Critics Complain as New US Agriculture Dept Label Rules Replace 'GMO' With 'Bioengineered' (msn.com) 152
"As the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) changes its labeling rules for genetically modified foods in the new year, critics say the new move adds work for consumers and creates large loopholes for suppliers," writes The Hill.
Starting on Saturday, foods containing "genetically engineered" GE ingredients or "genetically modified organisms" (GMOs) will now simply be marked as "bioengineered," according to The Washington Post. A phone number or QR code on the packaging may also direct consumers to more information, a decision some argue discriminates against people without access to a cell phone or smartphone, the Post added.
The USDA has said the change "avoids a patchwork of state labeling regulations" to provide a national standard for the labels that were once set on a state-by-state basis. But critics say the term could create confusion among consumers. "The worst part of this law is the use of the term 'bioengineered' because that's not a term most consumers are familiar with," Gregory Jaffe, director of Center for Science in the Public Interest's biotechnology project, told the Post.
The Center for Food Safety has also criticized the rules, saying it will leave the majority of genetically modified foods unlabeled, the Post added. Specifically, the USDA sets an exemption threshold at 5 percent of "unintended" genetically engineered ingredients. In the European Union, the standard is markedly lower at 0.9 percent. "Consumers are left not knowing if it's not present or if a food company just chose not to disclose," Peter Lurie, president of Center for Science in the Public Interest, told the Post.
The new rules also don't cover products with meat, poultry or eggs as their first ingredient (or their second ingredient after water, stock or broth). Lurie complains to the Post this will leave no disclosure for prepared foods in the freezer aisle like meat lasagna or chicken burritos:
Eating bioengineered foods poses no risk to human health, according to the National Academy of Sciences and the Food and Drug Administration. However, watchdog organizations say the new rules contain too many loopholes for consumers who want to avoid these foods...
The USDA will respond to complaints. There will be no in-store spot checks of food products. Anybody who suspects a violation may have occurred can file a written complaint with the USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service website. "The already overburdened consumer is going to have to spend four times as much time in the supermarket reading labels," said Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of the Center for Food Safety. "And now they'll have to be USDA citizen investigators to make sure this law has some consequences."
The USDA has said the change "avoids a patchwork of state labeling regulations" to provide a national standard for the labels that were once set on a state-by-state basis. But critics say the term could create confusion among consumers. "The worst part of this law is the use of the term 'bioengineered' because that's not a term most consumers are familiar with," Gregory Jaffe, director of Center for Science in the Public Interest's biotechnology project, told the Post.
The Center for Food Safety has also criticized the rules, saying it will leave the majority of genetically modified foods unlabeled, the Post added. Specifically, the USDA sets an exemption threshold at 5 percent of "unintended" genetically engineered ingredients. In the European Union, the standard is markedly lower at 0.9 percent. "Consumers are left not knowing if it's not present or if a food company just chose not to disclose," Peter Lurie, president of Center for Science in the Public Interest, told the Post.
The new rules also don't cover products with meat, poultry or eggs as their first ingredient (or their second ingredient after water, stock or broth). Lurie complains to the Post this will leave no disclosure for prepared foods in the freezer aisle like meat lasagna or chicken burritos:
Eating bioengineered foods poses no risk to human health, according to the National Academy of Sciences and the Food and Drug Administration. However, watchdog organizations say the new rules contain too many loopholes for consumers who want to avoid these foods...
The USDA will respond to complaints. There will be no in-store spot checks of food products. Anybody who suspects a violation may have occurred can file a written complaint with the USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service website. "The already overburdened consumer is going to have to spend four times as much time in the supermarket reading labels," said Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of the Center for Food Safety. "And now they'll have to be USDA citizen investigators to make sure this law has some consequences."
bioengineering... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: bioengineering... (Score:2)
Re: bioengineering... (Score:3)
Nearly all of nature is literally out to kill us and each other. Did nature save the dinosaurs? The fucking planet is unstable too. Earthquakes, volcanos, hurricanes, serial killers, etc. We always had to survive by fighting off nature. We have to GMO to survive, and the sooner we can eat fully chemically synthesized protein and carbs the better. Until then nature will try to kill and vice versa.
