USDA proposes allowing organic seal on GM foods
Proposed regulations could add thousands of food products to organic category

by Sustainable Food News
April 1, 2009

If NOP has its way, most foods on supermarket shelves will bear organic seal

Spoiler Alert: Yes, folks, this is our attempt at an April Fools joke.

Under pressure from some of the largest biotech firms in the world, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Organic Program (NOP) said Wednesday it has proposed allowing food products made with genetically engineered organisms to carry its green and white organic seal.

Currently, organic regulations forbid the use of GMOs in the production of certified-organic foods. The NOP’s new proposal calls for including food and beverage products made with up to 75 percent GMOs into the organic category.

If approved, the new rule could mean the addition of thousands of products bearing the organic seal on supermarket shelves.

The move comes after heavy lobbying from Field to Market, a coalition of grower organizations, agribusinesses, food companies and conservation organizations that advocates for “increasing agri-productivity while decreasing environmental impact, improving human health through access to safe, nutritious food and improving social and economic well-being of rural communities.”

Some Field to Market members include: American Soybean Association, Bayer CropScience, Cargill, Monsanto, ConAgra, DuPont, Grocery Manufacturers Association, National Corn Growers Association, National Potato Council, The Coca-Cola Company, The Fertilizer Institute, Kellogg Company, The Nature Conservancy, and the World Wildlife Fund.

“Consumers need to know that GMO corn and soybeans are really no different than their organic counterparts,” Darrell Giamiam, executive director of Field to Market, part of The Keystone Center, told Sustainable Food News. “Through painstaking, scientific trial and error, we have perfected GMOs to react identically within the human body. The bottom line is – it’s all good.”

Allowing foods made with GMOs is a “good first step toward creating a comprehensive methodology that can become the standard for defining and measuring agriculture sustainability,” said Dr. Lirpa Sloof at the WWF’s GMO research facility in Sofia, Bulgaria.

But some in the organic food industry say there is a reason GMOs were banned from organic food production when the rules were written nearly 20 years ago.

“We are astounded by the NOP’s willingness to bend to the influence of billions of dollars from these [biotech] companies,” said Bob McGinnigan, executive director of the Organic Food Alliance. “GMOs will kill you - maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow.”

The NOP said it will consider re-evaluating the proposal if the organic industry would also like to make a "donation" to its just-announced field trip to Cancun, Mexico.

Once again, this is an April Fools joke. (Dr. Lirpa Sloof is Dr. April Fools).