America has a proud tradition of empowering consumers. Families deserve to know what’s in the food they eat and that’s why GMO labeling is so important.
This week, the House of Representative will consider the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act. Unfortunately, the bill does nothing to support safe and accurate food labeling. Instead, it protects the status quo by preventing states from requiring labels on foods containing GMO ingredients and locks in the current and inadequate voluntary GMO labeling system.
In today’s Boston Globe, I join Congresswoman Chellie Pingree to set the record straight.
This is about consumers’ right to know. Plain and simple. Help spread the word if you support GMO labeling to ensure all Americans know what’s in the food we buy. Read the full Boston Globe op-ed here: bos.gl/MnKSd5u
nopolitician says
I see both arguments here. One one hand, labeling food “GMO” with no other information only serves to notify people who refuse to eat any GMO food, and plays to some kind of irrational fear. On the other hand, with no standards in place for GMOs, very little testing, and what seems like a shilly PR “pro-science” shaming campaign, I can understand the trepidation behind them.
Why don’t we step up to the plate and require some basic governmental testing of GMOs, and then once they pass the test, they can go to market? Or set some standards in which some minor genetic modification – which in many ways is no different than cross-breeding – can skirt labeling and further testing, but other modifications (inserting cross-species genes) simply can’t go to market without intensive testing?
I can see the benefits of genetic engineering, but I am not comfortable with giant corporations telling us that “they’ve got this, and they’d never, ever do anything for profit that would harm people or the environment” while at the same time decrying any regulations for testing as “unnecessary regulation”.
johntmay says
I see. GMO’s are totally safe, nothing to worry about, gentle as the soft rain from Heaven, but please, please, please don’t make us tell people that we are actually using them, because we have nothing to hide and all is well.
SomervilleTom says
The labels for the milk we buy say:
1. This milk has no human growth hormones
2. Human growth hormones are safe
GMO food is MUCH safer than human growth hormones. With some significant exceptions, the resulting product is indistinguishable (even in the laboratory) from an unmodified product. The very existence of distinct fruits and vegetables is itself a result of millennia of “genetic modification” (albeit much slower than what we do today).
A far more important threat to our food supply is the increasing monoculture of our agriculture. The dominance of major agribusiness players (who are also the leading practitioners of GMO) is the primary cause of that.
I think that strict label requirements disclosing GMO practices are an excellent idea. I think that same label can also state the scientific reality that those practices are safe. Surely the FDA or some similar organization should continue whatever testing is needed to insure that GMO foods remain safe.
The entire “issue” is a smokescreen, though. The genetic diversity of our food crops is a tiny fraction of what it was only a few decades ago. That lack of genetic diversity is far greater threat to public health than all this.
jconway says
This movement and the Jenny McCarthy iteration of the anti-vaccination movement, and that’s it. Otherwise all the science denial is on the right, but we should definitely purge it from our side.
I see no reason to label something that isn’t harmful in the first place. Seems like the kind of onerous regulation that helps undercut the political capital behind sensible ones. Kind of like the rush to label naturally gluten free products as such. By all means, Chipotle and Panera can pat themselves on the back and overcharge the Brookline soccer moms rushing in with the team after practice, but the government shouldn’t be in the business of misleading consumers.
Otherwise, GM is not only totally safe but essential to human life. GM products like golden rice have saved millions of lives from hunger, and while we definitely shoukd critique some of the Big Agra politics like Monsanto’s onerous IP protections that screw over third world farmers, the road to reform isn’t paved with misleading labels.
Christopher says
…to just say on general principles we should be able to know what we put into our bodies. I don’t know enough about GMOs to have a strong opinion on them either way, but we already have pretty detailed nutrition labels on our foods including both the good and the bad. I see no reason to not just add this to the list going forward.
SomervilleTom says
There is essentially NO process in place to assure that those detailed nutrition labels have anything to do with what’s actually in the container.
Our food supply is much less safe than too many of us assume.
Christopher says
…that those “Nutrition Facts” panels on packaged food, which I believe are there in the first place by government requirement, are not checked and controlled for accuracy? Your comment below appears to be about dietary supplements rather than actual food.
SomervilleTom says
I think, though I’m not sure, that the labels on packaged foods are more reliable. Dietary supplements a different matter.
Even food labels can be off by as much as 20% in, for example, calorie content (according to the above cite).
Earlier this year, DNA Analysis of supplements suggested that four of five “didn’t have the ingredients listed on the labels”.