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No they don't.
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Impossible. If they were trying to convince a Harvard professor to convert to vegetarianism, they didn't have 80 IQ points to begin with. /s
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Re:bioengineering... (Score:4, Informative)
Yes. Pretty much the first thing people did was to selectively favor the wheat that did not drop kernels randomly. They grabbed the heads with the most kernels, so the next crop held onto the kernels even better.
In the Americas the recent immigrants consistently picked the largest potatoes and also eventually got the size of the ears on maize up to a good size. And then there were these capsaicin (8-methyl-N-vanillyl-6-nonenamide for you purists) containing vegetables that were really interesting and worth all sorts of tinkering.
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Most genetically modified crops are certainly not sterile! Can you name one that is? I can't and I grow quite a few of them. The real reason why you can't replant the seed (other than licensing which I agree with you there), is that most of these varieties are hybrids. Plant hybrids only express desired genes for a couple of generations and then because of plant genetics (something to do with four chromosomes), the plants tend to revert to one of their ancestral lines. Many traits like glyphosate resista
Re:bioengineering... (Score:4)
It's the same difference as between configuring a program and reprogramming it with new functionality.
Selection affects the variants of a gene, the so called allele. It affects basically the value that is stored in a gene. Genetic modification adds new genes, which didn't exist before in that lineage at all (like bacteria genes in vertebrate or virus genes in plants or whatever). It adds a new layer of complexity, and thus more unexpected outcomes, like a configuration might trigger a bug, that was already there before, but reprogramming might introduce new bugs.
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Yeah yeah, hybridization and mutation never happened before GMOs. Oh wait, that's a bunch of nonsense.
But you know, no one ever made poisonous plants on accidents before GMOs. Oh whoops, except that did happen: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] Completely natural.
But fortunately we carefully test to make sure new natural plant varieties are safe before putting them on the market. Oh wait, no, that's GMOs.
So ultimately GMOs are safer than naturally modified plants, based on the evidence and procedures.
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Mutations happen all the time, but mutations can happen on many levels of the genome. Introduction of a new gene is a quite rare event. Most mutations happen either on the chromosome level (polyploidia for instance, or crossing-over), or at the allele level, where one gene switches from one value to another. Most genetic defects for instance fall into one of those t
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You are irrational. You fear a scenario that has never happened, but are not worried about the event that actually has happened.
You are irrational. You fear eating varieties that have been tested for safety, but not varieties that can be put on the market without testing.
You are irrational. You ignored my points, instead going on to talk about...meteor strikes? Stay on topic, please.
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Selection affects the variants of a gene, the so called allele. It affects basically the value that is stored in a gene. Genetic modification adds new genes, which didn't exist before in that lineage at all (like bacteria genes in vertebrate or virus genes in plants or whatever).
First of all in plants it would be better to refer to selection of traits rather than genes. Cross-breeding, hybridization, and back crossing are fairly course tools for genomic modification. About the most specific you could hope to get is 1 or 2 linkage groups spanning a few dozen kb of a chromosome. So when you are selecting and propagating varieties and cultivars, you are NOT selecting random background mutations within a single species, for the most part. There is some, but most of the genetic variatio
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I still chuckle when I read a package of hot dogs whose ingredients specify: "Mechanically separated chicken." The industry didn't pick that term; it's an FDA requirement. There are a set of techniques for processing meat where if you use them, the ingredients can't just say "chicken," they have to specify that it has been "mechanically separated."
Anti-science lunatics: check (Score:3, Funny)
Yup, the people opposed to this are anti-scientific loons who make frivolous complaints about unlicensed, insufficiently tested, barely regulated gene therapy. They use erroneous statistics to manufacture concern about risks with implausible mechanisms or that pale in comparison to the baseline. They are opposed to new, well-understood and minimalist methods to meet the needs of society, claiming that the new methods will make children keel over and die. They...
