California Failed to Pass Its Genetically Modified Food Labeling Law. Now What?
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By Ariel Schwartz
Despite initial support, a barrage of negative ads helped defeat the state's Prop 37, which means that companies can still sell GM-containing foods without letting consumers know. Now both sides are gearing up for another fight in Washington.
California's Proposition 37, a ballot initiative aiming to label genetically modified ingredients in food, was many things, depending on who you ask: an opportunity for consumers to get transparency in their food products; an affront on family farmers, food companies, and grocers; a lawyer's dream; a chance for the U.S. to catch up to the 50-plus countries that already label GMO foods; and a fear-mongering initiative propagated by people and companies that are against science.
In the end, the public was swayed by the No on Prop 37 campaign, which convinced people that the economic costs were too high and the science didn't make sense. As of November 6, Prop 37 is dead. The deck was stacked against the pro-Prop 37 camp, funded by companies like Nature's Path Foods and Amy's Kitchen, from the start. It just wasn't as well-funded; the No on Prop 37 movement saw pesticide companies like Monsanto and Bayer Cropscience sinking millions of dollars into the campaign. In the last 20 days before the election, No on Prop 37 spent an average of over $1 million each day on an ad blitz, killing the proposition's momentum--it dropped from 67% support in September to 39% support by the election.
Arran Stephens. The big question is: what's next? If the measure had passed, it's likely that GMO labeling would have become a federal issue--California is so large that many companies would have just started labeling products for elsewhere in the country too. Now the organizations and companies that fought to get the proposition on the state's ballot have to look elsewhere. "We're not going to give up: 4.2 million Californians voted for Prop 37. This should be a wake-up call, a signal to [President] Obama," says Arran Stephens, CEO and cofounder of Nature's Path (the company gave $660,000 to the Prop 37 campaign).
The next stop for the GMO labeling movement is Washington State, where I-522 (also known as "The People's Right To Know Genetically Engineered Food Act") is heading to the November 2013 ballot if it garners enough signatures. "It's a new law in Washington that wants to do the same thing but with simpler language," explains Stephens. There was some sticky language that got the Yes on Prop 37 camp in trouble in California--namely, labeling exemptions for alcohol and meat products that come from animals who eat GMO feed as well as a stipulation that .5% of microingredients in a product could contain GMOs and still be labeled GMO-free.
Editor's NoteWhat do we know about genetically modified food?
*You're already eating a lot of it; more than you think.
* It might be dangerous (then again, it might not).
* If you're worried, you can use this app to help figure out what foods contain it.
* Oh, and it might be making you fat.
Says Stephens: "Some people misinterpreted that to say 'Oh, you have a different standard than the European standard of .9%.' In Prop 37 it was .5% for each microingredient so the total aggregate could be higher, but it was a point that was argued in great hairsplitting detail to the extent where the bigger prize was forgotten or bypassed." I-522 will take out the exemptions and clarify the microingredient issue. There's no question, however, that the big pesticide companies will fight just as hard to make sure it doesn't pass.
While most of Nature's Path's business is in the U.S., Stephens lives in Canada. He hopes to take on labeling there as well. "The Canadian situation is worse than the U.S," he explains. "In the U.S, in certain states, you can pass state laws that give consumers protection independent from the federal government, but in Canada that's not the case. We're getting our ducks in a row and tackling bureaucracy in Canada."
There are plenty of people who don't care about labeling, as evidenced by the fact that Prop 37 didn't pass. And in fact, GMO foods might be 100% safe for human consumption. We just don't know. The FDA doesn't require GMO foods to go through a safety assessment process, and the pesticide industry has used patent control of its GMO crops to stop independent research.
Big pesticide companies will fight just as hard to make sure the Washington law doesn't pass. Here's what we do know: Between 1996 and 2011, toxic herbicide use increased by 527 million pounds due to the growing use of herbicide-resistant GMO crops. And continued use of GMO crops (and associated herbicides) is breeding superweeds and superpests.
Labeling isn't the same thing as taking GMO food off the market, but it has proven in other countries to make consumers wary. In fact, companies like Monsanto initially supported labeling in Europe, but "found that consumers didn't buy products that were labeled, so they switched tactics," according to Stephens. There's reason for them to be skittish.
Whatever happens in Washington, the pro-labeling movement will press on. "I'll never give up on this thing. I'm going to go down with my boots on," says Stephens. "Even though we may lose a couple of battles, this is a far bigger struggle and it's not over by any means."
Copyright 2012 by Fast Company. Reprinted with permission.
