Tell Kroger and Albertsons: It’s time to can BPA!
A new report found 67% of nearly 200 food cans from dozens of brands and retailers tested positive for the toxic chemical bisphenol A (BPA), a hormone disrupting chemical linked to breast and prostate cancer, infertility, and type-2 diabetes.
Kroger and Albertsons are food industry leaders who have the power and a moral responsibility to get toxic chemicals like BPA out of food packaging.
These companies have pledged to reduce their use of BPA in canned foods, yet a new report found that most of their cans sampled still tested positive for this harmful chemical. Meanwhile, some other leading brands have already eliminated BPA from their can linings.
Studies have shown this hormonally active chemical can migrate out of cans, get into the food our families eat, and make its way into our bodies, where it may be harmful to our health. BPA clearly has no place in canned foods we buy for our families!
Tell Kroger and Albertsons: it’s time to eliminate and safely substitute BPA in canned foods.
Send an email to the companies — here’s a sample email you can copy/paste and send today (see email addresses below).
Subject: Please eliminate and safely substitute toxic BPA in your canned food
As a loyal customer, I was alarmed to learn that your company still sells food cans lined with bisphenol A (BPA), a harmful chemical linked to breast and prostate cancer, infertility and type-2 diabetes that my family has been working to avoid.
As an industry leader, I expect you to do more to ensure that your canned foods aren’t lined with harmful chemicals like BPA or “regrettable substitutes” like PVC or styrene-based resins.
I am writing to urge you to develop a comprehensive policy to eliminate and safely substitute BPA in canned foods. Such a plan should be transparent and ensure that replacement chemicals are safe.
I support the recommendations from the new report, Buyer Beware: Toxic BPA & Regrettable Substitutes in the Linings of Canned Food and urge your company to:
- Commit to eliminating and safely substituting BPA from your canned foods and other food packaging and establishing public timelines and benchmarks for your transition to safer alternatives.
- Conduct and publicly report on the results of “alternatives assessments,” using the GreenScreen® for Safer Chemicals or a similar third-party certification tool for assessing the safety of your can linings.
- Label all chemicals used in can liners, including BPA or BPA alternatives; and demand that your suppliers of food can linings fully disclose safety data, so you can provide a higher level of transparency to consumers.
- Adopt comprehensive chemical policies to safely replace other chemicals of concern in your products and packaging.
Shopping in the canned food aisle shouldn’t be a “buyer beware” situation. I hope you will show the leadership that customers like me are counting on by eliminating and safely substituting BPA in your canned foods. I look forward to your response. Thank you.
Sincerely,
(Your Name)
Emails for Kroger can go to:
Rodney McMullen, CEO, rodney.mcmullen@kroger.com
customerservice@kroger.com
sustainability@kroger.com
Emails for Albertsons can go to:
Bob Miller, CEO, bob.miller@albertsons.com
web.comments@safeway.com
