Activists have expressed alarm at a growing push by the food industry to hide new enzymes in everyday food products.
Australia’s food regulator, Food Standards Australia New Zealand, is currently considering an industry application to use a new protein-glutaminase to process food.
The enzyme has been used abroad to process proteins, including in “fish-and meat-derived foods”, bread, certain drinks, tofu, noodles, and cheese.
The regulator says the enzyme is to be used in food processing only – to improve emulsification, foam stabilisation and gelling – and would simply not function in the final product that Australians consume.
But critics say the enzyme is a flavour enhancer in disguise, and have raised concerns that the industry is attempting to circumvent requirements to list it on the labels of food products.
Flavour enhancers would generally be listed on the labels of food products.
But this enzyme, because it is only being considered as a “processing aid”, would not.
The food industry, in its application to Australian regulators, made no reference to flavour enhancing properties.
But the same enzyme is described to the United States Food and Drug Administration as a flavour enhancer.
A petition started by the consumer-led Food Intolerance Network has now attracted more than 6,000 signatures in opposition to the new enzyme.
Howard Dengate, a food technologist-turned activist, is leading the charge. He said the latest application was part of a broader trend by the food industry to hide the contents of food from consumers by using the “processing aid” distinction.
“I don’t object to the enzyme, I’ve not objected to the last 10 enzymes that they’ve used as processing aids,” Dengate said.
“But I do object to the fact that they won’t tell us.”
He raised concerns the enzyme could cause adverse reactions in humans, but Fsanz says a rigorous safety assessment has been conducted to ensure it is safe.
The enzyme is inactivated by cooking or by decreasing pH levels in the processed food. Fsanz said that meant it was “no longer functional” in the food, and was susceptible to digestion, like other proteins.
“The function of the enzyme is not as a food additive or flavour enhancer,” it said in a statement.
But Dengate said the purpose of the enzyme was to free glutamates from chains of protein, which enhances flavour.
He fears Fsanz has not properly considered the issue, and that the food industry’s application has omitted it entirely.
“Fancy the word glutamate not even appearing in the entire document when the entire point of the processing agent is to produce glutamate,” he said.
“It stinks to high heaven, if you ask me.”
The enzyme is not the same as transglutaminase, otherwise known as “meat glue”, which has previously caused controversy in Australia and the US, after revelations it was used to press cheaper pieces of meat into forms that resemble expensive cuts.