At restaurants, markets and grocery stores across Massachusetts, the Boston Globe reported in 2011 that fish is frequently mislabled in Massachusetts (emphasis mine):
While food labels are more accurate than dietary supplements, the government actually does far less than you might think to insure that accuracy.
SomervilleTom says
The issue with Roundup-resistant corn was NOT the genetic modification technology needed to produce it. It was instead the wide range of truly evil corporate practices that Monsanto used it to enable.
I agree with you that this issue is a rare example of left-wing anti-science hysteria. I also feel that we should not over-react by refusing to consider reasonable labeling and regulatory requirements.
Still, I’m not sure how onerous a labeling requirement is. I also think its important that the government keep a close regulatory eye on GMO practices. While perfectly safe when done with good science, I think the potential for abuse is real and needs to be addressed.
A related issue is the complete LACK of FDA regulation of dietary supplements (emphasis mine):
The last bullet bears explanation — there is NO analog of clinical trials for food and cosmetic products. There is no oversight to confirm that dosages in the product align with label claims. Some readily available OTC supplements can, in fact, be quite dangerous even if they are “natural” and “organic”.
We suffer from a severe LACK of government regulation of our food supply, especially in comparison with other first-world nations. In Japan, for example, each retail package of beef includes a barcode that can be used to identify the specific animal and processor.
I want the FDA to ensure that each contemplated GMO modification is, in fact, safe. This should not be onerous, and should be a straightforward licensing process. It seems to me that a suitable label is a reasonable outcome of that process.
If we can ensure that electrical appliances conform to “UL Standards“, surely we can assure that our food is safe.
stomv says
The label isn’t misleading. It’s distinctly and succinctly factual.
If some people rationally choose to avoid GMO food, and others irrationally choose to avoid GMO food, so be it. In neither case it would be due to a misleading label; in both cases, it would be due to consumers making choices with the same old in/misin/disin-formation and one more piece of bona fide, 100% correct information.
Let those who stand to make additional profits from GMO’ing food convince us that it’s safe to eat. It’s their burden to prove their case. The government’s job, in this case, is to use regulation to provide consumer with information they want that isn’t available to them otherwise.
jconway says
If the labels suddenly turn up and the vast majority of the public is tuned out to the debate we will see a sharp uptick in consumers choosing non-GMO over GMO, any kind of fear mongering about GMO will now gain some credibility because people will say ‘if the government labels it, it must be bad!’. Particularly since its a labeling effort made by activists who are explicitly anti-GMO, if we give one anti-science faction a victory what else do we need to label? What is to stop the moral majority from labeling ‘it’s just a theory’ on textbooks? It’s also factually correct that it is just a theory, but labeling it as such takes away it’s credibility and gives in to anti-science fear mongering.
No it’s your burden to prove it isn’t safe! The case has already been made and is over 30 years old, same with the case for climate change. When 96% of scientists agree on something, it’s real. When 85% agree on something, it’s real. Peanut butter was also invented by an agricultural scientist, shouldn’t it get a GMO label too? How can Teddie’s pass itself off as natural peanut butter when that product was the brainchild of a brilliant man and not found in nature?
I am not against labeling per se, I am against labeling in a haphazard way to mollify illegitimate activists. The right denies science all the time to appease it’s base, progressives are better than that.
Christopher says
Nutrition Fact labels don’t just tell you how much fat, cholesterol, and sodium is in a food product, but also good things like vitamins, protein, and fiber.
jconway says
Chipotle and Panera stock holders will thank you for your ignorance.
Will Saletan of Slate has a good takedown of this ‘grassroots’ movement:
And the kicker
It’s just another marketing scheme. This does absolutely nothing to restrain the excesses of agribusiness like Monsanto, if anything they will adapt as Dole and other big companies have with the ‘organic’ labeling, and profit off a non-GMO line that they can now sell for more than the GM line thanks to the ‘costs’ of the labeling regime and the fact that this is a niche product affluent liberals think is the key to a lifetime of health, just as some of them think vaccines are a death trap for their kids.
What does the scientific community say?
I talked to a small scale organic farmer at a farmers market in Madison on the 4th of July weekend, I asked if his product was organic. He said it was, but he couldn’t sell it as such because the labeling requirements were too expensive for his small scale operation to handle. Meanwhile, Dole and other companies can meet the barest minimum standard to satisfy the labeling and sell those products for more. Products that should be cheaper since they are using older and less expensive methods to grow crops.
