not on the GRAS (Generally Regarded as Safe) list or subject to specific rulings. Then H E W Secretary Robert Finch spelled out six "options" dealing with the controversial Delaney clause. Basically, FDA's revocation order seeks to inventory and update informal opinions "in the light of current scientific information and current principles for evaluation of the safety of food additives." More sweeping in its potential impact is revision of the Delaney clause. Judging from Secretary Finch's remarks, some options carry more weight than others. One would retain the clause and deal administratively with carcinogens that unavoidably get into food. But Secretary Finch suggests that as in the cyclamates case, this would lead to a "succession of crises and crash decisions." Another option would broaden and strengthen the clause to cover irreversible effects such as liver, brain, and birth defects with tolerance levels on foods set for "compelling reasons." A third option would apply the principle of the Delaney clause to both food additives and natural substances, recognize that certain carcinogens are unavoidable and some essential to human health and nutrition, and conC&EN:
Fred H. Zerkel
HEW's Finch Issues revocation order 12 C&EN APRIL 20, 1970
vene expert panels for advice. Yet this, like the second option, entails the difficulty scientists now have in setting precise levels above which teratogenesis and mutagenesis will occur. Under a fourth option, additives would get approval for a limited time. This approach, Secretary Finch said, would "maximize the opportunity for controlled testing" but would have "serious disadvantages," such as the difficulty in precisely measuring the effects of any new additive and the danger that interim approval could lead to widespread human use before animal testing is complete. Secretary Finch's fifth option would require proving an additive useful to the public before approving its use. But the Secretary pointed out that Congress rejected this approach in 1958 and he questions whether any government agency can make such judgments apart from the collective judgment of the food producing industries and scientific community. The Secretary's sixth option involves legally or administratively determined periodic reviews of test procedures—an updating of minimum standards to establish food additive safety. But he notes that it gets into the area of "no accepted minimum standards for animal testing."
POLLUTION:
Industry Advises Nixon If the Nixon Administration fails to cure environmental ills, it will not be from a lack of Presidential councils. Yet another council chock full of advisers, a National Industrial Pollution Control Council (NIPCC), set about organizational chores in Washington last week, just five days after the President signed an executive order creating it. NIPCC, made up of 53 industry executives, joins an already existing Cabinet-level Environmental Quality Council, Citizens Advisory Committee on Environmental Quality, Council on Environmental Quality, and Office of Environmental Quality. Under the President's executive order, the new council's activities include surveying and evaluating industry plans and actions on environmental quality, identifying and examining effects of industrial practices on the environment, encouraging industry to improve environmental quality, and recommending solutions to environmental problems. The council also provides a sort of in-house sounding board for the Administration to measure industry commitment to cleaning up the environment. The new council, Commerce Secretary Maurice S tans said at a White
3M's Cross Discussion and interaction
House press conference earlier this month, is to draw together the talents of the business community to deal with pollution problems as well as to enlist the help of major corporations. The Administration has indeed drawn top-drawer talent to man the council. For instance, Bert S. Cross, 64, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of 3M, is chairman of the new council. Other council members include Union Carbide's Birney Mason, Jr., Monsanto's Charles H. Sommer, American Cyanamid's Clifford D. Siverd, Chemagro's Herbert Tomasek, PPG Industries' Robinson F. Barker, B. F. Goodrich's J. Ward Keener, Goodyear *s Russell DeYoung, Atlantic-Richfield's Robert O. Anderson, Standard Oil's (N.J.) J. K. Jamieson, FMC's Paul L. Davies, and Swift and Co. s Robert W. Reneker. Secretary Stans said that NIPCC had divided into 29 subcouncils—one for each industry grouping having a significant interest in pollution problems. Included are subcouncils on chemicals, fertilizers and agricultural chemicals, and detergents. Will the council mesh with the various advisory groups already set up? NIPCC chairman Cross apparently thinks so, but it will "take a lot of discussion" and "interaction."
ENVIRONMENT:
Plethora of Bills Just as the White House does not appear to be lacking in environmental advisers, Congress, living up to its Constitutional mandate, is not experiencing any paucity of legislative proposals on environmental matters. When Sen. Edmund S. Muskie (D.-
THE CHEMICAL WORLD THIS WEEK
the capability to analyze "scientifically and objectively" legislative and operational environmental proposals. Rep. Hogan's ecological college would not have a campus. Students would attend short-term seminars in ecology, environmental studies, and related fields under federal grants at existing schools.