Wait, which thread are we in? I need to ca
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Isn't all farming bioengineering?
Unless you try to be pedantic, the answer is no. Bioengineering requires that you are using modern engineering techniques like gene editing, artificial tissue, specially designed nanoparticles that enter certain cells to deliver some chemical, things like that.
Building a wooden shed with basic tools is not "civil engineering" (engineering part implies e.g. making computer simulations to optimize the dimensions)
Writing a Hello World or a shell script is not "software engineering" (engineering implies you use
Re: bioengineering... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: bioengineering... (Score:2)
Stark Nurseries, the original owner of the Red Delicious apple is still around. They didn't make it, but did own it for a very long time.
Licensing is voluntary (Score:2)
If it didn't lead to increased yields and/or weren't otherwise more profitable to the licensees, no one would license it.
You contradict yourself.
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Horseshit. Just because Monsanto uses GMO to control grain seeds, doesn't mean that many MANY other forms of food production don't use GMO to increase yield and improve resistance to various problems.
critics say the term could create confusion among (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:critics say the term could create confusion amo (Score:5, Informative)
Oh yeah, and the people behind using the most demonizing labeling they can think of mentioned in this article are some real winners:
The Center for Science in the Public Interest, basically a DC lobbying group, was behind the push to get people to switch to 1% and skim milk, pushed the idea that saturated fats are bad, and that trans fats are benign.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Center for Food Safety, another DC lobbying group, has lost basically every major lawsuit it has filed against GM crops, where ultimately science prevailed:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: critics say the term could create confusion am (Score:2)
This, it's a terrible mark of failure in our society that we've created this product labelling standard to cater to anti-science cranks in the first place. What's next, a 5G-free label for electronic devices so they can feel safe from mind control waves?
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This, it's a terrible mark of failure in our society that we've created this product labelling standard to cater to anti-science cranks in the first place. What's next, a 5G-free label for electronic devices so they can feel safe from mind control waves?
Don't give them any ideas!
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If a product 'does not contain' or is marked 'NO " (fill in the blank with bogyman) then people just assume that thing is bad. Some people argue about patents and licenses and dismiss the science. The science is real, it works, it is safe, and we need to use it in a responsible way. If we want unencumbered seed then it needs to be government funded research and development. Makes sense that someone that develops a product wants to sell that product, only selling it once ever to some customers does not
Re:critics say the term could create confusion amo (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong. GMO = ANY genetic modification. Educate yourself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] as an example of something our species that needs that dumbasses spreading false propaganda will keep from us.
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Could be worse (and we may yet get there), see Paolo Bacigalupi 's _The Windup Girl_ or "The Calorie Man"
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If you want to specify that the genes have been edited by CRISPR in a lab, you need a better term than GMO or bioengineered because everything is. A more specific term like "gene edited" would be better.
Re:critics say the term could create confusion amo (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:critics say the term could create confusion amo (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually natural evolution does produce patenable crops, and can also produce sterile crops. Golden Delicious and many other variants of specific plants are naturally evolved and also patented. Bananas have been naturally evolved to be seedless and thus sterile, so they can no longer reproduce any other way than through shoots. Sometimes the farmers also help the evolution along by radiating it, to make more random mutations, this is how the red Christmas flower was created from its natural white variant. Not sure that is much better than "bioengineering", but it isn't GMO.
Re: critics say the term could create confusion am (Score:2)
Pretty much every fruit and many vegetables eaten over the last 2000 years are effectively sterile. A apple is naturally sour and bitter (and seeds poisonous). Any apple seed will naturally kill off the genes we so desire. Same goes for most vegetables.
Reality is that most of the "vegan" diet is just massively mutated offspring of their natural counter parts. Only if you go to seafood or wild meat do you approach the normal natural order.
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You keep talking about sterile crops, but I've been growing GMO crops for decades and none of them (in North America and Europe) are sterile! Most farmers wish they were of course because volunteers in subsequent years are as bad as weeds. Rest assured nearly all grains are not sterile. There was talk at one time about selling sterile seed to third-world countries, but I haven't ever heard of that actually happening. For crops that are not hybrids, keeping back a portion of the harvest for next year's
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Are any of the major (top 20) crops grown in the world naturally found in the wild?
