There are a lot of emotions swirling around GM foods and the rights of consumers to know what they're eating. As Oregon 92 has just been narrowly defeated on a legal technicality, and Maui's GMO Moratorium is under siege by Monsanto, I have decided to look more closely at our government's involvement in this.
Enter HR 4432, officially titled "To amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act with respect to food produced from, containing, or consisting of a bioengineered organism, the labeling of natural foods, and for other purposes."
A short title also exists, for the benefit of PR departments everywhere: "Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2014".
Yum. Let's dig in.
Here is a link to HR 4432 in its entirety, so that you can read and draw your own conclusions. My observations are from reading the entire bill, and especially Sections 103 and 425.
This bill starts by banning states from unilaterally creating GMO labeling laws to inform consumers. It proposes a federal law.
But the real intent lies deeper than that imho. First, the bill redefines terms like "natural" to allow GMOs, if the manufacturer can establish that the presence or absence of bio-engineered DNA is the only material difference.
Second, the bill sets a strong burden of proof on organic small farms that wish to grow and market their products as GMO-free. More on that below.
Third, the bill bans any mention of organic natural foods as being safer or better than their GMO counterparts. Where's the line between saying "Our lettuce won't kill you" versus "If you prefer foods that have not been genetically modified through in vitro recombinant deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) techniques, then you'll love our lettuce"? According to this bill, there is none.
But most sinister is what I will call the bill's virtual protection racket. It works like this. As a small organic farmer, if I want to market my product as GMO-free, I must ensure that the entire path to market - from seed to harvest to processing to transportation to distribution - is certifiably GMO-free. If my product shares any infrastructure with known GMO foods, I cannot claim being a GMO-free, per 425(A). The burden of proof therefore is prohibitively expensive for a typical small farmer, which is what Monsanto, Dow et al are counting on.
Now here's the rub. If I as a small farmer succeed in proving that my entire supply chain is certifiably GMO-free, and yet my product still manages to become "inadvertently" corrupted by bio-engineered DNA, I get an exemption and my GMO-free status is considered legally valid, per Section 425(B).
Why?
It's clever really. If Monsanto or other biotech company manages to infect my crops, they are legally held harmless, because this exemption creates a situation of "no harm" to me, and therefore "no harm" to them. So the bill first limits how many small farmers will even try to get costly GMO-free certification, and then holds the biotech giants harmless from any damage they may do to the relative handful of certified GMO-free farmers. Plus, a small farmer may be less likely to complain as long as their good-faith investment in being certifiably "GMO Free" is protected.
HR 4432 is a very well constructed bill, and a crafty one.