Just as the organic labeling movement was co-copted by big agribusiness so will the anti-GMO movement. If we want to help small farmers, we should create a farm policy that helps small farmers. This isn’t it.
stomv says
Look, I respect your work around here, but you’ve gone of the deep on this one.
It’s never the consumer’s burden to do a damn thing but pay for the products he or she brings to the register. Consumers have every right to make rational and irrational choices about products. Most of retail seems to rely on irrational decision making as it is.
This is, in fact, nothing at all like climate change, for the following reason: worst case analysis. The worst case in climate change is climate change. The best case is we reduce emissions of SOx, NOx, PM, Hg, stop spilling oil in bodies of water or on land, reduce black lung disease, and spend some treasure in the process. Contrast that with GMO: the worst case is a significant disaster. Monoculture, excessive -cides, introducing species with no natural predators, etc. It seems to me that GMO is far more like nuclear energy. The benefits are massive, it can provide wealth and safety and quality of life for millions of people, and experts in the study believe its safe. As long as there isn’t a disaster, at least.
While it’s true that Marcellus Gilmore Edson’s patent was awarded a patent for peanut butter about twenty years after Gregor Mendel’s pea plant experiments, it’s also true that the act of dry roasting peanuts and possibly adding oils or others has nothing to do with modifying the genes of the peanuts, per se. If, of course, Teddie uses GMO peanuts as an ingredient in the peanut butter, then yes, throw on the GMO label by all means.
I don’t know — you’re a progressive, and you’re arguing that we should deny the science that went into modifying the genes. I’m the one claiming that we shuold, in fact, acknowledge the science.
jconway says
First of all, no need to apologize or qualify your criticism, much of it is valid. I don’t take any of this personally, I think I went into college debate mode where I tried to negate every point and it took to my to places I didn’t want to go. Slippery slopes are good rhetorical tools for short term debate rounds when you are trying to impress judges, but they aren’t an effective means of arguing public policy on the internet. So I can take the hint that I went a little overboard in my opposition, I completely agree with where Bob and Charley come from down and up the thread where their comments echo where I am coming from but are far more measured in their tone.
Is a label all that harmful? I still have concerns when the vast majority of the public believe, incorrectly, that GMOs are intrinsically harmful. Placing a label on there could imply that GMOs are bad and need a warning label while non-GMOs are good, even if they use pesticides, are conventionally grown, etc. It doesn’t help when Chipotle and Panera are explicitly making that claim and profiting off of it.
GMOs are value neutral, they can be used for good or for ill. They certainly should be regulated, and maybe a label makes sense, but the impetus behind these efforts should be based on scientific consensus and scientific evidence. An organized political movement that spreads misinformation and misleads the public shouldn’t get a win to notch on it’s scoreboard, especially when most of it’s claims fly in the face of a solid and growing scientific consensus. Science should govern public policy, especially in the field of public health.
I don’t expect the industry to police itself, the burden is not on the consumer, but the burden at this point is on GMO opponents to find scientifically valid objections to GMOs that withstand scrutiny. They got bupkis as the Saletan article points out, far better than I admittedly have in this discussion.
Who says we are denying the science? We should celebrate it! I am arguing there is nothing intrinsically different between a GMO crop and a non-GMO crop from a biological standpoint or from a nutrition or health standpoint, therefore no reason to differentiate between them in labeling. The ‘right to know’ is basically to know a trivia fact, oh cool, a gene was spliced to make this cucumber. Other than the fact that its genes were manipulated, it’s really not a big deal, its a routine innovation at this point almost three decades old. It’s just the 21st century equivalent of breeding two different crops to create an entirely new one, something we have been doing for millenia without the hysterics that have accompanied this movement.
Trickle up says
I do think that is the question, perhaps paired with” …compared to the absence of a label?”
I think that if labeling were required, it would in the short term be an unwelcome burden to marketers trying to capture the healthy, natural vibe. I don’t worry about them, they are infernally ingenious.
There would be little choice for these companies but to explain things. They’d be locked in to an honest debate for once, instead of the dishonest one that banning labeling would engender.
Possibly this debate would start out very shrill and weird, but that would pass.
I totally get why a company like Intrexon Corporation, which is trying to market GMO apples that just have a few genes switched off, does not want to be tarred with the same brush as Monsanto. I just think the value of food transparency outweighs that.