Are there wild crops of corn, oats, or potatoes that are the same genetic makeup of what is commercially grown?
Also, are there wild cows, chickens, pigs, or sheep that can't be genetically distinguished from those raised on a farm?
Re:Bioengineered Is Not Selective Breeding (Score:2)
Genetic Modification or Bioengineering [wikipedia.org] is not selective breeding. From the USDA, "The Standard defines bioengineered foods as those that contain detectable genetic material that has been modified through certain lab techniques and cannot be created through conventional breeding or found in nature.", USDA BE Disclosure [usda.gov]
GE is also useful for vendor lock in. Use our seeds to maximize yield using our pesticides and herbicides, since no plant will naturally have an immunity or our chemicals.
GE is used to cre
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That is to say, if it says GMO on the packaging, the chances are there's no molecules of Roundup at all in the package
Citation needed. It does not disappear magically into thin air. At the minimum, "roundup in food" is a thing on google.
Roundup Ready has been a major part of the food chain now for a good 20+ years, you'd expect, if it were as carcinogenic as you claim, that cancer rates would have gone through the roof. NHL rates, however, have stayed fairly constant since the early 1990s. (Link: https://seer.cancer.gov/statfa... [cancer.gov] - see "Historical trends")
But Roundup itself was introduced in 1976. And the new cases double from 1975 (earliest data) to 1995. And deaths grow by about a half in the same time, although they have dropped down again, probably thanks to improvements in treatment.
Roundup is a herbicide (specifically targeting grasses), not a pesticide.
You got me there. But just to go with the nitpicking here... Just like in bombing brown people overseas, we have collateral damage to keep track of. If it k
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>Roundup is a herbicide (specifically targeting grasses), not a pesticide
Pesticide is a blanket term for products that are meant to control pests and that includes herbicides, insecticides, bactericides, fungicides, etc.
So Roundup is both a herbicide and a pesticide.
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"Roundup is a herbicide (specifically targeting grasses), not a pesticide."
That's stated as if being a "herbicide" gives something a free pass and is 100% safe by default. Agent Orange was a VERY popular herbicide in the 60s and we all know how well that worked out for those exposed.
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Wow! Someone should study the natural pesticides in grounding plants and insects and see if we can CRISPR gene edit it into useful crops!
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No, I will not — even if I wanted to. Roundup degrades in under three weeks [wi.gov].
If this was your only bullshit concern with GMO, let me disabuse you from similar misconceptions on 5G and chem trails... Your choice...
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"Glyphosate’s half-life (the time it takes for half of the active ingredient to degrade) is between 3 days and 19 weeks depending on water conditions. Glyphosate disperses rapidly in water so dilution occurs quickly, thus moving water will decrease concentration, but not half-life. The primary breakdown product of glyphosate is aminomethylphosphonic acid (AMPA), which is also degraded by microbes in water and soil. According to the EPA, available data do not suggest that this compound
Doesn't mean the same thing (Score:2)
Streisand. (Score:2, Informative)
This name change approach is probably the wrong way to address the situation. Triggers the Streisand effect in more folks than anything.
I'm completely OK with GMO. Virtually every thing we grow has had an absurd degree of change by genetic selection over centuries.
The practices we use for genetic modification are far more selective and tested than anything we've done in history. They're not only safe by any standards I can think of, but one of the most tested in all of history if you consider how many fe
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>Not too long from now, basically everything is going to be GMO
You might find this interesting:
"The U.N. Food Systems Summit put biotechnology at center stage, although agroecological innovations offer greater promise for sustainability"
https://www.scientificamerican... [scientificamerican.com]
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Yes, it'd be bad if Monsanto sues all the farmers for pirating their WheatResist+ 2.0(tm)(r) GMO seeds,
That won't happen for two reasons:
1. Monsanto no longer exists.
2. Their GMO patents expired years ago.
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There are other reasons for disliking GMO other than thinking it's poisonous. For example, the possibility of accidentally creating and spreading pest-resistant weeds.
