How to Spot a GMO
Want to see something shocking?
So, here's why this is shocking. What this is saying is that of the corn, soy and cotton grown in the US,
- 93% of soy grown in the US is genetically modified (GMO)
- 78% of cotton is GMO
- 73% of corn is GMO
Plus, according to the Non-GMO Project,
- 95% of sugar beets is GMO
- 90% of canola is GMO
These crops are transformed into a myriad of packaged grocery items (cereal, granola bars, salad dressings, chips, soda, etc). It’s estimated 80% of the conventional packaged grocery products in the average supermarket now contain GMOs! The other portion of GMO crops (mostly the corn and soy) is fed to animals.
So what can we do on a local level in response? We recently held a staff training here at City Market to educate ourselves on this big and confusing issue and I discovered something I hadn’t been clued into before.
I’ve always known the certified organic standards require farmers to plant organic seeds and that none of the ingredients in processed organic foods can be genetically modified. But, with around 90% of these commodity crops being genetically modified, there’s a high risk of contamination – when organic farmers plant non-GMO seeds in their fields, GMO pollen can still make its way from neighboring farms (sometimes traveling miles) and contaminate the organic crops.
Wanting to address this contamination issue, several organic food companies got together and started The Non-GMO Project. The Project is a non-profit that works with food manufacturers to certify their products are using best practices to avoid GMO contamination. Companies in the program go through a third-party product verification system – the ingredients in their products are tested for GMO content, their production methods are analyzed to make sure they can track the non-GMO crop through the supply chain, and processing equipment must be cleaned if it is also used to process GMO crops.
We’re going to start putting together education materials on these issues here at City Market so consumers concerned about avoiding GMOs have as much information as possible. While we’re creating information tailored for the products we carry here at City Market, the Non-GMO Project has a database on their website of all the products verified to the Non-GMO standard. They even have free iPhone App you can download and use while you’re in the store.
The label itself is showing up on a few of the products themselves (check out the Lundberg Rice Crackers, just for one example) and we expect manufacturers will begin more widely using this label on their packaging.
Keep in mind as you’re using this tool, many of our local producers don’t use GMOs and aren’t certified by the Non-GMO Project.
What questions do you have about GMOs in food? What resources would you like to see available at City Market?