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10 Comments
Add CommentWhat now? how about we focus on more important things rather than trying to put useless labels on our food. I gladly voted against Prop 37.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCalifornia is broke. How were we going to pay for this program?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm all for science and I'm all for good product labeling. When we label cigarettes or alcohol its because we *know* the hazards. Requiring labeling for something that *might* be a hazard is not the same. Folks that are worried already have an option to buy food labeled as 100% Organic. We already have a label that covers *might* be a problem, we didn't need another one.
It has been scientifically demonstrated that humans are very easy to brain wash.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe first problem is the fact it was a proposition. This is a representative republic and not a direct democracy, so if the politicians cant do their job, making and passing laws, then those politicians need to be replaced.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThen looking at the ridiculous law it was far more than it seemed as most laws are. It should only take a couple of sentences to say identify GM food. Not all of that nonsense in the law and in the end it was in fact true that it would simply have cost consumers more money to pay for something with limited benefit and likely just giving trial lawyers yet another excuse to scam money through ridiculous lawsuits.
It is not that hard to avoid GM modified food, if a like that is needed to get around the fact that some people are too lazy to pay attention to what they eat, then it sort of proves the law was ridiculous to begin with.
There is nothing else to do, if California lawmakers want this law, they should pass it. Thats it.
As to "catching" up to the 50 countries, not sure where they are but the rest of the world has not proven itself to be all that useful when it comes to law, so that is hardly an argument. What has probably really happened and was avoided here is the Food industries would have used this labeling to put any kind of crazy food additive or GM substance in the food and because they Labeled it, then somehow they are absolved of any sort of problems those additives may cause. At least without the label, those companies have to be careful about what they do and claim.
100% Organic is, when it exists, an expensive and rigorous standard. Most food on the shelves of stores today has undergone some sort of genetic manipulation at some period. What we have done is to open an irreparable hole in one of the toughest defenses of the general public, not by neglecting any one thing, but by generally lowering lowering standards of responsibility.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's not Ca.'s fault that this should fall solely on their shoulders, though they certainly led the parade for such changes. Politicians all fall victim to particular psychoses provided they describe a large enough demographic. Business concerns have always been tempted against legitimate responsibility.
What is so uncomfortable about the present necessity is that it is a direct result of modern method and criteria. These factors became the fodder of philosophical dare long ago. We have marginalized responsibility, even adulthood, and the remedy may be as destructive as the result.
"100% Organic is, when it exists, an expensive and rigorous standard."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy would labeling fro GMO be any different? According to your post we could slap a GMO sticker on just about everything, how does that solve anything?
Regulation is great when it makes sense and can be made to work. When it doesn't make sense and doesn't work well then the regulation itself is a much of a problem as what it was trying to solve.
Temper the the article above with this one:
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/science-sushi/2012/11/07/prop-37-fails-scientists-cheer/
What about labeling the stupidity of politicians and "well-intentioned" citizens?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy not a proposition to ban contrails (what are they spraying on us?) another to eliminate all vaccines (MMR causes autism!!!) and still another one to make pi equal to 3 (who needs all those pesky decimals anyways?).
Does the definition of genetic modification include selective breeding?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou know what really annoys me about this argument? The "Superweeds" labeling...intimating that it's something "superbad", super-noxious, and super-incidious. When they stoop to meaningless hyperbole, they undermine their credibility. What's super about a super weed vis-a-vis organic non-GMO plants? So it's resistant to a herbicide. You don't use herbicides on organic foods anyway (which is about the only thing that is likely to be non-GMO these days). So who cares if the weed resists a herbicide other than the GMO plant grower? It's not like the weed can take over the world. All it *might* do is force all agriculture back to the old days when a field had to be hoed to remove a weed. I bet anti-GMO folks as a class would think that's a good thing anyway.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScare mongering.
It's all well fine and good, as some above posters have noted, to provide information, but it has to be meaningful information. Scary words like "herbicide" and an increase of "527 million pounds" (which is a completely meaningless statement without knowing the baseline), or "Superweed" are a disservice. And you know the general public, with no understanding of what GMO really is or what specific GM was employed would have it even worse.
Plus the primary herbicide used these days for GMO weed resistance is glyphosate...which isn't thought to be dangerous to animals anyway.
No, I don't believe GMO's include selective breeding. I do agree that people concerned about eating GMOs, like myself, can simply buy organic food, which does not have GMOs. But, I am still for the labeling requirement because it brings attention to this important issue to the lesser informed population. And, it is proven that labeling reduces the amount of GMOs sold, which will therefore reduce the amount of Roundup being sprayed on our land, and promote the growth of smaller organic family farms.
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