The Failure of The GMO Labeling Initiative, Strengthens Organic Labeling
Golden rice (right) compared to white rice (left).
Golden rice contains beta-carotene, a precursor of vitamin A, and was the first genetically modified crop in which an entire biosynthetic pathway was engineered.
The failure of the California initiative to label GMO foods, it got me to thinking that maybe it was not a
failure. Corporate lobbyists spent 45 million opposing advertising,-a waste of their profits.
We are already protected from GMO products by buying certified organic foods. It needs to be
shouted out that an item certified organic is a non GMO product. It points again to the methods of
large corporations to diffuse and disorient the purchasing community through mixing messages.
Corporations target niche markets with double talk to fragment and disassociate their consumers from
making practical shopping choices. An example of this behavior has been shown on a campaign to
target low income inner city consumers to not drink public water but to buy their bottled water. The
water they are selling is not spring water, but water from the public water supply (the same as tap
water) The company spins the idea that the water from the tap is not good enough. Water bottling
companies have put up water dispensing vending machines in lower income neighborhoods. This is
the same water that people will get from their own tap. The water dispensing vending machines are a
way to get people to pay more for water. This is how a corporation uses the newspapers and media to
sell their overpriced tap water to people.
Again all the media attention over labeling of GMO products, may be a tempest in a teapot aimed at
dismaying people about their loss of power and inciting a feeling of powerlessness to the people about
their ability to choose good foods without GMO ingredients. At first the initiative looked like a
negative for GMO ingredients, but now that the vote is over and the initiative “failed”, corporations
promoting GMO products can look at this as a media victory for themselves. Instead lets congratulate
ourselves for choosing organic products and for the corporations wasting $45 million for lobbying
against proposition 37, because we are already protected from GMO products by buying certified
organic.
Continuing to do your part in the rejection of GMO products by buying organic food is a great
contribution to improving our food markets. Your purchases are significant, otherwise why would
every single purchase be recorded and inventoried. Lets use the labeling media brouhaha to continue
to use our common sense by buying organic products.
Written by: Cathy Harragian, Bird of the Hand Farm 12/31/12