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I'm completely OK with GMO. Virtually every thing we grow has had an absurd degree of change by genetic selection over centuries.
These are different things and carry different risks many of which have nothing at all to do with safety of the product itself.
Creating invasive species, weaponization of IPR regimes against farmers directly or indirectly (e.g. contamination, wind blown seeds), enabling cost reduction initiatives resulting in people ingesting more ****icides than would otherwise be the case.
The practices we use for genetic modification are far more selective and tested than anything we've done in history.
The Agriculture industry and its lobbyists are legendary. If you put a new GMO product on the market you don't have to test it first.
Re: Streisand. (Score:2)
Is that like organic water?
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Did you know that gluten free communion wafers exist?
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In other cases it makes a lot less sense.
For example when I look at the markets in Germany then labeling products has devolved into an advertising market, where companies more or less buy a certificate from a certificate issuing corp
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GMOs aren't the direct problem (Score:2, Informative)
From what I've been able to tell, GMOs themselves aren't the problem - it's the things that GMOs make it possible to do with crops. Making a crop resistant to Round Up isn't a problem. Then proceeding to soak it in Round Up which we then consume IS. I'd eat the GMO all day long as long as I'm not also consuming poison that was put on after. Bring on the golden rice, I say.
But that requires too much nuance for the average person. Much like the whole nuclear weapons vs responsibly managed nuclear power vs nuc
Re:GMOs aren't the direct problem (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, good points about the overuse & abuse of pesticides that Monsanto/Bayer promote.
In addition, there's the problem of intellectual property business models, whereby farmers are effectively "renting" the technology in the seeds & are forbidden from doing any of the things that farmers usually do to save money, recycle, be more efficient, etc.. Also, once you've signed up with Monsanto/Bayer, it's an expensive legal minefield to get out of it. It's terrible for farmers & consumers & that's why the European Union banned it outright. You can't even import food into the EU unless it's clearly labelled as non-GMO. They also test foods for the presence of GMOs.
It's a pity because I believe we could do a lot of good in the world with GMOs if only the right motivations were there. It's one of those examples of a powerful & potentially wonderful new technology but... you know... evil bastards. Monsanto/Bayer are the reason we can't have nice things.
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In addition, there's the problem of intellectual property business models, whereby farmers are effectively "renting" the technology in the seeds & are forbidden from doing any of the things that farmers usually do to save money, recycle, be more efficient, etc..
That is not a GMO thing, that is how modern farming have worked for decades, hybryd seeds are also patented and not allowed to be reseeded by the farmer, something that is not seen as a problem by the farming community since its far cheaper for them to buy new seeds than to be both farmers and seed producers.
Also, once you've signed up with Monsanto/Bayer, it's an expensive legal minefield to get out of it.
Citation needed, you don't sign up with anybody. You simply buy seeds and plant them, most farmers that I know change between different GMO producers and/or hybrid seed producers from season to season d
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>That is not a GMO thing, that is how modern farming have worked for decades, hybryd seeds are also patented and not allowed to be reseeded by the farmer
The rules are rarely the same, GMO ones are much more clear cut, and they depend on what country you are in.
>something that is not seen as a problem by the farming community since its far cheaper for them to buy new seeds than to be both farmers and seed producers.
Depends on the farmer, keeping seeds to plant next season doesn't have to be very compli
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While it's not "complicated" its far more complicated than just buying new seeds since you need special equipment and the extra storage. Another reason is that even if you broke the agreement, a second generation hybrid seed does not give the same yield and crop vigour as the first generation so its simply better business as a farmer to buy new seeds. Also you might not want to plant the same crop the next season.
The rules however is exactly the same since both are covered by patents. If you mean that the G
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>While it's not "complicated" its far more complicated than just buying new seeds
How complicated it is depends on the farmer, farming practices, available funds, environmental context, long term viability, etc. Collecting seeds is an old practice and the idea of it being 'complicated' doesn't even enter the mind of a lot of farmers.
