Day 039 - 20 Oct 94 - Page 46
1 A. The complication arises because of the way in which the
2 identity and purity of these materials gets defined,
3 changed. Until, I think it was about 1983, I am not
4 entirely precise about the date, but until then it was
5 customary to characterise the Carrageenan purely in terms
6 of the average molecular weight, and food grade was
7 material with a high average and degraded with a low
8 average.
9
10 But it came to be appreciated that you could have a high
11 average molecular weight but, nonetheless, that would
12 represent the average of a spread, and within you could
13 have what was nominally food grade Carrageenan with a high
14 average molecular weight, but which would contain within it
15 some molecular weight fragments which might otherwise be
16 characterised as degraded Carrageenan not appropriate for
17 food use.
18
19 More recently, it has been thought necessary and desirable
20 to revise these specifications of identity and purity of
21 Carrageenan and require not merely averages but some
22 I think it is in terms of not containing material of
23 molecular weight lower than some particular figure.
24
25 Q. When did that come in?
26 A. I am not sure if I have the precise figure. It was,
27 I think, no earlier than 1982 and no later than 1985, but
28 I am not precisely sure when that determination was made.
29
30 Q. I was watching a cooking programme on the television last
31 night where the Irish cook who was teaching the well-known
32 television cook how to cook seemed to be using quite a lot
33 of what she called "carrageen"?
34 A. Yes.
35
36 Q. But nothing was said which would guide me one way or
37 another on the issue in this case.
38
39 MR. MORRIS: So is that the case for Carrageenan complete?
40 A. I do not think I have anything else to add in respect
41 of that material.
42
43 Q. Right. You will all be extremely unhappy to know that I
44 have discovered there were some more references to BHA and
45 BHT which I have identified. Let me just say what they
46 were and ask you if they are important? There was 82.
47
48 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Let us finish with Carrageenan first.
49
50 MR. MORRIS: I think we have finished it.
51
52 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Can I ask you then, because I did not
53 underline in this any reference to evidence of direct human
54 reaction, have I missed something in your text in relation
55 to that?
56
57 THE WITNESS: No. I am not aware of any evidence directly
58 deriving from studies on humans in respect of Carrageenan,
59 native or degraded.
60