Let Intextron explain why its apples are not like Monsanto’s Roundup-enabling strategy. That won’t be hard, they are nothing alike.
jconway says
One that relies on scientific evidence and public health experts to make regulatory decisions, not interference from politicians or activists. Policy in this area should always follow the science, not politics. There was an erosion of trust during the Bush administration as Dr. Richard Carmona can attest to, where politics played an outside role in what the FDA could and couldn’t do. Now that our side is in charge, I do not want to go back to that.
The FDA has consistently opposed mandatory labeling, at this time, because there is not sufficient evidence that it is required. That should settle this debate. As a progressive science blogger eloquently put it, the onus in a debate is always on the forces advocating a change to prove why the change is needed. Whether it’s the Olympics, this issue, or another issue. As she put it:
This undermines scientific consensus elsewhere, we already see an erosion in public support for teaching evolution in schools, around climate science, and even around vaccinations, where psuedo science and the politics of personal autonomy (right to know/right to choose) outweigh the legitimate science. Obviously, GMO labeling isn’t harmful to the public as efforts against mandatory vaccinations are, but the arguments opponents of either employ are strikingly similar. Distrust of the government, distrust of the scientific community, cherry picking evidence, and deliberately misleading folks about what is and isn’t fact.
So it’s a small beachead in the war against ignorance, but I’d rather progressives be on the winning side. After all, we won’t always be in power, and the next time the religious right gets in charge we don’t want them browbeating the FDA via ballot initiatives and Congressional lobbying at GMO opponents are doing today.
Trickle up says
The FDA has very limited scope with regard to GMOs, so much so that that some accuse it (erroneously I believe) as having been subject to regulatory capture. Not so, it’s authority is just very narrowly defined.
All FDA’s decision about GMO stuff (the most recent I know of concerned apples and potatoes) have been, within its narrow legal authority, technically correct.
The decision about labeling is a political one, which is why the issue is in Congress.
And by the way, a congressional ban on labeling would mean that the FDA could henceforth never consider whether labels might be appropriate in light of new information or economic arrangements. So if you really support the FDA, you don’t want a ban on labeling.
Trickle up says
I’m surprised to hear this sentiment from any progressive:
You really lost me with that. I’d rather be on the right side, helping it to win.
jconway says
I just don’t like this ‘right to know’ rhetoric, when in reality, it’s nothing you really need to know. We could affix a label to every Poland Spring bottle stating ‘this product may contain trace amounts of dihyrdogen monoxide’, it’s also accurate, but is that something the public really needs to know? Too much of the GM regulatory rhetoric is shrouded in polemical language about frankenfish or killer crops, when in reality, it is a relatively safe and in many cases, essential product.
I agree that we do need to overhaul how we regulate food in this country, and there is a lot more we can do to encourage organic, encourage local farmers, ban or regulate factory farming as best as we can, etc. I think so much activist attention and time has been diverted to this pet issue, with the same corporate entities we ought to be regulating on actual issues cashing in. Would we be defending the 63% of the public that rejects what 85% of scientists think on another scientific issue like climate change? I don’t think so. Time for liberals to speak out in favor of science, even if we temporarily make some enemies at the Whole Foods checkout counter.
jcohn88 says
We label food by place of origin, but that does not mean that a banana from Costa Rica is healthier than one from Ecuador or an apple from Washington State is healthier than one from Massachusetts or one Argentina. It is simply allowing information about the history of the food they eat. I don’t see why that is a problem. If there is nothing wrong with GMOs, as you say, then there should be nothing wrong with labeling them. The label does not inherently imply reason for suspicion. It is simply information about the history and practices of the food.
People may oppose GMOs on the grounds that they are a part of a bundle of practices that lead to greater monopolistic control over agriculture by a few unsavory and often predatory corporations. Why should they not have the right to know that information? (One can see it as less akin to a nutrition label than a “fair trade” label in such respect–a discussion of corporate practice, rather than inherent nutrition.)
When it comes to GMOs, there are secondary environmental problems that are very important: the fact that genetic modification is often used to makes crops more amenable to heavy pesticide use and to facilitate monocropping, which has damaging effects on soil.
