Celebrating Choice this October

October is Non-GMO month. Sponsored by The Non-GMO Project, Non-GMO Month was created to raise awareness of the proliferation of genetically modified organisms in our food supply and to offer an alternative to eating them. We should all be celebrating.

I’m sure my regular readers know all about GMO foods (I write about it at least once a year) but there are many people who are still unaware that this technology exists and that they are definitely consuming it (whether they want to or not). Loyal readers, bear with me while I start off with an explanation of what GMOs are and why you might not want to eat them.

GMOs (Genetically Modified Organisms, also known as Genetically Engineered (GE) foods) are foods that have been bred, not in the age-old way of crossbreeding the same species to get better traits, but by inserting genes from a completely different species into a plant or animal to, hopefully, get a new trait.

Proponents of genetic engineering will tell you that these new foods, which could never occur naturally, are perfectly safe to eat, won’t cause any environmental damage. and are the only way to feed the 7 billion people now living on the planet.

The companies who created these Frankenfoods (mostly Monsanto, DuPont, Syngenta) conducted the safety studies, so, of course, the tests show there is no harm in planting or eating GE foods.

Under industry pressure, laws were passed in the 90s that allow GE food to quickly enter the marketplace if they are found to be “substantially equivalent” to their non-genetically engineered cousin. However, since gene splicing is not an exact science and the substantially equivalent test only looks for known components of the foods, this way of evaluating the safety of these novel foods is flawed. New toxins could be created and we wouldn’t know from the substantial equivalency test. Only if the new toxins were allergenic (like in the case of Starlink corn) would we know right away. Some toxins could take generations of eating GMOs to discover, as some of the new testing on rats and mice is showing. Strangely enough, when it comes time for the biotech companies to patent their new foods, they claim that they are completely novel.

Biotech companies have touted that GMOs will reduce herbicide and pesticide use and increase yields, thus causing less environmental harm and putting more money in farmers’ pockets. Recent reports of superbugs that have developed immunity to pesticides and super weeds that can withstand heavy doses of herbicide cast doubt on these claims. Studies also show that the money being made on these crops is ending up in the seed companies’ pocket, not the farmer’s.

The majority of genetically engineered plants on the market either have the Bt bacteria (Bacillus thuringiensis, a naturally occurring soil bacteria that is used as a pesticide) inserted into every cell of the plant or they have one of their genes reengineered to tolerate specific herbicides. None of the genetically engineered plants on the market today are designed to increase nutrition value and early claims of increased yields that would feed the world are not coming true. Scientists are also starting to discover Bt in the human digestive track, a place biotech companies said it would never end up. What its effects are, we don’t know.

If you are still with me, you might be wondering if 90% of the soy, 85% of the corn, 90% of the cotton, 90% of the canola, 95% of the sugar beets grown, and soon a huge percentage of alfalfa, in the US are genetically engineered why we can’t tell if we are eating them and why so many people believe they never have (if you are one of those people, I hate to burst your bubble, but if you’ve eaten any processed food or any conventionally raised animals in the last ten years, you’ve eaten GMOs)

Although at least 40 other countries require GMO foods to be labeled, the United States does not. Up until now, the only way to try and avoid eating GMOs was to eat only organic, especially if the products contained any known genetically engineer ingredients (i.e. corn, soy, cottonseed, sugar beet, alfalfa, squash, papaya, milk, and now sweet corn). However, eating organic is not a sure fire way to avoid them. There is plenty of room for contamination and most processed organic foods contain some non-organic ingredients. And those non-organic ingredients are the ones most likely to contain GMOs.

That’s where the Non-GMO Project comes in. The Non-GMO Project is a non-profit, third party certifier that tests and verifies products are substantially (more than 99.1%) free of genetically modified organisms. If you’re like me and you’re not convinced that GMOs are safe and want to be able to decide for yourself if you want to eat them or not, the Non-GMO verified label is the only way to be sure.

Last October was the first time Non-GMO month was celebrated. At the time, there were about 1000 products certified. This year there are over 3000 and many of them now bear the non-GMO Verified label on the package. There are thousands more products that are enrolled and waiting for testing results. If we buy only non-GMO verified products in October, we will send a strong message that we want to know what’s in our food and we’re willing to pay for it.
Maybe then, food producers and government officials will start listen to consumers (rather than Monsanto execs) and traditionally bred crops will once again be the norm. Until then, I’m looking for that label.