>The rules however is exactly the same since both are covered by patents
In a lot of places and for a lot of products the restrictions on GMO patented seeds are much more re
Re: GMOs aren't the direct problem (Score:4, Informative)
Farmers do not "soak" their crops in anything. Not even water. Farmers do not make a lot of profit, they use the bare minimum to minimize costs to get the necessary results. Commercial Organic actually uses more chems as those are more targeted, needing more types, and spraying all is cheaper than walking the field to see what particular solution is needed in each acre.
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I'd eat the GMO all day long as long as I'm not also consuming poison that was put on after.
You don't eat roundup when you buy food crops with GMO.
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Then proceeding to soak it in Round Up which we then consume IS. I'd eat the GMO all day long as long as I'm not also consuming poison that was put on after.
Your choice of words paint a misleading picture. The herbicide glyphosate (of which one brand is Roundup) is used relatively sparingly [thelifeofafarmer.com], where 600 mL (a Gatorade bottle), or ~0.6 kg, is distributed over an acre (0.4 hectares) of soil, before the crop is planted. The crops themselves generally aren't sprayed with it because they'd be in the way of the soil, which herbicides act on by making it unsuitable for weeds.
This is in comparison to EU-approved organic pesticides (pages 36-37) [europa.eu], where a copper-chemical f
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>Very little is grown without pesticides.
The parents point was lots of GMOs lead to much higher use of pesticides. Which is bad for the environment, which is bad for humans.
How Biotech Crops Can Crash—and Still Never Fail : https://www.scientificamerican... [scientificamerican.com]
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>Having to use more and more pesticide is not unique to roundup
Of course that's not unique to Roundup. The idea that Roundup Ready GMOs facilitated an even faster evolution of Roundup resistance in uncontroversial.
That link talks about the problems faced today by a lot of common and widespread farming practices.
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-insert Nicholas Cage "You don't say!" meme here-
Yes, and consuming some of that is probably nearly unavoidable, even the harsher chemical stuff - the trade off we have for being about to (theoretically) feed our population. But when you genetically modify a plant to survive being saturated in a pesticide that you know will be harmful to humans, and then soak them in it and feed the result to humans, well, the outcome is pretty obvious. But it's still not the GMO hurting anyone, it's the poison.
Spare Time (Score:2)
They don't have to spend their time reading labels, looking for their boogeyman. They should choose a more rewarding hobby.
New bad word (Score:2)
If it isn't wild, it's bioengineered (Score:2, Interesting)
See Gregor Mendel mid 1800s. Nobody bitched about this until Monsanto got involved and tried to apply license fees to agriculture. Fun fact: Last year I bought some strawberries at Costco that were friggin' HUGE. I posted a photo on Facebook. A friend of mine, who happens to be a radical leftist, said "Nice GMO strawberry". Then I posted the photo of the non-GMO label on the box. Yeah, funny how good farming works.
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Quadra-trita-caline, how little did you know political hacks and FUD profiteers would do what Klingons couldn't.
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A friend of mine, who happens to be a radical leftist, said "Nice GMO strawberry".
There are no GMO strawberries. They don't exist.
GMO and IP (Score:3)
No basic food should be covered by intellectual property laws.
I don't care about genetically-modified foods, but I care about who owns the "rights" to those foods.
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"I got just as much right to that mine as he does, now that it's worth something!" -- Charles Foster Kane's father
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No basic food should be covered by intellectual property laws.
1. Non-GMO seeds can also be patented.
2. Most GMO seed patents expired years ago.
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If that's true, then how do the companies that sell GMO seeds make any money?
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If that's true, then how do the companies that sell GMO seeds make any money?
Most farmers buy seeds rather than saving seeds from their harvest regardless of whether the seeds are GMO or not.