Again, the “right to know” should not be viewed in the narrow lens of health/nutrition because that is not the only factor one uses when one decides which food items to buy.
centralmassdad says
As far as I am concerned, this “issue” along with the “issue” of vaccines, is where the “Conservatives are anti-science!” argument does a Wile E. Coyote “uh-oh” face, blinks twice, and then plunges to the canyon floor, splat.
jcohn88 says
Did you even read a word of my post? I said that the question of the health value of GMOs was immaterial to the question of labeling because we label food for many things that have no bearing on health value. We label for labor practices and country of origin; those aren’t questions of nutrition. We label in order to allow people to make informed decisions about the food they purchase by giving them a good picture of how it got from origin to store. Why is that controversial?
centralmassdad says
And it is BS. The Slate article quoted in this thread makes clear where this crap comes from. I could support this so long as it was absolutely, 100% certain to impose no costs on any producer or consumer, anywhere. Because I see no reason why anyone, anywhere, should have to pay one cent in order to support your “right to know” useless, meaningless information in order to allow you to indulge your silly fantasies and superstitions.
couves says
The issue is processed and restaurant-prepared foods in general. For example, Chipotle may be a largely GMO-free restaurant, but they still use soybean oil on everything. GMO or not, that stuff is going to kill you.
Trickle up says
as some sincerely do, you want this. If you think that humanity needs this technology, if that (rather than making a buck) is your actual agenda, and you tale the long view, then you absolutely absolutely want GMO labeling.
Why? Why, when there is so much overblown crackpot pseudoscience on the internet about GMOs and other stuff? Why erect that barrier to public acceptance?
Because “We know best” paternalism destroys food transparency and feeds the worst sort of ignorant paranoia. Because we need to move forward in a good way on food. Because people are not effing foie gras geese subject to corporate gavage.
Also because holding agribusiness to account is a broadly useful principle.
If you don’t take the long view, if you are a biotech fanboy who revels in feelings of superiority over the ignorant masses who must be hoodwinked for the Greater Good, or if you are just out to make a buck and don’t want to shoulder that particular burden thank you very much, then you do not want mandatory labeling.
Disclosure: I am a GMO skeptic who is disgusted by the level of public discourse about this issue. But i want labeling very much.
Bob Neer says
Secret is weak. Public is strong. For the long term success of GMO foods (probably a very good thing) these labels should go on sooner rather than later. The longer the industry resists the more is looks like it has something to hide.
centralmassdad says
And for the same reason, every article or media reference about climate change should have a lengthy quote from Prof. Lindzen at MIT about how climate change is bullshit. Because otherwise, it looks like science has something to hide.
Christopher says
…but the suggested equivalence is a false one. Bob is suggesting there is nothing wrong with one more piece of ACCURATE information. Your comment calls for giving credence to a viewpoint that is just plain INACCURATE.
Bob Neer says
It is important for people to be exposed continuously to both good and bad arguments so that they can make an informed choice. What I object to is shutting down the process and deciding people are too uninformed to be trusted with the information of whether food does or does not have GMOs in it. More information is stronger and will be for the long-term benefit of the GMO food industry, which I broadly support.
jconway says
I guess I am just leery of where the anti-GMO movement is coming from, the misinformation they trade in, and their funding sources. I would rather not give them a victory, and I would want to see how the costs affect implementation and whether those FDA resources or the political capital exerted on this niche cause could’ve been better spent elsewhere. In theory, more information is better.
But like ‘teaching the controversy’ regarding evolution or climate change in schools, having the government wade in and argue there is one where there really isn’t might further misinform the public. That’s the danger of politicized labeling. Vermont’s labeling regulations for example were explicitly justified for ‘public health’ purposes, which implies a danger where there isn’t one and puts government on the side of spreading misinformation.
Trickle up says
fight it with facts.
jconway says
In Vermont the stated purpose is to keep the public informed of the health risks of GMOs, which to me is akin to “teach the controversy”. The core question is should science inform public policy or fear mongering? It’s a minor issue, but I think we undermine our credibility as the science party by going down this road. Activists of any stripe shouldn’t be able to force their values via government when said values fly in the face of empirical evidence. This is the argument we make against the religious right, and it’s funny to see the same kind of arguments advanced on our side.
“It’s not really scientific evidence” “people have a right to know” “teach the controversy and let the people decide”. Science isn’t a democracy, facts are true or false, they can’t be voted on or contravened at the ballot box. They are with regularity thanks to the right, and now sadly, thanks to our side too.
Trickle up says
it would tell you there is no big secret about what is in your food.
The real question you should ask is, What facts would a ban on labeling convey or imply? It ain’t pretty.
Yes, labels place a new burden on industry to explain this technology. Some companies, like Monsanto, may be net losers because there are some legitimate criticisms about the practices that their GMOs enable.
I say good. There is no sector better equipped for this role, and Monsanto deserves scrutiny and criticism.
