The “Empire Strikes Back” Against California’s GMO Initiative
July 3, 2012
Charges are flying. Here are some facts.
As we have reported many times,
GMO foods are not safe. Remember those rats fed GMO corn whose
offspring were fine but whose grandchildren were sterile? Is this
uncontrolled experiment on human beings a good idea?
The California Right to Know 2012 Ballot Initiative, if enacted in
November, would require GMO food—that is, all food containing
genetically engineered ingredients—to be so labeled in the state.
Consumers all over the US are in favor of this by wide margins. It is
very important because, with the full power of the US government behind
GMO, and huge amounts of money flowing back to Washington from GMO
producers, the only way to stop the GMO juggernaut is to tell consumers
what they are buying.
The usual suspects are mounting a huge disinformation campaign against
the initiative. A leading coalition is StopCostlyFoodLabeling.com, the
funding for which comes in part from the Council for Biotechnology
Information—whose
members include Monsanto, Dow, and other GMO companies.
Peggy Lemaux, an extension specialist in the Department of Environmental
Science at UC Berkeley,
was recently quoted in a National Public Radio piece as opposing the
initiative. She has credentials, but keep in mind that she’s a member of
an agricultural science council that includes all the major biotech
companies, and was recently the recipient of
a financial award
provided by Monsanto.
One of the chief charges against the initiative at the moment is that it
will be used by bounty-hunting trial lawyers to file abusive lawsuits
against food companies, including natural food companies, arguing that
they are selling foods or supplements that contain undisclosed GMOs.
This charge is designed to cause division within the natural health and
natural foods community by frightening off companies that might normally
support the initiative.
Is there any truth to their allegation? Will “Label GMO,” if passed,
turn into a rich source of income for racketeering—legal
bucket shops and bounty-hunting lawyers? In short, no. This is not a
valid charge.
Currently there are many abusive lawsuits going on in California, many
of them associated with an earlier initiative passed in 1986 called
Proposition 65 (formally titled “The Safe Drinking Water and Toxic
Enforcement Act of 1986”). This poorly designed and poorly written law
too often allows lawyers to make false charges against
businesses—particularly supplement companies—for not adequately warning
consumers about trace amounts of heavy metals or other chemicals in
their products. It also allows plaintiffs to keep a “bounty” of 25% of
whatever civil penalties are collected.
The vague rules governing the law and the bounty seem to encourage some
lawyers to try to make a fast buck by shaking down companies for a
settlement prior to going to court. This is possible because, among
other problems, Prop 65 has defined allowable levels of these
contaminants for only about 300 of the over 800 different chemical
elements covered by the law. Not only are some of those defined limits
unrealistically low, but undefined limits mean that any trace may be
considered toxic and actionable.
This is not good science. Metals and other such elements naturally occur
in food; the more natural the product, the more likely that it will
contain what might mistakenly be taken for a contaminant. Our bodies are
designed to remove elements such as lead every day so long as we are not
being flooded with them. It is bad enough for a company to be expected
to test for over 800 different elements and compounds, but to do so with
defined standards on only 300 of them is indefensible.
Label GMO, the current initiative, is not at all like Prop 65. The
differences have been carefully delineated in
a paper by James C. Cooper, PhD in economics from Emory University
and JD magna cum laude from George Mason School of Law, where he is
currently an adjunct law professor. Among the important points Cooper
makes:
Label GMO provides seven years in which producers can gradually reduce
the GMO exposure of their products from no more than 5% to zero.
So long as food or supplement producers have a statement from their
supplier stating that to the supplier’s best belief there are no GMO
elements, the producer is immune from suit.
The same is true if the food is certified organic and certified GMO-free
by an independent organization, or falls into some other categories—the
producer is immune from GMO labeling liability. No doubt it will make
sense for some food producers to help create an independent certifier.
Once a violation has been identified, the producer also has 30 days in
which to correct it, in which case there is no liability.
There is no “bounty” for plaintiffs who initiate lawsuits.
Professor Cooper is not an activist supporting the Label GMO Initiative.
He is a respected scholar pointing out that Label GMO should not be
crudely tarnished with Prop 65’s failings. Indeed, Label GMO was drafted
with Prop 65’s failings in mind. Although both involve labeling and both
allows lawsuits, they are otherwise very different laws.
The opponents of the Label GMO initiative—led and financed, we can
expect, by GMO producers working as surreptitiously as possible—will do
whatever they can to defeat it. They know the initiative is currently
popular with consumers and voters. Consumers naturally want to know what
is GMO food and what is not, and feel, rightly, that they have a right
to know. The GMO producers can be expected to use scare tactics and to
try to enlist natural food companies on their side, or at least blunt
their support for the initiative, by using any charge they think will
stick. Our job is to give you, and California voters in particular, the
facts, pure and simple. Please read
Dr. Cooper’s full report for all the facts about why Label GMO is
not “another Prop 65.”
And stay tuned. This is just one battle in what will be a long, drawn
out, expensive conflict.
The Alliance for Natural Health USA
1350 Connecticut Ave NW, 5th Floor, Washington, DC 20036 Ph: 800.230.2762
www.anh-usa.org
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