02 Nov 2012 Prop 37: Food fight of the decade
On November 6, those of who live in California will get to vote on Proposition 37, which requires mandatory labeling of genetically-engineered foods (GMOs). And the whole country is watching. It’s shaping up to be quite the battle.
A quick glance at who’s supporting the bill and who’s against it should tell you a lot. Supporters include Joe Mercola, the Organic Consumers Fund, Nature’s Path Foods, Dr Bronner’s Magic Soaps, Clif Bar and Co, and Annie’s. Opponents include Monsanto, Dupont, PepsiCo, DOW, Kraft Foods, Coca-Cola, Nestle, General Mills and Kelloggs.
Questions, anyone?
The issue of GMOs has been a perplexing one and not nearly as simple as people on both sides of the fence try to make it. People have been selectively breeding crops and animals for ages (how do you think we have jumbo roses, or Boston Terriers, or uniformly-red tomatoes)?
And there are honest, well-meaning scientists who are trying to solve massive problems like vitamin deficiencies in third world countries using GMO techniques. Researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Institute for Plant Sciences, for example, have created a strain of “golden” rice that contains an unusually high amount of beta-carotene (vitamin A) and hope to offer the golden rice seed free to any third world country that requests it.
So genetic modification — all things being equal — is not always evil. Whether it’s used for good or for avarice depends on who’s using it…..
Huffington Post: Read more
Prop 37 is a dead heat, latest poll says
California’s Proposition 37, once considered a shoo-in after earlier poll results, is now looking like a dead heat, according to a Los Angeles Times poll.
This November, Californians will vote on an initiative that would require any food containing ingredients derived from genetically modified crops to be labeled as such.
The anti-GMO campaign’s dangerous war on science
Backers of the “California Right To Know Genetically Engineered Food Act” are pitching it as a matter of providing information to consumers, who, they argue, “have a right to know what’s in the food we buy and eat and feed our children, just as we have the right to know how many calories are in our food, or whether food comes from other countries like Mexico or China.”
I have no concerns about the safety of GMOs. But I support the right of people to make choices about what they eat, and think we should provide them with the information they need to do so.
I understand where some of the nervousness about GMOs comes from. I worry about the uncontrolled chemical experiments our species is doing on our bodies, and am a big consumer of organic foods. I am also skeptical when industries assert that their products are safe, because so often these claims have turned out to be false.
But I also appreciate the challenges of feeding our growing population, and believe in the power of biotechnology to not just make agriculture more efficient, but to make it better for people and the planet. And as a molecular biologist very familiar with the technology of genetic modification and the research into its safety, I do not find it in the least bit frightening.
What I do find frightening, however, is the way backers of this initiative have turned a campaign for consumer choice into a crusade against GMOs. They don’t want the “genetically engineered” label to merely provide information. They want it to be a warning – the equivalent for GM food of the cancer warning on cigarette boxes.
The problem is there is no justification for a warning. There is no compelling evidence of any harm arising from eating GMOs, and a diverse and convincing body of research demonstrating that GMOs are safe. But rather than reckon with this reality, anti-GMO campaigners have joined their climate-change denying brethren, and launched an agressive war on science….
Prop 37 will cost Californians
Prop 37 supporters argue that the labeling is a health issue, but it’s not. We are not aware of a single credible study that says GMO foods are …