Saturday, March 9, 2013

Whole Foods to require labels on genetically modified products - Los Angeles Times

Whole Foods to require labels on genetically modified products - Los Angeles Times

Whether such businesses are motivated by goodwill, the promise of profit from sympathetic consumers or the threat of impending legislation is unclear. But Whole Foods' move will be copied by competitors, said Scott Faber, vice president for government affairs for the advocacy organization Environmental Working Group.
"Clearly, they're going to be the first of many retailers who will require labeling as a condition of sale in their stores," he said.

But for now, tackling the crusade on genetically modified organisms will be tricky, said James Richardson, senior vice president of food research firm Hartman Strategy.

Other trends propelled by large retailers have the benefit of being easy to understand. The low-sugar push, the gluten-free movement and more "aren't hard to grasp and are tied to immediate, palpable concerns such as digestive health and weight," Richardson said.

Concerns about genetically modified food, however, are a fairly new phenomenon and are often steeped in complicated science. Until more companies choose to label products featuring modified DNA, the main consumer reaction to isolated efforts such as Whole Foods' order will be puzzlement, Richardson said.

"There's not a big interest among mainstream consumers in avoiding GMO because it requires them to have a fairly complex, intellectual sense of what it even means and why it's a problem," he said. "Sugar is much more terrifying than an abstract fear like that."

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