Note that it’s difficult to know whether or not you are eating GM products in NZ because there’s no requirement to label them. Soy is largely GM. Personally I avoid soy unless it’s organic, similarly corn I avoid. GM corn crops were slipped into NZ under Helen Clarke’s watch back in 2000 or thereabouts. Read Seeds […]
Uncovered Mexican Study Confirms GM Soy Causes Harm to Pancreas — Rangitikei Environmental Health Watch
‘Soy is one of the most commonly genetically modified (GM) crops. More than half of the world’s soy crop is now grown from GM plants. In New Zealand, ingredients must be identified as GM if they contain modified DNA or protein, but the unintentional presence of GM content of up to one percent is allowed. The major brands of soy milk available in New Zealand are manufactured from GM-free soya beans grown in Australia or the USA. However, we also import soy flour and soy meal from Argentina, where 98 percent of the soy crop is GM. Some of this soy meal is used for animal feed. If you wish to avoid any trace of GM soy, choose soy products and meat that have been certified organic, and avoid manufactured products that contain soy derivatives such as soy flour and flavourings.
Per hectare of land, soya beans produce more protein than just about any other crop, making it a cheap source of food both for humans and the animals farmed to feed us. (About 85 percent of the world’s soya bean crops are used to make vegetable oil, with the resulting ‘de-fatted’ soy meal used for animal feed.)
Advances in food technology have isolated soy proteins, which have an almost magical ability to take on any taste and texture. Soy protein (often labelled as hydrolysed or textured vegetable protein) is now used as a low-cost way of ‘extending’ the meat used in processed and fast foods, reducing fat and cholesterol while preserving protein content. Soy flour and soy oil (often labelled simply as vegetable oil) are used in a huge variety of processed foods, and it’s almost impossible to find a bar of chocolate that doesn’t include the emulsifier soy lecithin.
Soy ingredients are embedded in nearly 100 percent of fast food items. An item such as a chicken nugget may have been made from a chicken fed soy meal, its meat extended with soy protein isolate, then fried in soya oil.”
https://goodmagazine.co.nz/putting-the-spotlight-on-soy/