You (elsewhere) disparage right to know, but that is exactly what is at stake. Industry won’t like having to explain itself, but in the long run aligning its interests with disclosure and openness will be better for everyone.
johntmay says
People need to learn how to cook, how to prepare food. Is “Home Economics” still offered in schools?
Peter Porcupine says
Along with woodworking, sewing, etc., and other practice to call skills absent from public license school systems
Peter Porcupine says
..not practice to call
(What the he’ll kind of auto finish is THAT?)
AAAaaarggggh….
jconway says
I think right now there is an unjustified panic from good people with good intentions. I try and buy organic when it is affordable, I try to to get sustainable seafood, and country of origin and labor practices matter to me as well so I get that labeling helps educate the consumer. I note though that many of those labeling practices are self policing not mandated by the government. The USDA Organic label is from the government but is considered too stringent for some, too loose for others, and has added complications as well as informing consumer choices.
Any kind of GM labeling should be honest about what GM foods actually are and really educate the consumer. What I fear is, we will simply see GM or Non-GM slapped onto a variety of products, with lobbyists on either end eroding the meaning of those terms and big corporations like Chipotle or Panera misleading the public by taking symbolic stances against them while meeting the bare minimum to meet the non-GMO requirements, as many now do with organic labeling or the blurred distinction between natural and artificial ingredients. I love Teddies peanut butter and bring some back with me to Chicago when I make trips home, but it’s sort of dishonest to label it a ‘natural’ product since it isn’t found in nature and was literally invented by an agricultural scientist.
It won’t inform consumers when the movements demanding the labeling are spreading misinformation and propaganda about what GM is and isn’t. As someone else pointed out up thread, agriculture itself is a man made genetic modification to nature, just one developed gradually over millenia and essential to human civilization and flourishing. What products get the label depend on how we define it, so it will always be a subjective and sometimes arbitrary distinction and we should let scientists rather than activists or lobbyists set the standards.
petr says
… I’m not sure you can ‘erode’ the meaning of the term if it isn’t all that clear at the beginning. Modern agriculture is all about resisting spoilage, either from disease or excess time-to-market, and thus selling more of what they grow at market over a longer period. It’s about efficiency. Genetic modifications, mostly, occur to combat disease and increase longevity. But I don’t buy food because it’s efficient. I buy food in the hope that it is delicious and nutritious. By and large, in my experience, the bigger the seller the blander the food and the longer a food has a shelf life the less delightful it is to eat… and it’s often less nutritious to boot. To some extent, it’s a tradeoff… maybe there just isn’t that much yummy to go around and the more food we have the less delicious each separate morsel must be: the law of conservation of delicious… ? But I daresay that, perhaps more picky than some, I’m not unique and so I can say without fear of contradiction that most people go to market with much the same in the way of motivations. In some respects, yeah, they don’t need to know that their food was genetically engineered to be disease resistant. But if GMO is a marker of taste and quality, even if only marginally so, I want it labelled. I think you allude to this somewhat in your description of Teddy’s peanut butter. It’s a better product for being careful to be ‘natural’, even if that meaning isn’t exactly precise…
GMO is also a (possible) marker for agribusiness practices that I’d, also, like to know about. Monsanto, for example, owns a patent (which it has promised not to bring to market) for a genetic modification to plants that causes sterile — that is to say — useless seeds. Monsanto also makes ‘Roundup Ready’ crops that require farmers to buy their herbicide “Roundup” (and use more of it, more heedlessly). The soybeans themselves are resistant to the herbicide and so the herbicide is used to scorch the earth of everything else…
The glib answer to GMO, and SomervilleTom touched upon it above, is that it’s ALL geneticallly modified food… and that’s true, as far as it goes, but most modifications are due to environmental pressures as described by Darwin and not profit motives as described by Adam Smith… Maybe that’s changing… and maybe there’s not reason for that not to change… The Darwinian pressures have no motive, make no judgements and accepts all consequences. I don’t think the same thing can be said of GMO. The nightmare scenario for me is some interaction, in the field, between GMO and Non-GMO that can’t be predicted. Perhaps a modification harmless to human interacts with a non-GMO plant to create a modification that is lethal to honey-bees? We won’t know it until it happens. After all, agribusiness fed cows to other cows and sheep to other sheep for a long time before they figured out the dangers of that…
SomervilleTom says
Darwin theory describes what happens AFTER genetic changes happen (environmental pressures cause certain organisms to flourish in that environment and others to suffer).
