KEY POINTS:
Food safety officials bungled the release of a highly contentious report into the safety of milk but had not deliberately tried to suppress its findings, an external report released yesterday said.
Swedish scientist Stuart Slorach said the Food Safety Authority had erred when it deleted a layman's summary Professor Boyd Swinburn had written for his 2004 review on the safety of A1 and A2 milk when it posted the report on its website.
Studies have found that A1 milk carries a gene which has been linked to diabetes. That has led some scientists to call for New Zealand's dairy herd to be switched to cows which carry the alternative A2 gene.
"By deleting the lay summary, and especially doing so without discussing with or informing Swinburn, NZFSA laid itself open to criticism that it was withholding important information from the public," Dr Slorach said.
That impression was reinforced when an authority member mistakenly scheduled the release of Dr Swinburn's report for a day when the author would not be available to comment on it. These slips were seized on by some, who claimed the authority had held back information on A1 and A2 milk for some ulterior motive.
Dr Slorach yesterday dismissed such claims. He said the excised lay summary and the published executive summary were virtually the same and in some places were word for word.
However, authority chief executive Andrew McKenzie conceded his organisation had been at fault, and said the authority had spent the four years since the Swinburn report learning from its mistakes.
"We are a growing organisation, the whole philosophy is continuous improvement, and I think the report does show that when it comes to some of these other quite controversial issues ... it shows that we have moved a long way since 2004."
Food Safety Minister Lianne Dalziel said the authority's handling of the Swinburn report had led to damaging and unnecessary speculation about its findings regarding the safety of milk as a foodstuff.
"I think what was really important for me arising out of the report was that there was no evidence to back up the fact that NZFSA was trying to withhold important information from the public, it was actually dealing with the incredibly difficult balancing act of how do you make sure that people keep drinking milk at the time when this matter was being addressed."
Lincoln University Professor of Farm Management and Agribusiness Keith Woodford - who has written a book about A1 and A2 milk - said the report let the FSA off lightly, but it did confirm his view that some of its actions over the Swinburn report were difficult to justify.
"At least we agree it was bungled," Professor Woodford said. "It will be portrayed as NZFSA being vindicated, but if one actually looks through there one can see that it actually vindicates things I was saying."
He said the report cleared the air over the Swinburn report, and it was now time for the debate on A1 and A2 milk to move forward.
That next step will come later this year, when the European Food Safety Authority is expected to release an in-depth scientific study of the two milks.
While highly critical of the authority's handling of Dr Swinburn's review, Dr Slorach praised its handling of other food safety issues such as chemical levels in imported food, mercury levels in fish, the safety of the food additive aspartame, and its strategy for dealing with campylobacter in poultry.
The report said the campylobacter situation in New Zealand was "clearly unacceptable", but the FSA's research into the issue had been impressive and it was being given an appropriately high priority.
REVIEW FINDINGS
* Key recommendations of Slorach review of the Food Safety Authority
* FSA needs to improve its communication skills to better inform the public.
* Authority's risk management framework should emphasise a preventive approach to food safety.
* Government should set out clear risk management criteria for the authority.
* Authority should publicly list rejected imported foods.
* Authority should intensify its campylobacter information campaign.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT
* Cabinet will consider proposed changes to the authority, which will then be included in a food bill to be introduced into Parliament in the next few months.
