Yesterday we talked to the founder of an on-line provider of organic, and non-GMO, meat and seafood. Their customers pay more for their food. They expect, of course, great quality and healthy supplies of food.
Trying to buy organic and non-GMO, as we see here, is sometimes a slippery slope. Labeling is often misleading or unclear. Bloomberg here captures one example of ambiguity around gene-editing a specific plant versus introducing DNA from other sources. For those of us who are not scientist, is one technique OK and the other unhealthy for us and the planet?
It tells us to get educated, read labels, understand some of the complexities of our agriculture industry and advocate for proper labeling as we've seen in individual states and hope to see federally. Buying local from a proven source helps, but you need to be willing to spend more money.
Farming touches many, many aspects of sustainable movements--use of chemicals, water, treatment of animals, protection of habitat, efficiency, production, a possible shift to regional versus global suppliers. Farmers impact our lives in many ways. This is an important industry that is key to our survival but the preservation of our planet as well. This is a place in which you can make a lasting impact by being a very smart shopper and supporter of triple-bottom line approach to food production. We need to restore health to our soil, fruits, vegetables and raised animals.
USDA passes on oversight of cooking oil new to store shelves
Monsanto, DuPont, Dow developing crops with the new technology
"Products made possible through gene-editing have landed on grocery shelves. Whether they’ll stay there is up to shoppers wary of technological tinkering.
Food companies are now required to label GMOs in Vermont, and debate is raging over a federal standard. But so far, regulators at the U.S. Department of Agriculture have taken a pass on overseeing gene-edited crops. They say cutting DNA from a plant is not the same as adding genes from another organism. So corn injected with outside DNA is classified a genetically modified organism, but canola that can tolerate herbicide because scientists removed a gene is not.
Industry giants like Monsanto Co., DuPont and Dow Chemical Co. have stepped through the regulatory void. They’ve struck licensing deals with smaller companies for gene-editing technology. U.S. farmers harvested 8,000 acres (3,237 hectares) last year of gene-edited canola processed into cooking oil marketed as non-GMO. Looming are U.S. consumers who’ve rejected GMO products despite a preponderance of evidence that they’re safe to grow and eat.
Consumer Feeling
“There’s a feeling among consumers that they want their food as close as possible to what nature intended,” said Carl Jorgenson, director of wellness strategy at Daymon Worldwide, a retail marketing firm. “There’s an overall distrust of Big Food and Big Science.”
Farmers and scientists have manipulated crops for thousands of years. Gene-editing is what proponents call a more precise version of mutation breeding that’s been used since the mid-1900s. Commercial varieties of edibles, including wheat, barley, rice and grapefruit, were created by mutating DNA with chemicals or radiation.
With GMOs, there’s suspicion among consumers. U.S. food companies spent millions fighting labeling requirements, fueling theories that GMOs are unhealthy. And there’s a sense that the benefits of genetically engineered crops have gone mainly to farmers and big agricultural companies that supply seeds and pesticides and not to consumers.
Labeling Laws Are New Front in Battle Over GMO Foods: QuickTake
Doug Gurian-Sherman, director of sustainable agriculture at the Center for Food Safety, said today’s conversations about gene-editing remind him of GMOs in the 1990s -- the rhetoric is lofty and promises abound about healthier food and drought tolerance.
“This is largely unproven,” Gurian-Sherman said. “There’s a proclivity to believe we can develop new, useful technology that will answer tough problems.”
Edited Soybeans
Calyxt, a Minnesota-based subsidiary of the French bio-pharma company Cellectis, has developed genetically edited soybeans that produce oil able to withstand high cooking heat without producing trans fat. Crops are growing in the U.S. and Argentina and could be on the market as soon as 2018. Calyxt is also working on low-gluten wheat and potatoes that make healthier french fries and chips.
“If that mom shopping Kroger sees a bag of potato chips that has less neurotoxins, they may see a value there,” said Daniel Voytas, chief science officer at Calyxt. “We’re very much focused on the consumer.”
There are various forms of gene-editing technology, but the most well-known is Crispr, a platform embroiled in a fight over patents that could be worth billions of dollars. The USDA recently said it wouldn’t regulate Crispr mushrooms that resist browning with age.
Crispr, the Tool Giving DNA Editing Promise and Peril: QuickTake
Gene-editing has applications beyond food. Bill Gates has said the technology can eradicate malaria, and it’s being used to attack other debilitating diseases. Scientists have also used gene-editing to create hornless dairy cows, a DNA modification that eliminates the need to painfully remove them.
Crops are on the forefront of gene-editing because plant DNA is the easiest..."
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