The dominant factor (no pun intended) in food production is genetic selection by intentional breeding — “animal husbandry” (and plants as well). Gardeners cross-breed big fat tomatoes with not-so-big and sweet tomatoes, hoping for big, fat and sweet. That’s “genetic modification”. Big muscular dogs are interbred with docile and intelligent dogs hoping for big, muscular, docile, and intelligent offspring.
The difference is more than a nit — Darwinian evolution takes much longer and the results are generally unpredictable. Husbandry can be accomplished within a human lifetime, and is nearly always both predictable and intentional.
To a great extent, GMO foods do in a laboratory/factory what farmers do in the field. That’s why most scientists agree that most GMO food is safe.
nopolitician says
Yes, GMOs are in many ways more precise because in theory, we know exactly what genes we are moving around. On the other hand, we are inserting genes into organisms that may not get there from nature in a million years, and we don’t possess a complete knowledge of genetics to be able to say that what we’re doing is by default, safe.
I recently read some more into this. Here’s one example: the “Flavr Savr” Tomato. Tomatoes are picked at a stage of development when they are “mature-green”. They are then put into rooms containing ethylene gas to ripen them, and are then shipped to grocery stores in refrigerated transports. When they are on the shelf, although they look ripe, they are not actually ripe yet, and consumers dislike them.
Scientists figured out that an enzyme (polygalacturonase) in tomatoes degrades the pectin found naturally in them. Degrading the pectin makes the tomatoes soft and harder to ship. They inserted a reverse image “anti-gene” into the tomato which blocks the polygalacturonase gene, calling this the “Flavr Savr” gene. In order to know if their transfer was successful, they also inserted a gene that makes a protein which makes plants resistant to the antibiotic kanamycin. They then exposed the plants to kanamycin and the ones that survived were the ones which successfully had the Flavr Savr gene.
Here are things which I do not understand in this type of situation:
1) Are scientists certain, with near 100% belief, that the sole function of polygalacturonase in tomatoes is to degrade pectin?
2) Is there an issue with eating a tomato that does not have naturally degrading pectin in it?
3) Is the resistance-to-kanamycin protein kanamycin sole purpose in nature to provide resistance to kanamycin, or is that just an observed side-effect? Do we know what that particular gene might also do?
4) Is it good to be resistant to kanamycin?
5) Is there any interaction between the resistant-to-kanamycin gene and the polygalacturonase blocking gene?
I’m looking for a middle ground here. Pro-GMO groups seem to take the line of “hey, this could have happened in nature so you should trust all GMO or you’re anti-science”. It seems like a pretty weak argument, a weak copy of a similar argument used against anti-science climate-change deniers except that the climate-change deniers are far more obstructionist and head-in-the-sand. Asking for scientific proof is not anti-science.
I totally understand the concept of breeding varieties naturally, but GMO goes way beyond that. It doesn’t take the genes from a firm, crisp apple and put them together with a large, flavorful apple to produce a firm, crisp, large, flavorful apple. It may take some genes from a pear, or a banana, or in some cases, just makes them up (the anti-genes, as described above) to block certain traits.
That is not “doing what farmers do in the field”, and I have to believe that there are reasons [not understood] why, in nature, an apple can’t be bred with a banana, so why is it “natural” to do that in a laboratory?
That, coupled with the fact that the primary goal of this experimentation is aligned toward large agricultural corporations, makes me think that maybe we shouldn’t accept “just trust us” as “science”.
jconway says
Here is a link to a science blog I enjoy reading that demolishes the anti-GMO argument, as does Will Saletan who I linked to above.
There is already a robust FDA regulatory regime in place to make sure GMOs that are harmful do not reach the market, that essentially vet the products to make sure the ones that land on our shelves are already safe. They also have a really sensible policy on the approach labels should take, and the FDA has already determined voluntary labeling is most appropriate in this instance.
At the end of the day, I would much rather public health experts make these policy call than politicians or voters. If FDA scientists changed their policy on labeling than I would change my position, just as I would on science curriculum and climate change mitigation. Until then, I trust the experts over the paid lobbyists on either side.
Charley on the MTA says
PESTICIDES! “This product was treated with glyphosate.” Well that’s news you can use.
