According to Life, the Russian Ministry of Agriculture is preparing the ground for irradiation of food and agricultural products. The technology, tests of which in Tatarstan were stopped after the first year due to protests from the population and failed results, is entering the federal level. The regulatory framework for this is already ready.
The Ministry of Agriculture of the Russian Federation has developed a draft action plan to study the possibility of using ionizing radiation (gamma radiation) for processing agricultural products and sent it to the executive authorities for consideration and approval. This was reported on April 19 by Life.
According to the publication, during 2017 Rospotrebnadzor, Rosatom and the Federal Agency for Scientific Research should carry out work to determine the optimal conditions and modes of irradiation of agricultural and food products, study the effect of irradiation on food safety, and prepare a feasibility study for the need to use this technology, compared to existing methods.
Thus, Rosatom's plans to introduce radiation technologies in the agro-industrial complex and food industry of the country, first announced eight years ago, are being implemented.
The regulatory framework for this is already ready. Currently in Russia there are several GOSTs regulating the irradiation of food and agricultural products. Including:
GOST ISO 14470-2014 “Radiation processing of food products. Requirements for the development, validation and routine control of the process of irradiation of food with ionizing radiation ", GOST 33302-2015 “Fresh agricultural products. Guidelines for Irradiation for Phytosanitary Treatment ", GOST 33271-2015 “Dry spices, herbs and vegetable seasonings. Guidelines for exposure to pathogens and other microorganisms."
Promotional video:
From July 1, GOST 33820-2016 “Fresh meat and frozen meat. Guidance on irradiation for the destruction of parasites, pathogenic and other microorganisms "and GOST 33800-2016 " Irradiated food products. General requirements for marking ".
According to Life's interlocutor from Rusatom Healthcare, a subsidiary of Rosatom, the state corporation expects to build in 2017 a standard irradiation center with an automated product processing system. The promotion of such centers in the Russian and foreign markets is likely to be handled by Rusatom Healthcare.
TATARSTAN ANTI-NUCLEAR NIGHTMARE BECOMES A REALITY
In 2009, the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Tatarstan and the State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom signed a protocol of intent, according to which a local scientific and practical experiment on the use of radiation technologies in agriculture was to be conducted in Tatarstan for three years. The project was supervised by OJSC All-Regional Association Isotop.
At the first stage of the experiment, in 2010, it was planned to carry out pre-sowing irradiation of agricultural seeds in order to increase their germination and lay them for storage. The second, in 2011, is to sow the second generation of irradiated grain, as well as irradiate (that is, sterilize) livestock feed. The authors of the project expected that feeding cows with irradiated products would lead to an increase in milk yield. At the final stage, in 2012, it was planned to irradiate eggs and live birds in incubators. Radiation treatment, according to the experimentalists, was to increase the survival rate of young animals, as well as immunity, egg production of chickens and weight gain.
The first stage of the experiment was carried out at the Bulgar-Arysh farm in the Spassky region of Tatarstan. In the spring of 2010, 100 tons of wheat, 30 tons of barley, 4 tons of corn and 30 tons of potatoes, after being treated with gamma radiation, were sown on six hundred hectares of land.
Andrey Silkin and Sergey Kirienko, who were at that time the director of Izotope and the head of Rosatom, respectively, in 2010 and 2011 reported on the success of the first stage of the experiment. Silkin told First Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Igor Shuvalov and President of Tatarstan Minnikhanov, and Kiriyenko told Dmitry Medvedev that the increase in the yield of radiation-treated wheat was 17-23%, barley - 11-12.4%, corn - 21-27%, compared to control. Moreover - in a dry year.
True, in the spring of 2011, at a round table in the Ministry of Agriculture of the Republic of Tatarstan, dedicated to gamma irradiation of agricultural crops, it suddenly turned out that the beautiful numbers do not correspond to reality. Representatives of the Federal Center for Toxicological and Radiation Safety of Animals (now the Federal Center for Toxicological, Radiation and Biological Safety), who participated in the project, admitted that the yield of irradiated wheat and barley seeds in 2010 was about 4 centners per hectare. The potatoes were not born at all.
The fate of the harvested crop from the experimental fields remained unknown. Most likely it was eaten. The project itself did not go beyond the first stage. An unpleasant incident was added to the continuing protests of the anti-nuclear fighters - a massive death of livestock and the death of bees in the Spassky region of Tatarstan not far from the Bulgar-Arysha plots. Although the local veterinarian explained the death of livestock by the low quality of feed due to the drought, the beekeepers complained about the “chemistry” that is being watered on the fields, and the Emergencies Ministry argued that it had not recorded an excess of the radiation level on the spot, the events clearly did not benefit the image of the Rosatom project.
At the end of April 2011, the Minister of Agriculture of the Republic Marat Akhmetov at a meeting of the State Council of the Republic of Tatarstan announced that production tests of the technology for pre-sowing seed irradiation had been stopped.
Scientists have already finished off the initiative of atomic scientists in the course of a scientific discussion on the topic "Technology of gamma irradiation in agriculture: PROS and CONS", which took place in June of the same year at the Kazan Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The event was organized by the Kazan branches of the Society of Plant Physiologists of Russia and the Russian Society of Biochemists and Molecular Biologists.
Practically all representatives of science, except for the direct participants in the experiment, opposed the use of the technology of pre-sowing irradiation of seeds. Scientists recalled that this technology was tested in the Soviet Union for many years and proved to be economically ineffective. At the same time, it carries much more dangers than benefits.
The participants in the discussion already then predicted that Russia was threatened with irradiation of crop and livestock products, and warned of the need to conduct research on this technology.
If the information provided by Life is correct, all studies of the safety of radiation exposure of food should meet in 2017. In fact, this means that there will be no long-term tests of the technology in order to determine the possible consequences for human health in our country.
Gamma radiation can be used to:
- pre-sowing irradiation of agricultural seeds in order to increase their germination (radiation doses from 5 to 50 Gy. Tests in the USSR, however, showed that the method does not give constant, reproducible results. In most cases, irradiation did not affect the productivity of plants. The method is not used abroad);
- disinsection, that is, to combat insect pests of agricultural products (radiation doses from 100 to 500 Gy);
- inhibition of growth (suppression of germination of tubers of potatoes, onions, root crops during storage; dose of 50-200 Gy);
- sterilization of food (sterilization, pasteurization in order to increase the shelf life; the dose of radiation, depending on the type of sterilization, ranges from 4 to 50 kGy).
Nelya Biktimirova
