WASHINGTON, D.C. - The Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) and other trade groups have filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging Vermont’s GMO labeling law. The lawsuit comes at a time when new, recent surveys revealed that an overwhelming amount of Americans believe that genetically modified foods should be labeled accordingly.
GMA issued a statement calling Vermont’s mandatory GMA labeling law, Act 120, a “costly and misguided measure that will set the nation on a path toward a 50-state patchwork of GMO labeling policies that do nothing to advance the health and safety of consumers.” The Snack Food Association, International Dairy Foods Association, and the National Association of Manufacturers are supporting GMA’s charge against Vermont.
Vermont became the first U.S. state to require labels on foods containing genetically modified ingredients when Governor Peter Shumlin signed the bill into law last month. Maine and Connecticut have previously passed similar laws, but they won’t take effect until other states follow suit, according to local news station WPTZ. Vermont’s law takes effect in July 2016. Lawmakers in Massachusetts, Oregon, Colorado, and New York are also considering labeling proposals, according to MintPress News.
“Act 120 imposes burdensome new speech requirements – and restrictions – that will affect, by Vermont’s count, eight out of every ten foods at the grocery store,” GMA said in a statement. “Yet Vermont has effectively conceded this law has no basis in health, safety, or science. That is why a number of product categories, including milk, meat, restaurant items and alcohol, are exempt from the law. This means that many foods containing GMO ingredients will not actually disclose that fact.”
Recent surveys by the International Food Information Council Foundation (IFIC) and Consumer Reports suggested that a majority of Americans support GMO labeling. IFIC’s survey showed that 63% of Americans endorse the FDA’s current voluntary policy for labeling genetically modified foods, according to a press release. Meanwhile, the April 2014 Consumer Reports survey revealed that 92% of respondents felt that foods made with GMOs should be labeled accordingly, MintPress News reports. The results also showed that 72% of those respondents felt that it was important or very important to avoid genetically engineered ingredients when making purchases.
However, GMA has gone on record to say that GM crops “are safe and have important benefits for people and our planet,” noting that they use “less water and fewer pesticides, reduce crop prices by 15-30 percent.” GMA also claims that a new study from Cornell University shows that New York’s proposed mandatory GMO labeling bill would cost families an average of $500 per year. The association encourages bipartisan federal legislation, the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act, HR 4432, which would require a label on foods containing GM ingredients only if the FDA determines there is a health or safety risk.
In response to the lawsuit, the Organic Consumers Association’s National Director, Ronnie Cummins, said that the move is a “desperate attempt to protect corporate shareholder profits at the expense of consumers’ rights and health.” Cummins added, “More than 60 other countries have either banned GMOs, or require mandatory labeling of foods that contain them. Consumers in the U.S. have every reasonable right to the same information that consumers in other countries have about foods and ingredients that have not been subjected to independent, pre-market safety testing.”
Clearly, this will be a fight that will continue for months, perhaps even years, to come as both sides of the debate throw down the gauntlet. Though California lawmakers recently rejected a GMO labeling law (see the link below for our previous story), it remains to be seen how other U.S. states will weigh these heated opinions when voting for their respective proposals.
California GMO Labeling Bill Rejected
Stay tuned to AndNowUKnow as we continue following any further developments on this lawsuit.
