Rogueish

thenoobyorker:

How California’s GMO Labeling Law Could Limit Your Food Choices and Hurt the Poor - Freakonomics Blog [via think on this]

“The American Medical Association resolved this week that “there is no scientific justification for special labeling of bioengineered foods.” The association has long-held that nothing about the process of recombinant DNA makes genetically engineered (GE) crop plants inherently more dangerous to the environment or to human health than the traditional crop plants that have been deliberately but slowly bred for human purposes for millennia. It is a view shared by the National Academy of Sciences, the World Health Organization, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the U.N., the European Commission, and countless other national science academies and non-governmental organizations. And yet Californians will consider on their November ballots a law that mandates cigarette-like labeling of food derived from GE plants. Proponents claim to promote opportunities for consumers to make informed choices about the foods they eat. But to build support for the measure, they have played on consumer fears about a promising technology that is nevertheless prone to “Frankenfoods” demagoguery. If successful, they may well imperil the ability of Californians, and consumers around the world, to choose a technology that scientists contend could end hunger and malnutrition, lift hundreds of millions from poverty, and reduce the environmental impact of feeding an evermore populous world.”

This is why discussion of GMOs is so annoying; this starts off with a perfectly reasonable objection to largely unfounded fears about health effects of GMOs, but  then ends with bullshit (and, yes, Monsanto propaganda) about genetic modification ending malnutrition and poverty, which are political problems rather than biological ones, and problems which are perpetuated by the agribusinesses that control most of the implementation of genetic engineering in food.