On Election Day, while the rest of the country was watching to see who was going to be the next president, I was watching for the results of a different campaign, one that could’ve potentially changed how the food business does things and forced a conversation about our food into the national eye.
ART OF THE POSSIBLEOn Election Day, while the rest of the country was watching to see who was going to be the next president, I was watching for the results of a different campaign, one that could’ve potentially changed how the food business does things and forced a conversation about our food into the national eye.
Corinna Scott/VANGUARD STAFF
I’m talking about California’s Proposition 37.
A ballot referendum, Proposition 37 would have required the labeling of all foods or foodstuffs that contain genetically modified organisms.
While it ultimately failed, the referendum poses a larger question: Should we use GMO foods in our supply chain?
Supporters of GMO foods have two main arguments: One, they’re safe, and two, they’re necessary to ensure that we feed the world.
There have been numerous studies on both sides of the argument regarding GMOs. The Food and Drug Administration—responsible for ensuring our food supply’s safety—has said that evidence of negative effects from eating GMOs is nonexistent, but all of the completed studies have been short-term and limited in scope.
The Union of Concerned Scientists found that these tests paid little attention to the environmental costs of GMOs and focused more on whether the plants would grow in the intended manner and not if they were really safe.
The major crops grown in the U.S.—corn, soybeans and wheat—are now largely GMO crops. When you buy a box of crackers, the chances are very good that your purchase contains these organisms.
Given that there has been little verified testing regarding the safety of these crops, we should at the very least be cautious and offer people a clear and transparent choice between eating GMOs or not.
In respect to the argument that genetically modified foods are necessary to feed the world, numerous studies indicate that these foods are no more productive than native crops grown using commonsense farming practices like crop rotation and crop diversity.
According to the Institute for Responsible Technology, crops of Bt corn—corn that’s had the botulism toxin inserted into its gene structure—have dropped 12 percent when compared to non-modified crops.
Originally intended to fight the growing problem of instability in the food supply, GMOs supposedly allowed for safer and more productive crops. But this hasn’t happened. Despite the more than 20 years of increased use, the global food supply is still at risk.
Why do we continue to allow this experiment to continue? There hasn’t been any proven benefit to using GMOs with regard to increased productivity, or have they been proven safe?
When we ask ourselves these serious questions, it’s important to know who’s paying for certain information.
For example, agribusiness went ballistic when California asked voters to decide if GMOs and genetically modified food products should be labeled. The campaign to stop Proposition 37 spent $47 million to defeat the measure. The measure’s supporters spent slightly more than Monsanto’s opposing contribution of $8 million.
The campaign for safer food should continue, but it should be done using practical, scientific procedures. Instead of allowing agribusiness to continue injecting our food supply with unproven and potentially dangerous GMOs, we should demand transparency and accountability.
We need to take our food’s safety into our own hands and not allow bureaucrats to make our most important decisions for us. Nor should we allow the interests of major businesses dictate what’s safe.
Labeling can play a major part in understanding where our food comes from and what it’s made of—two points about which we all need to be more knowledgeable.
We can start by demanding that all genetically modified foods be clearly labeled. We should demand further testing to prove the safety of these products, not just in terms of health but also with regard to long-term environmental impact.
