By Alyssa Carducci, The Heartland Institute
The mission of the Heartland Institute is to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems.( Smokers Rights )
Sowing Fear
“I-522 is about freedom of choice so we can decide what we feed our families and whether we want to buy and eat genetically engineered foods,” said Trudy Bialic, spokesperson for PCC Natural Markets.
Gregory Conko, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, says consumers have a right to know if products they purchase have negative health consequences. However, requiring producers to provide notice of genetically modified ingredients misleads people into believing a health risk exists, Conko said.
(Steve Forbes: “Over its 25-year history, CEI has played a critical role in preventing the worst of the left's utopian nightmares from becoming reality, and in undoing some of the damage those policies have created.”)
“The use of recombinant DNA techniques—what’s generally referred to as biotechnology, genetic engineering, or genetic modification—to modify foods does not itself make a food more or less safe, or change the nutritional value of a food,” said Conko. “So labeling a product as ‘genetically modified’ gives consumers no useful information.”
‘Betrays a Political Agenda’
Todd Myers, environmental director at the Washington Policy Center, says non-genetically modified (GMO) crops have negative impacts that could be listed on labels as well.
Myers points out non-GMO crops often require more water, more fertilizer, and more herbicides. Each of these factors could harm the environment and even human health.
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