Harvested seeds don't breed true if they are hybrids, may be cross-pollinated with incompatible strains from neighboring fields, or may be contaminated with weed seeds. Buying seeds also saves the farmer from the hassle of storing the seeds over the winter without spoiling. Commercial seeds are often treated with fungicide or, in the case of legumes such as soybeans and peanuts, inoculated wit
Better learn to love GMO (Score:5, Insightful)
Increase yield
Withstand brief flooding
Withstand drought
Withstand high wind
The fastest way to do that is engineer the genes.
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There is no GMO resistant to bullets or corruption. This is the biggest problem of food supply. GMO is a solution looking for a problem and a bad solution.
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The fastest way to do that is engineer the genes.
The fastest way to do it is to switch crops, the crops we're predominantly using now were chosen because they offer the best economic performance in ideal conditions and literally not for any other reason. People want white sugar, white flour, clear veg oil etc. and we have chosen the crops that provide the most sanitized experience so that we can make spoiled people happy with consistency at the supermarket.
The other fast way to improve yields is to go back to using human cultivation. I was hoping that cro
Bioengineered sounds like an 80s horror movie (Score:2)
Reading labels? (Score:2)
"The already overburdened consumer is going to have to spend four times as much time in the supermarket reading labels".
How many people (except some extremists) read the labels of EVERY SINGLE FOOD ITEM they buy or eat, and scan for GMOs, and subsequently reject it due to such ingredients? Practically EVERYTHING we eat has been modified through some means.
I scan for just kale and mushrooms... BLECH.
I know the products I buy on a regular basis, and don't bother to read those labels.
No voluntarily reported risk... (Score:2)
Eating bioengineered foods poses no risk to human health, according to the National Academy of Sciences and the Food and Drug Administration
An absence of evidence voluntarily reported by bioengineers is definitely not evidence of absence. Let's not get lost in fallacies.
And, what the FDA claims is not that GMO is 'no risk', but that they are held to the same safety standards as non-GMO foods. Which, includes plenty of things associated with long-term health risks.
For the curious, here's the FDA's own statement [fda.gov] on the matter.
I don't personally worry much about GMO's, but do expect that bioengineers will keep tinkering and sometime in t
Ya, but ... (Score:2)
A phone number or QR code on the packaging may also direct consumers to more information, a decision some argue discriminates against people without access to a cell phone or smartphone, the Post added.
Do people really investigate food using their phones while shopping at the grocery store? While I do read the labels on (usually unfamiliar) things, I can't imagine whipping out my smart phone and doing a deep dive in Aisle 12 to investigate what kind of bio-engineering has been done. I'm pretty sure most people are simply for or against and, if someone cares, all they really need is to see some indication on the label like GMO or "bioengineered" to make their decision.
Double speak (Score:2)
"Doublespeak is language that deliberately obscures, disguises, distorts, or reverses the meaning of words. Doublespeak may take the form of euphemisms (e.g., "downsizing" for layoffs and "servicing the target" for bombing),[1] in which case it is primarily meant to make the truth sound more palatable. It may also refer to intentional ambiguity in language or to actual inversions of meaning. In such cases, doublespeak disguises the nature of the truth.
Doublespeak is most closely associated with political la
Apples are bioengineered (Score:2)
Wait until they hear that apples have been bioengineered for thousands of years.
I can't think of a single food we eat that ISN'T (Score:2)
Apples?
Corn?
Wheat?
Any kind of non-game meat.
Everything we eat is 'bioengineered' in the sense that humans have meddled with it's evolution in a directed, deliberate way.
The apple you ate today looks NOTHING like (and is about 30x the size of) actual apples as they were first encountered by primitive humans.
Re:Why is labeling needed at all? (Score:5, Interesting)
Interesting thought: how many people who won't touch GMO food are perfectly OK with injecting GMO vaccine directly into their bodies?
And conversely how many people who won't touch the GMO vaccine are perfectly OK eating GMO food?
The latter actually makes more sense as your digestive system is designed to shred proteins and DNA. But consistency isn't a strong point either way.
Re: (Score:2)
Horseshoe theory -> more people than you might think are paranoid about both GMO foods and GMO vaccines.