WA state GMO labeling people's initiative 522

[Carla_M]

Anybody following this? Anybody placing any bets?

I am all for the passage of the initiative to require labeling of any food products that make use of GMO products. But the big food companies are spending a fortune in their campaign against 522.

info link

[Squirl]

Not going to happen. 

I believe the people of WA can vote it in.  Just as in California vs. EPA and Arizona v. U.S., the federal government will step in under the supremacy clause or interstate commerce clause and invalidate it.

Almost 60-70% of our food supply and probably 80% of processed foods in the supermarket have GMO crops in them.  There is no way the federal government would allow it to stand.

[flyingvan]

Not needed anyway.  Non GMO foods are pretty happy to increase their market share and label accordingly---an excellent example of free market dynamics in action.  Here in The People's Socialist Republic of Kalifornia it's easy to shop non GMO

[Don_P]

The US government, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Monsanto Corporation 

Would you knowingly purchase genetically modified food for human consumption by your family? I'm not asking whether it is good or bad just what your buying decision would be standing in the aisle faced with the openly labelled choice of GMO vs non GMO. Because of that stigma and the stakeholders significant investment in our legislative process I seriously doubt it will stand.

Personally, I have no problem with it being listed right beside red dye #4 on the ingredients panel, it can be in the same fine print. Those that wish to tout one or the other can put it in bold on the package front... I doubt it will be the GMO food doing that.

[Squirl]

By the way, personally I know that much of my food supply is from GMO products.  It is nearly impossible to avoid.  I am one of a small percentage of consumers that took the time to research the food supply chain.

Our society has warning overload to the point were most are ignored.  Because of strict liability (which I also don't think is a bad thing) there are a dozen warning labels on the simplest of products.  I believe the labels will be ignored like everything else. 

I know this topic was about labeling, but I will comment a little on GMO products as a whole.  There is good and bad in everything.  The good is with drought like there was last year, there still was a decent corn crop because they were GMO.  The other good is that it helps keep food costs down.  The other side is things like soy beans with companies including the Monsanto Corp. have 94% of the market in the U.S. and then there is little to no biodiversity left.  They also use legal means and the cost of litigation to keep their monopoly.

http://phys.org/news/2013-06-gmo-corn-soybeans-dominate.html

It just also happens that the two largest crops that the U.S. government subsidizes (corn and soybeans) are also almost exclusively GMO products now.

The US government, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Monsanto Corporation 

[John Raabe]

I voted for it. Labels are updated all the time and it just provides more info for the consumer. There is a lot of money being spent (on both sides). It sounds like Monsanto is hoping to stop it here and kill the momentum.

[Carla_M]

I've done a lot of research into food and GMO too Squirl. It amazes me in a way that if I mention GMO most often I get a raised eyebrow look from most people. Considering that we all stick food in our mouth several times a day it seems that most of us don't care where it comes from or what has been done to it. But then I used to be one of those too. Friends visiting from Germany got me thinking and after putting some efforts into changing what I eat I find myself feeling better, some health issues gone and more full of life. I do read all the fine print too now.

I was just curious if many here were paying attention.

[Don_P]

We gave up trying to label our chickens and eggs as organic or non GMO, we can't reliably find feed that is non GMO. With corn the genetics of the heirloom corn in Mexico are being contaminated by GMO pollen drift. We are losing the original genetic source material. I hope for the best but we don't have a real good track record, it is quite concerning.

http://www.agriculture.com/news/business/no-expt-effect-likely-from-mexic-gmo-b_5-ar34604

As for wheat, the wheat growers said "No thank you" to GMOs and yet;

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-06-20/the-search-for-monsantos-rogue-gmo-wheat

BTW, we are also in the public comment period of FSMA, a change in farming practices which will affect many farmers.

http://sustainableagriculture.net/fsma/speak-out-today/

[MountainDon]

I used to think "ain't science grand!" and marveled at the increase in yield through chemistry and gene manipulation, etc. Now I have lost that former enthusiasm and would very much wish Monsanto and their cousins would implode or something. It would be nice to have a real informed choice. And I read labels too... as long as I take my reading glasses along with me. 

[Windpower]

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/11853

from "Seeds of Destruction"

Henry Kissinger:
"Control oil and you control nations; control food and you control the people."


Many companies are voluntarily labeling foods "Non-GMO" I think we might just win this one  by voting with our pocket books

Non GMO organics is all we buy --- GMO foods will ruin your health

I have lost 18 pounds and am in in the best shape I have been in for 20 years -- this is after 4 months of getting off the junk food and processed foods (largely a consequence of my 'on the road " work life from which I retired)

In this southwest corner of Wisconsin it is amazing how many people are informed -- the food CO-OP's are strongly organic, non GMO and locally produced when possible  (haven't seen any local avocados yet

[diyfrank]

I voted yes. It makes no sense to not label it.
The fact that so much money is being spent to try and prevent it from passing sends up  reg flags.
I think it will be on all labels eventually.

[Squirl]

Don_P you touched on a topic I find most disturbing.  Pollen drift.  With things like Monsanto already having 90% of crops in the U.S. and only 6% of the market as non-gmo, it is difficult to keep the small seed stock left that is not owned and controlled by one company.

Maybe it's just my paranoia or my lack of scientific understanding, but if they can genetically modify these plants to do so many things, why can't they modify them to be sterile?

I'm also curious about Asian expansion.  Asian courts and enforcement of the rule of law on things like patents and copyrights is abysmal compared to the U.S..  What happens when the gmo genetics expands into the Asian seed crops?

I am uncomfortable with one corporation having legal control over an entire species, especially one that is one of our main caloric supplies.  Since the majority of meat calories in this country come from corn and soy and 70% of our supermarket products contain those, a mutated disease could more easily wipe out a large portion of our food supply.

