By Dr. Merrill Matthews Institute for Policy Innovation.
One of the great ironies is that the media habitually brand conservatives as anti-science when its the political left that has repeatedly embraced policies that are contradicted by the best available science. And one of the most recent examples is the lefts war on food containing genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
All commercially available GMO foods and plants in the U.S.--which include several varieties of corn soybeans canola and cotton--have been tested and approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Plus several other plants have been approved but may be limited or not yet commercially available. These include certain varieties of squash cantaloupe flax papaya tomatoes sugar beets and others.
The FDA says:
Foods from genetically engineered plants must meet the same requirements including safety requirements as foods from traditionally bred plants...Foods from genetically engineered plants intended to be grown in the United States that have been evaluated by FDA through the consultation process have not gone on the market until the FDAs questions about the safety of such products have been resolved...FDA teams of scientists knowledgeable in genetic engineering toxicology chemistry nutrition and other scientific areas as needed carefully evaluate the safety assessments taking into account relevant data and information.
And yet the political left is convinced that GMO foods are wreaking havoc on our bodies and the environment and those critics are doing all they can to scare the public. Hence Vermonts new law requiring GMO labeling on most food products.
The left claims that such laws promote transparency but GMO products are so integrated into the U.S. food chain that 70 percent to 80 percent of processed food could contain some level on GMO foods
according to the Grocery Manufacturers Association.
And so food producers with nationwide distribution chains are trying to figure out how to respond in the face of a state-imposed penalty of $1000 per day per product.
There are solutions. Congress could fix the problem by prohibiting efforts like Vermonts law but that legislation stalled out recently in the Senate.
Or companies could pull out of the state--there are only 626000 people in Vermont. Food companies might lose sales but the cost of nationwide compliance--which is what most of them think makes the most sense--might cost some companies even more than the losses incurred from leaving Vermont.
But those would only be managing the crisis not fixing the problem. People who want to avoid GMO foods are free to choose products marketed as such just dont try to claim the science backs that decision.
Todays PolicyByte was written by Dr. Merrill Matthews resident scholar with the Institute for Policy Innovation.
