World According To Monsanto, pt 7, Informed Consent

Would it be all right with you if your parents, if you are an adult on your own recognizance, were still allowed to decide what cities or towns you could live in? Would your answer be any different if your parents were real estate agents and would probably make good decisions?

Would it be all right with you if the government made up a national menu and required you to eat only that food to conform? Would your answer be any different if the menu contained your favorite foods?

Well, I think I'd have to say no on both counts, and in case of both contingencies.

Believing in self-determination, free will and informed consent as I do, I couldn't approve of such policies. This is the level of choice that I see being removed from each of us when the government refuses to require the labeling of transgenic foods.

By way of self-reported studies and captive university research laboratories whose future grant funding depends on the favor of the biotech industry, the FDA has approved numerous transgenic crops that are processed in the regular food supply and sold to an unsuspecting marketplace.

They've been allowed to patent self-replicating, living organisms and release them into the wild without the public even having a chance to debate the implications.

'Oh,' the biotech folks will say, and have said in the comments at this blog, 'but you can buy organic food.'

First, it's as ridiculous that I should have to pay a premium to have food that wasn't sprayed with poison in the first as that I should have to pay a premium in order to know what I'm eating. Second, I can't be sure that I know what I'm eating, not even if I buy organics.

Transgenic contamination found in wild Mexican corn:

NOW it's official: genes from genetically modified corn have escaped into wild varieties in rural Mexico. A new study resolves a long-running controversy over the spread of GM genes and suggests that detecting such escapes may be tougher than previously thought. ...

Organic standards didn't used to cover transgene contamination in 2001, when this farmer actually went to the trouble and expense of testing his crop:

David Vetter wants the biotechnology industry to keep its genes off of his Nebraska organic farm. ... Genetic testing revealed .1 percent Bt contamination of his 2000 corn harvest. Given that he had verified the purity of the seeds, Vetter attributes the problem to cross-pollination with transgenic corn on nearby fields.

... For consumers to expect a guarantee that all organic foods are free of unwanted genes is unrealistic. ... Testing for any kind of genetic or chemical residue has never been required, says Annie Kirschenmann, of Farm Verified Organics, an organic certifier in North Dakota. ...

And really, they still don't, not as of 2008, since which time very little has changed:

... But once the [USDA] declares a transgenic crop safe, granting it "unregulated status," it treats the crop as identical to any other plant. No one tracks whether it's spreading into conventional or organic crops, said John Cordts, a biotechnologist with the inspection service who wrote the environmental assessment for deregulating Roundup Ready sugar beets in 2005.

Cordts noted that U.S. organic standards don't require organic farmers to test for the presence of genetically modified strains -- only to make good-faith efforts to avoid them. ...

This question has even affected papaya farming:

... "We found that I had unknowingly planted a single GMO seed in the middle of the orchard," [Toivo Lahti, an organic farmer on the Big Island,] said. "The pollen from this tree contaminated and made suspect all the papayas on the farm. We cut them all down and lost our seed source and thousands of dollars."

... "Now we know that UH is also selling contaminated papaya seeds, so even if farmers buy non-GMO seeds from the university, they could still be planting the genetically-engineered tree," Lahti said. ...

And will organic farms always be decertified if contamination is found? One reporter got very confused answers on this:

... But when the reporter from the Mercury News tried to get answers that were in alignment with what is public policy, it wasn't so simple. He wrote Jeff [Fiorovich of Crystal Bay Farm]: “Decertification appears to be a very confused topic. I spoke with folks at CCOF and the state, and looked at the USDA's regs. I sounds as if they generally won't decertify an organic farmer if his or her crops are contaminated. But they also ssid decertification could happen under some circumstances. It's all very hazy.” ...

The Union of Concerned Scientists address this question in an FAQ:

Can I avoid engineered contaminants by buying organic food?

Yes, for the most part. Organic standards forbid the use of genetically engineered seeds and inputs in agriculture. The organic industry is doing everything it can to avoid contamination with genetically engineered DNA and to a large extent it is succeeding.

But organic farmers cannot avoid pollen coming into their fields and cannot readily detect genetically engineered seed mixed into the seed they purchase, so sometimes, through no fault of their own, organic producers are not able to deliver the pure product that their customers want.

Even if engineered DNA is occasionally found in organic food, consumers should not lose faith in organic agriculture. No sector of the food system is trying harder to meet consumer demand for choice. ...

So, in other words, no. I mean, mostly. Well, kind of. Okay, look, we're really, really trying. That's as good an answer as you can get to the question of whether it's even possible to avoid eating genetically modified food.

You can't know for sure what it's in. You can't know for absolute sure what it's not in. Not only can't you know, no one knows, not without expensive, because no one can control the spread of wind-carried pollen that can be carried for miles on a gusty day - this, anyone who understands grass reproduction (and grains are grasses) at the most basic level can tell you at once. No one can control the spread of pollen carried by insects, either - the plants dependent on insect pollination won't bear fruit or seeds if not pollinated, so you can't screen them off from the world and still get a crop.

Therefore, you can't consent to having purchased and eaten genetically modified food. No one ever asked you. No one will ever tell you. For the same reasons, you can't even truly say yes to eating them. There's no 'GMO Aisle' in the grocery store where supporters of biotech foods can proudly go in order to tell the world that they've stopped worrying and have learned to love our new, transgenic overlords.

You cannot, in short, exercise consent in this matter.

Whatever else may be said about GMO/GE crops, this remains a serious moral sticking point with me. The authoritarian means by which genetically modified crops have been forced on the public, the monopolistic control of the seed industry over the food supply, the patenting of adventitious lifeforms, the lack of transparency and anti-trust enforcement, it just goes on and on and on.

How can a society with democratic values trust people who behave this way towards us?

There are simply questions that other people shouldn't be allowed to decide for another adult on their own recognizance, and what we are and aren't allowed to eat ranks pretty high up on the 'none of your f*ing business' scale. We can make suggestions, offer opinions and give advice, - we're human, hard to help that vice - but there it should end. Because this is a level of compulsion that's simply wrong on its face.