Colorado, Oregon Voters Set to Decide GMO Labeling Rules
Ballot initiatives in Colorado and Oregon could change the way GMO food products are labeled. Zeljko Radojko / Shutterstock.com
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With no federal guidelines in place, the big battle over genetically modified food products is playing out at the state level.
The complex issue of GMO labeling for food products is being considered by voters in Colorado and Oregon, and both supporters and opponents seem to agree that the topic of genetically modified organisms is so complicated that a better approach would be comprehensive federal legislation.
“Someday I could believe there will be a national labeling law that would cover this,” said Don Ament, a former Colorado state lawmaker and agriculture commissioner who is an unpaid spokesman for the No on 105 campaign in Colorado.
In the meantime, he said labeling GMOs on a state-by-state basis would be confusing and debilitating to states that pass such laws, putting farmers and food producers in those states at a major competitive disadvantage.
But former Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich says big agricultural companies have pumped so much money into lobbying efforts that Congress is unlikely to ever act on GMO labeling, leaving it up to state legislatures or the citizen-initiative process.
“Anyone who says we’ll handle it at a federal level just isn’t aware of the extraordinary efforts that have been made over the last 15 years to block anything from happening at a federal level, and everyone knows that our federal government right now is up for sale,” Kucinich, who tried to pass legislation for 15 years but never got a bill out of committee, told GovExec State & Local in an interview.
Laboratory modifications to seeds and other farming products have revolutionized agriculture in recent years, Ament said, allowing him to use far less water and essentially zero pesticides on his own Colorado farm.
But health concerns have prompted 64 countries around the world to enact either GMO labeling laws or bans despite a wealth of scientific evidence pointing to the overall safety of GMOs.
Still, Ament said he understands why people are concerned about what they’re eating, which is why he would like to see the federal government tackle the issue and put consumers’ minds at ease.
“That whole [legislative] process gets to be a compromise so that you come out at the end with something that’s meaningful. Now we’re just going to vote on this ‘yes’ or ‘no,’” Ament said of Colorado’s Proposition 105. “It doesn’t tell you what’s in the product or anything like that. It just says it’s genetically engineered. That raises serious questions. What does this mean?”
Larry Cooper, co-chair of Right to Know Colorado, said in an interview that people deserve to know if common food items are produced from seeds that have been injected in a laboratory with DNA, bacteria or protein to make them more insect- or weed-resistant. He points to a report that food giants Monsanto, Kraft and PepsiCo have pumped nearly $7.5 million into a $12 million campaign war chest to oppose 105.
“This is not a ban, it’s not a warning label, it’s just a simple label,” Cooper said. “Right now we’re choosing blindly, we’re not educated, we’re not informed, and there’s no transparency. The bottom line is: Why can’t we know what’s in our food? What are they trying to hide?”
Right to Know Colorado has amassed a more modest $600,000 from 2,200 individual donors, Cooper said.
In Oregon, a record $18.7 million from Monsanto, PepsiCo, Mead Johnson and Dow AgroSciences has reportedly been pumped into the No on 92 Coalition to fight Measure 92, while at least $7 million has been pulled in by the Yes on 92 campaign—making it the costliest ballot issue in Oregon history. Late polling shows the measure trailing.
Similar citizen initiatives have failed in recent years in both California and Washington state, so if either measure passes in Colorado or Oregon this coming week, it would be the first-ever voter-approved GMO labeling law in the United States.
The Vermont legislature earlier this year passed a GMO-labeling law and the state is now being sued by major food producers in order to overturn the bill. Lawmakers in Maine and Connecticut also passed labeling laws earlier this year that won’t go into effect until more surrounding states pass similar legislation.
“If Monsanto and others are successful in blocking this at the federal level, which they have been, then the only recourse that people have is at the state level, and people in the states have a right to do this,” Kucinich said.
David O. Williams is a freelance journalist based in Eagle, Colorado.
(Image via Zeljko Radojko/Shutterstock.com)
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