[MountainDon]

if they can genetically modify these plants to do so many things, why can't they modify them to be sterile?

that would cost them extra money though

[curlewdave]

I also just sent in my ballot with a "yes" vote.  The opponents have already poured $33 million into their campaign.  Take a look at the top 5 contributors for a quick realization that the concern is not for the consumers!

[Don_P]

if they can genetically modify these plants to do so many things, why can't they modify them to be sterile?

The "terminator gene", Monsanto owns the patent but after quite a flap has promised not to use it. That promise has actually cost them money and misery. If they could terminate, there would be no possibility of saving seed, you would have to buy seed every year in non hybrid crops, canola, cotton ,etc. They instead have to bully and take farmers to court for saving their patented seed now. But, think for a moment about how well we've done keeping the roundup ready gene sequestered in just the plants we want them to stay in. We have those genes in unintended crops and we have roundup resistant weeds in those fields now too, yup the same weeds the roundup resistant crop seeds were supposed to make easier to kill with roundup are now becoming roundup resistant themselves as the genes drift. NOW, imagine a sterility gene getting loose in the environment and drifting around rendering one species after another sterile. Farfetched, sure... but not that far. If there is a breakdown in the triggering mechanism, we starve. Nature is very good at random evolution with genetics.  Then consider the effect on poor farmers throughout the world who rely on seed saving in order to plant their next crop. BTW the likely source of the pollen that is contaminating Mexico's heirloom corn is from planting imported feed corn, illegal, but done by poor rural farmers inadvertantly. Pandora's box.

Google terminator gene, here is an older article;

http://www.sbs.utexas.edu/genetics/genweb/Essays/Terminator.htm

Do you remember a few years ago when starlink corn, an animal feed corn with built in insecticide, got into corn chips and taco shells sickening quite a few people.

We also have potatoes that have BT built into them to kill the potato beetle. You've been consuming them at Mickey D's and in chips. We have no idea what BT does inside a human. Look at who is on the board at Monsanto, you'll recognize names if you've kept up with government. Look at where people in government positions related to ag have come from, right on into the Supreme Court, you'll see Monsanto more often than is healthy... literally.

[considerations]

"Do you remember a few years ago when starlink corn, an animal feed corn with built in insecticide, got into corn chips and taco shells sickening quite a few people."

So you can extrapolate what it is doing to the the other mammals that are being raised on it...chickens, cattle, etc...and therefore, thusly, eggs, meat, milk. Lovely.

Monsanto was behind that food safety bill that was dancing around Congress a few years ago as well...requiring even the hobby farmer to report how many chickens they have..do you have a vegetable garden, etc., and worded to prohibit even gifting home grown or made foods to others. The New England rep sponsoring it was apparently married to someone high up at monsanto and the legislation was written in large part by their lobbyist staff..."assisting" because of their industry experience. 

Monsanto alone has spent more than 7 million in WA to fight I522. That is about 25% of the opposition spending on this initiative. That is enough right there for me to support the measure.

[Don_P]

Don't forget to scroll back up and read up on FSMA and voice your opinions... the Food Safety Modernization Act. One example, right now our chickens are turned into the garden post harvest to clean up weeds, remove grubs and till. Well chickens do poop but we consider this a nutrient bonus. Under fizzmah we would not be able to replant for 9 months. I can readily apply any non organic fertilizer, herbicides and insecticides and directly replant.

[Pine Cone]

I voted for 522 as well.  I have more than a decade of experience as a forestry researcher at UC Berkeley, and have a pretty open mind about technology.  Add another 25 years of forestry experience and I have more than a passing familiarity with practical genetics and pesticide use. 

I have a good background in statistics and know how long good agricultural or forestry research can take.  I also had a year-long Public Heath Statistics class so I have some appreciation about trying to prove or disprove health risks.  Think about trivial problems like proving that smoking might be bad for your health.  How many decades of research and how many different studies did it take to tobacco companies to admit there might be heath problems associated with tobacco use?  GMO products have been in use for a trivial amount of time so we really have no idea what impacts they might have on ecosystem health or public health.  No one can prove the long-term safety of any GMO crop or derived products.  They have not be in use long enough to for any real long-term study measured in decades instead of months.

Lets assume GMO products are good for you.  As a researcher you want to prove GMO products are safe, causing no more heath products than non-GMO foods.  Without labeling, it would be impossible to have a long-term research study of the general population to determine if GMO products were safe or harmful because you would not be able to know whether or not potential research subjects had or had not used GMO products. 

If GMO products are safe, let the labels get created, do the research, and let Monsanto and other GMO companies make their case.  The argument that GMO products must be safe since they haven't been proven to be harmful doesn't carry much weight.

What many (if not most) people don't know is that much of the genetic modification of food crops is either to make them toxic to common insect pests or to make them more resistant to common herbicides like Roundup (glyphosate). 

This makes it cheaper to grow since growers can lower their losses to insect pests and competing vegetation.  Neither is likely to make GMO products safer or more nutritious or any other benefit to consumer health.  On the other hand, it does seem probable that creating a plant that kills insects might also be creating a plant that might not be that good for people to eat.  Not a huge leap of logic to think that increasing the amount of herbicides used on a crop is not likely to be environmentally neutral, and I'm not excited about eating food that was produced using twice the herbicide as it's non-GMO relative.

Neither GMO modification makes the food safer to consume, and solid scientific proof of any effects on people or animals that consume GMO food/feed will be difficult to get and take years and years, even if labels are mandated.

I don't know if it will raise my food costs or not, but it is a price I am willing to pay to get the information I want. 

[Pine Cone]

Unfortunately the measure lost, about 45% Yes on GMO labels to 55% for no labels, still some uncounted votes out there, but not enough to make the difference.

Just have to try again later...