CHEMICAL EXPORTS:
Japan Is Major Market
Sen. Muskie No paucity of legislation
Me.) gavels the opening of Senate Subcommittee on Air and Water Pollution hearings on water pollution this week, for instance, the subcommittee will have in hand at least a dozen different proposals on what to do about cleaning up the nation's waters. Included are Administration water pollution control bills, S. 3470, S. 3471, and S. 3472, part of a fistful of environmental measures introduced by Senate Minority Leader Hugh Scott (R.-Pa.) in mid-February; Sen. Muskie's National Water Quality Standards Act of 1970, S. 3687; and other measures, such as Sen. Walter Monday's (D.-Minn. ) Clean Lakes Act of 1970, S. 3697. The Muskie and Mondale bills have been referred to the subcommittee in recent days. Sen. Muskie's measure would broaden the coverage of the water quality standards program, toughen enforcement of standards, and double federal funding for construction of waste treatment facilities. Sen. Mondale's bill includes provisions that would increase federal grants for waste treatment works near lakes and provide measures to enforce water quality standards for lakes. House members are also getting in on the environmental action. Rep. John Dingell (D.-Mich. ) has introduced H.R. 16848, which would establish a national environmental information bank within the Smithsonian Institution. Rep. Lawrence Hogan (R.-Md.), meanwhile, calls for creating a National College of Ecological and Environmental Studies administered by the National Science Foundation in H.R. 16847. Rep. Dingell's information bank would serve as a central depository for environmental data. It would have
Although the current hassle over textile imports has put a strain on JapanU.S. relations, the fact remains that Japan continues to be a major customer for U.S. chemicals. The Japanese market for U.S. chemicals, up 25% to a value of $304 million in 1969, will likely grow substantially again this year, according to Nelson A. Stitt, director of the U.S.-Japan Trade Council. Today the Japanese chemical industry is the Free World's second largest, surpassing that of West Germany. Japanese exporters have built up a considerable business in the U.S., too, but the trade balance in chemicals has been widening in favor of the U.S. Although U.S. imports of chemicals from Japan climbed from $70 million in 1967 to $161 million last year, the trade surplus increased from $157 million to $183 million. The gap will probably widen even more in 1970, as "the Japanese economy is expected to grow by 12% while American economic growth has been tapering off," Mr. Stitt says. Inorganic chemicals are the biggest single factor in the surplus. U.S. exports of these chemicals to Japan climbed from $18 million in 1967 to $62 million in 1969, while imports went from $14 million to $22 million to give the U.S. a positive balance of $40 million in inorganic chemical trading. Major items among these exports have been mercury compounds, aluminum oxide, and carbon black. Exports of organic chemicals to Japan were $67 million last year, up from $65 million in 1968. Japan's import market for organic chemicals has grown markedly, particularly for cyclohexane, p-xylene, and dimethyl terephthalate used in making synthetic fibers. In recent years the U.S. has been Japan's major source of glycerine. In spite of tough competition from European drug makers, U.S. exports of pharmaceuticals to Japan have gone up steadily—from $16 million in 1967 to $22 million in 1968 to $30 million last year. Conversely, imports from Japan were only $5 million in 1969.
Other groups of chemicals which the U.S. is exporting to Japan in significant quantities are fertilizers, plastics, and pigments. Exports of fertilizer, primarily potash, have been $12 to $15 million annually over the past three years. Japan is the U.S.'s biggest overseas customer for potash. Exports of plastics are currently $32 to $34 million per year. The U.S. has been the leading supplier of plastics to Japan, with thermoplastics and silicones the biggest items. Pigment and paint exports to Japan were $9 million in both 1968 and 1969, says Mr. Stitt. Again the U.S. has been the top supplier of these materials. The big item has been synthetic resin paints.
SCIENCE SUPPORT:
Handler for Redesign In terms as brisk as the wind and rain outside the convention hall, National Academy of Sciences president Philip Handler called on thousands of life scientists last week to redouble their own public defense and to call for a redesign of federal agencies supporting science. Dr. Handler's remarks were part of the keynote speech at the annual meeting of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology in Atlantic City. Narrowing the present choices considerably since his initial thoughts on science policy as NAS president last year (C&EN, June 30, 1969, page 2 4 ) , Dr. Handler x-rayed the body of science, found scientists themselves guilty for part of the malaise, urged immediate letters to Congressmen, and mapped out a reordering of federal science support based on a new federal agency for research and higher education. Since fiscal 1968, Dr. Handler states, reduction in scientific effort or capability from budgetary restraint has been of the order of 25%. Although Vietnam-related pressures have been partly to blame, a more important cause has been "the growing disenchantment with science and what it has wrought . . . the most painful aspect of our current circumstance is the fact that, in considerable measure, we have generated it ourselves," Dr. Handler said. This self-infliction has taken several forms. First, Dr. Handler notes, the public's growing environmental concern stems largely from alarms sounded by professional biologists. Another part of the trouble stems from the habit of selling science to public sponsors not on its own merits but as part of the budget of mission-oriented agencies. Yet another problem is a serious conflict of interest, in which APRIL 20, 1970 C&EN
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