Historic California GMO Mandatory Labeling Proposition Up For Vote

By Clem Nilan, General Manager

Californians are embroiled in a debate on the merits of labeling genetically modified food. Voters will decide on November 6 on Proposition 37: the mandatory labeling of foods containing GE ingredients. It's a high profile contentious vote with national ramifications. As is often said, as California goes, so goes the nation.

We in Vermont have first-hand experience trying to pass a GMO labeling bill. The bill was withdrawn despite polls showing overwhelming popularity with the public and support from the very top. Governor Peter Shumlin was quoted in the Burlington Free Press saying he thinks consumers have a right to know what’s in their food.  But the Governor feared the labeling law, which would have been been the first in the nation, would not withstand a constitutional challenge. The state’s effort to require labeling of milk that contains bovine growth hormones was rejected in court in 1996. Under threat of a lawsuit from Monsanto, Vermont gave up on passing a labeling law this year, awaiting the outcome of the California vote where the stakes are very high.

 In an August 21 article in the San Francisco Chronicle, authors Grant Lundberg, CEO of Lundberg Family Farms, and Kathryn Phillips, director of Sierra Club California, wrote, “Voters will decide on an issue this November that affects us all: our right to know what's in our food. Many food products on market shelves in California - from baby formula, to corn flakes, to soy milk - contain genetically engineered ingredients that are hidden from consumers. Millions of Californians are saying: We want to know, and we have the right to know, if our food has been genetically engineered.”

In the same newspaper on the same day, Dr. Henry Miller, a fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, writes, “This food-labeling scheme - written by trial lawyers who hope for a windfall if it becomes law - has many flaws: It creates a new bureaucracy, has huge loopholes and hidden costs and will result in higher grocery bills.” 

Proponents of the legislation point out that the European Union has no such problems where mandatory labeling of GM food has been going on since 1997.   Even Prince Charles has weighed in on the issue saying that multi-national companies were conducting an experiment with nature which had gone "seriously wrong" and relying on "gigantic corporations" for food, he said, would result in "absolute disaster".

From a much less lofty perch, our Co-op’s position is to strongly support GMO labeling so that our members may make informed choices. We’re not a minority.  The organic watchdog group Cornucopia reports, “Recent polling indicates almost 70% of citizens support informational labeling.” In May, Vermont Public Radio reported that “four separate polls found that more than 90 percent of Vermonters support requiring labels on food made with genetically modified seeds.”

Cornucopia reports that over $26 million has been donated by “corporate agribusiness fighting Prop 37,” while only $2.6 million has come in from the organic side.  Cornucopia reports, “Biotechnology corporations and corporate agribusinesses have collectively donated millions of dollars to defeat Proposition 37.  Monsanto alone has donated $4.2 million, while food giants Pepsico and Coca-Cola have each donated more than $1 million.”

What is very troubling according to Cornucopia is that many natural food companies including Naked Juice, Silk, Horizon, Santa Cruz Organic, Morningstar Farms, Honest Tea, and Lightlife have contributed money to fight Proposition 37.  Less known is that the above-mentioned companies are owned by corporate parents such as General Mills, Coca-Cola, and ConAgra.

With Prop 37, California voters will decide more than the future of their state. The ripples of this vote will certainly be felt here in Vermont.