GMOs are a huge issue in current day society. There are always debates on whether or not they are a good thing. On one hand, it allows us to produce at much higher efficiency. On the other hand, their long-term effects have not fully been studied and observed. I personally support them. Even though we covered food waste in class (and in some class activities), we do have issues with poverty and feeding the masses. To reduce our production efficiency even more would make this worse (but I’m not going to argue this in this post). Despite supporting GMOs, I believe that they should be transparent. In this recent article, Monsanto and other large corporations have been lobbying for an act called the DARK act. Now this sounds eerie enough already, and it’s also kind of fitting too. The DARK act would block state laws that require the labeling of GMOs. This is where I say turn on the lights.
We talk a lot about transparency. A lot of the ‘success stories’ we see in class are about a company coming out and being transparent with their practices before they are discovered. With this in mind, it would be a horrible idea for this ‘DARK’ act to pass. While I may support GMOs, I also support the right for the consumer to know what goes in their product. To me, this is a step backwards from where we should be going.
In the internet age, once something is discovered, the information does not disappear. Companies should not be trying to hide things. Whether or not they try to be transparent may be another issue, but hiding things only serves to tarnish their reputation. This DARK act is a direct insult to consumer rights.
Instead of passing legislation blocking labeling, the government should be trying to pass legislation that enforces labeling.
While GMOs and whether or not they are safe for long term human consumption is certainly a hot, and highly debated topic, I agree that consumers should have the right to transparency in what they are buying and consuming.
An interesting and similar case, however that was discussed in my Government and Business class is the regarding country-of-orgin labelling (COOL) being made mandatory in certain states in the US. Opposers of this law claim that it would cause foreign meat in the US market to seem less appealing, and thus lose sales and be a barrier to free trade– something I could see being an argument for Monsanto and other GMO producers. On the supporting side for the argument, supporters state that they have the right to know where their goods come from, which ultimately is what I agree with. The meal labelling law was eventually repealed by US congress, stating that labelling was considered “protectionism” and disruptive to free trade.
Article about US congress repealing COOL in case anyone’s interested: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/meat-labelling-law-repealed-1.3372216