The question of labeling is whether the variable being labeled is relevant to public health and interest, or not. GMOs … Not really. Not yet. Case by base basis at best.
kirth says
I agree with those pointing out that GMOs are not the worst thing happening to our food, if they are bad at all. (And yes, the way Big Agro is handling patented-crop aspect is really problematic.) Let’s start with contamination. How do I as a consumer know that the food I buy is free of noxious chemicals and infectious organisms? I can’t know that, because those kinds of contamination don’t surface until after a bunch of people get sick. The requirements for FDA recalls of food are Kafkaesque:
Remember the Peanut Corporation of America salmonella contamination episode? Those peanuts were used in all kinds of food products, and the labels of said products never revealed the source of the peanuts. So even if you somehow knew that PCA was shipping infectious peanuts (which you could not, of course, know until enough people were sickened by them), how would you know that those peanuts were in your peanut butter, or your Clif bar, or whatever? I am not calling for a labeling change to address this, because it would be ineffective. I want the FDA to have a more streamlined process for removing tainted food from the food supply.
I also want more stringent restrictions on the amount of contamination allowed. Did you know that more than 90% of chicken sold in the US is contaminated with salmonella? It doesn’t have to be that way. Europe has a zero-tolerance standard for salmonella in chicken, and we could, too — if we were willing to pay for it. I would pay more for chicken certified as being free from infectious biota.
Using hormones and antibiotics to promote growth in livestock is another huge problem. It should be banned. You can buy hormone-free milk, at a premium, but that milk should be the standard offering.
SomervilleTom says
In terms of food safety, investigation (or lack thereof) into food additives, and the impact on public health of various components of our food supply, I suggest that high-fructose corn syrup should be at or near the top of the list. I’m not sure that most GMO foods even belong on the same list.
Here’s the rub about high-fructose corn syrup (emphasis mine):
There is also this:
Food additives like high-fructose corn syrup are essentially drugs — drugs that are fed to hundreds of millions of us every day, without our knowledge, without government regulation, and without government-mandated clinical trials.
I think putting a GMO label on food products is a tiny and helpful baby-step towards getting the US food industry under control. I remind us that the Thalidomide disaster happened in my lifetime, that it happened because the US government at that time did essentially NO clinical trials of drugs, and that the pharma industry loudly objected to the suggestion that stronger government regulation was needed. Fortunately, the good-guys won that battle and created the FDA that we know today.
We have a serious problem with the safety of our food supply. MUCH stronger government regulation of the food industry is a vital part of the solution that problem. A contemplated new food additive, like high-fructose corn syrup, is even more potentially dangerous than a new drug because it will be so widely consumed. Today, our government conducts nothing comparable to the approval process required by the FDA for a new medication (even prescription, never mind OTC).
In my view, neutral labeling of GMO content is a baby step towards becoming the Olympic sprinters we must be in order to catch up with our food supply problem.
Christopher says
…is that high fructose corn syrup has a way of converting to fat inside you. Therefore, a product can be labelled as having no fat, but if it has HFCS it can have the same effect on your waistline. When trans fats became all the rage as the new dietary bogeyman, the vast majority of products proclaimed they didn’t have any (or enough to count) anyway. Then some jurisdictions tried to ban it. My reaction was, if you want to ban something my nominee is HFCS.
jconway says
They only reason they are economical for big agribusiness is because of all the subsidies we give to corn growers. End the gravy train, and real sugar will become economically profitable again. As it is, Coke and Pepsi finally discovered many consumers prefer real sugar in their products and have kept real sugar versions on the shelves. Still unhealthy and they still use way too much of it compared to milder colas like Mexican Coke or Fentiman’s, but it’s a sign that already the demand is there for an alternative. I can’t be the only goy on this forum who stocks up on Kosher Coke .
Christopher says
Also, isn’t agribusiness, like fossil fuels, doing just fine on its own?
SomervilleTom says
Agribusiness hasn’t been “on its own” for generations.
Federal subsidies are so out of control, and so entangled with social policy (the USDA administers food stamps!) that the politics of any change are enormously complex. The subsidy amounts themselves are so large that even the right-leaning publications can’t hide from the reality. Hence, conservatives have learned to link them to social policy — thereby hijacking the debate and distracting attention from the real underlying issues (where have we seen THAT tactic before?).
Finally, I think it’s worth observing that agribusiness and its subsidies are inseparable from fossil fuels and its subsidies.
Christopher says
Couldn’t agribusiness do just fine on its own just like the fossil fuel industry COULD do just fine on it’s own? I realize we’ve been subsidizing both for decades, but would argue for reduction or elimination of said on the same logic. Namely, they don’t need the public’s help staying in business and turning a handsome profit.