Lawmakers think so, and they blame it on irradiation, the word. A spending bill that President Clinton recently signed into law directs the agency to come up with the wording by early 2002. It's construed by some consumers as a warning. Even before that approval, industry officials worried that consumers would balk at the term irradiation.
Food is irradiated when it is exposed briefly to electrons, gamma rays or X-rays.
A leading advocate of alternative labeling is Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa, whose state has a facility that treats ground beef with electron-beam radiation. The FDA requires labeling of irradiated products to indicate that they have been treated with irradiation. They also must bear a symbol, known as the radura, which consists of green petals in a broken circle. At the direction of Congress, the agency proposed early last year to consider alternative language for the labels. The FDA has yet to act.