The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) had extended its deadline to August 25, 2017 for submitting comments on GMO labeling of food products.
Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) — also known as GM foods and bioengineered foods — appear in our food supply in various forms, affecting both plants and animals as well as oils, seasonings, and food additives.
Why Be Concerned?
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), GMO seeds are used to plant over 90% of all maize (corn), cotton, and soy grown in the United States, which means that many of the foods you eat likely contain GMOs (1).
Although most notable organizations and research suggest that GMO foods are safe and sustainable, some people claim they may harm your health and the environment.
While it’s possible to naturally give foods desirable traits through selective breeding, this process takes many generations. Also, breeders may struggle to determine which genetic change has led to a new trait.
Genetic modification significantly accelerates this process by using scientific techniques that give the plant the specific desired trait.
For example, one of the most common GMO crops is Bt corn, which is genetically modified to produce the insecticide Bt toxin. By making this toxin, the corn is able to resist pests, reducing the need for pesticides (3Trusted Source).
GMO crops are incredibly common in the United States, with at least 90% of soy, cotton, and corn being grown through genetic techniques.
We don’t know
We truly only understand a fraction of how what we eat affects our body and our health. Inflammation from various foods and substances is at the root of most of our major diseases. With that in mind, how can we not be concerned about eating these foods, due to their inherent chemical makeup and much of the commercial practices that surround the production of this food (pesticides, herbicides, and the impacts on the animal proteins that we eat)
Allergies
There is some concern that GMO foods may trigger an allergic reaction.
This is because GMO foods contain foreign genes, so some people worry that they harbor genes from foods that may prompt an allergic reaction.
Cancers
Similarly, there’s a common concern that GMO foods may aid the progression of cancers.
Because cancers are caused by DNA mutations, some people fear that eating foods with added genes may affect your DNA.
Other environmental and health concerns
Although GMO crops are convenient for farmers, there are environmental concerns.
Most GMO crops are resistant to herbicides, such as Roundup. This means that farmers can use Roundup without fear of it harming their own crops, and of even greater concern for packaged foods that contain wheat, corn or soy is that RoundUp is subsequently used for these crops in much greater quantities as a desiccant to aid in harvest.
Testing?
You might think that if there were truly any reason to be concerned, the FDA and USDA would be looking out for us. However, there is little to no testing done on GMOs due to an FDA rule called ‘substantial equivalence‘. In essence, what it amounts to is, “see this bioengineered soybean? It is pretty much like any other soybean. So we do not need to do any other testing, right?”
The Process
Because of the complexity of agreeing on what products to label and how to label them, the USDA had put together 30 questions that those so inclined went through and answered as a way of giving their opinion.
Some of the issues the USDA was seeking input on are summarized below:
- What should bioengineered foods be called?
- What types of breeding also qualify as GM?
- What should be considered “found in nature” and not require GMO labels?
- Do highly refined products like oils and sugars need GMO labels?
- Should all GMO ingredients be disclosed, or only “most predominant” ingredients?
- How much “bioengineered substance” has to be present for a food product to be GMO?
- Should dietary supplements and “medical food” have GMO labels?
- What should a GMO symbol look like?
- How can digital or electronic disclosures be regulated and account for changing technologies?
- What labels should be used for fresh produce in bins, fish at counters, and foods sold online?
- How should small food manufacturers be defined to be excluded from GMO labeling?
- What kind of records should the government require to demonstrate compliance?
- How would hearings be held for non-compliance, and how should the findings be made public?
- How should GMO disclosure requirements be applied to imported food products?
- Should USDA GMO labeling rules preempt any GMO labeling legislated at the state-level.
Once the USDA received our comments, it was to come up with new regulations on GMO labeling; the labels were intended to tell people more about their food products than the then-current labels did. However, they would not necessarily address all situations.
Simple Solution:
The best solution, by far, since all packaged foods already have a nutritional label and ingredient, would be as simple as using a bold font for any ingredient that has been bioengineered, or fed bioengineered foods. This would not have required any more space nor require any package redesign. The front of the package would not make any declarations one way or another, but customers that are interested in what the ingredients are would have a simple and clear way to make a note of any GMOs.
By the way, the USDA clarified that “food derived from any animal, including invertebrates such as crickets or bee products, would not require disclosure as a bioengineered food solely because their nutrition came from food with bioengineered ingredients.” What happened to the notion that “we are what we eat, eats”? Furthermore, food sold in restaurants would also not require GMO labels, and Americans spend more in time restaurants (prior to the Pandemic) than in grocery stores.
What did the USDA come up with?
More than a year late, the USDA finally came up with its GMO labeling rules (dare we hope for something thoughtful and clever after all that time?). The rule preempts any related state laws, making it easier for companies to do business nationally with only one set of GMO labeling requirements.
The GMO labeling law finally arose from the muck and mire just in time for Christmas (2018). The law will allow QR codes instead of legitimate labeling, and, for those who do choose to label clearly, the necessary language is the little-known phrase, “bioengineered food.” Additionally, Soda and oils made from GMOs are exempt from any labeling.
Officially announced right before Christmas, key aspects of the new GMO-labeling rules – also known as the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard – include the following:
- Instead of requiring companies to use the on-package labels “Made with GMOs” or “Made with Genetic Engineering”, which would make it easy for consumers, the USDA has done the polar opposite.
- Not only are companies not required to use on-package labels, but they can use QR codes instead. As the Center for Food Safety has long argued, QR codes are inherently discriminatory to the elderly, poor, rural, and minorities.
- And if companies do use an on-package label, it must use the phrase “bioengineered food,” a term not commonly used or understood by consumers.
Conclusion
As much as we might like to think that our government is looking out for us, organizations like the EPA, FDA, and USDA demonstrate time and time again that their actions are not aligned with their charter; in a word, ‘corrupted’. There were so many more straightforward, more transparent, and more functional solutions to the GMO labeling conundrum, all of which would have been no more difficult or costly than the intentionally obfuscatory approach of using a QR code.