9 August 2015
Why I Hope They Label GMO Foods
Posted by Dan Satterfield
Just saw a story on the BBC that Scotland has banned GMO crops. I wonder if they know that every crop growing there now has been genetically modified by humans and nature countless times? The folks that passed the ban have been genetically modified as well!
I actually hope that they do make labelling of GMO foods mandatory. Actually, I don’t see why they shouldn’t proudly display it on the products. In general that means less insecticide was probably used, and it will taste better.
That seems like a win-win to me.
If someone comes along with some rigorous scientific evidence that these foods are not good for me, I’d likely change my mind, but I doubt that will happen, since most of what I have eaten for the past 50 years has been modified, and I’m still alive. The cold wind off the North Sea is making Sagan’s candle flicker tonight….
Dan Satterfield has worked as an on air meteorologist for 32 years in Oklahoma, Florida and Alabama. Forecasting weather is Dan's job, but all of Earth Science is his passion. This journal is where Dan writes about things he has too little time for on air. Dan blogs about peer-reviewed Earth science for Junior High level audiences and up.
Dan, the real problem with GMO food plants is not whether they’re healthful or not but the ecological consequences. Glyphosate (Roundup) resistant crops reduces the need for weeding but some of that resistance has been transferred to weeds themselves. As a result farmers have gone back to 2,4-D and atrazine or combinations of all three, leading to weeds that are multiresistant.
Well, there have been studies that show the accumulation of glyphosate in Round-up Ready GM soybeans. I think I would want to know if I’m consuming these particular products.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308814613019201