Cheerios To Go GMO-Free

Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "ABC News reports that General Mills has ended the use of genetically modified ingredients in Cheerios, its flagship breakfast food. General Mills has been manufacturing its original-flavor Cheerios without GMOs for the past several weeks in response to consumer demand. Original Cheerios will now be labeled as 'Not Made With Genetically Modified Ingredients,' although that it is not an official certification. 'We were able to do this with original Cheerios because the main ingredients are oats,' says Mike Siemienas, noting that there are no genetically modified oats. The company is primarily switching the cornstarch and sugar to make the original Cheerios free of GMOs. Green America has been targeting Cheerios for the past year to raise the profile of the anti-GMO movement. 'This is a big deal,' says Green America's Todd Larsen. 'Cheerios is an iconic brand and one of the leading breakfast cereals in the U.S. We don't know of any other example of such a major brand of packaged food, eaten by so many Americans, going from being GMO to non-GMO.' For its part, General Mills says, It's not about safety,' and will continue to use GMOs in other food products."

Comments

GMOs feed over a billion people

[Anonymous Coward]

Genetically modified food feeds over a billion people who would not otherwise be able to eat given the arable land available. The "organic" craze is for marketing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5amLAMRQk5I

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[NoNonAlphaCharsHere]

So you're saying that the increase in productivity of GMO grains over "traditional" grains, given the same arable land area is enough to feed an additional billion people? In a word: bullshit.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope, this is a lobbying message subsidized by Monsanto and co, it is actually very possible to feed everyone with the food we create and the land we have. More importantly, it hides the fact that GMOs are not at all used to feed the aforementioned starving peoples. Quite contrarily, GMO seeds have been repeatedly used for market domination through legislative bullying, most infamously ending in the suicide of farmers in india due to non-affordable seed prices after Monsanto cleared the market from other companies by undercutting and legal bullying before rising the cost.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a commonly quoted number. See Green Revolution.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[fustakrakich]

We throw away over half the food we produce, and we let the commodities market manipulate the prices. We don't need GMOs. You're just spreading propaganda.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[NoNonAlphaCharsHere]

GP is giving all the credit to GMO seeds. He's lying.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ackthpt]

Nope, this is a lobbying message subsidized by Monsanto and co, it is actually very possible to feed everyone with the food we create and the land we have. More importantly, it hides the fact that GMOs are not at all used to feed the aforementioned starving peoples. Quite contrarily, GMO seeds have been repeatedly used for market domination through legislative bullying, most infamously ending in the suicide of farmers in india due to non-affordable seed prices after Monsanto cleared the market from other companies by undercutting and legal bullying before rising the cost.

In other news today, 1/3 of the world is now Obese.

We don't need no stinkin' GMO food, it's all about making seed banks all bound to Intellectual Property and making money for Monsanto, et al. Call a horse a horse.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[andydread]

Yes but patenting lifeforms then suing zealously over those patented lifeforms that contaminate non-gmo farms is bad so say no to GMO until they quit patenting life.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[jedidiah]

Even before GMO foods were invented we allowed a lot of produce to rot in this country for various reasons. The problem isn't that we don't have enough land or good enough seed stock. Feeding people (or not) usually has to do more with local politics and who controls the land.

It's like how the entire Irish potato famine was very avoidable.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ackthpt]

Who needs to go to India for evidence of Monsanto raids on farms? We've had stories of thess actions posted on /. for years, further, they are well documented in legal proceedings, where Monsanto goons have appeared with local law enforcement dragged in as their flunkies, to seize farms where they suspect a farmer is reusing seed or is using crop seed contaminated from a neighboring GMO field. All they need is their expert witnesses to show up in a court and state that Farmer Brown has some of their IP in his field, without paying them and he's done farming this year and likely stuck with a ruinous monetary settlement.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm seriously sick of this ignorant crap. There is absolutely no known possible mechanism for GM foods to cause cancer because they're GM. If you're going to speculate, at least look into real possible risks like those associated with glyphosate salts used in agriculture. If you're going to attack GM, focus on the real issues like intellectual property associated with staple crops.

Also, look up mutation breeding, which is how most of our non-GM foods came into existence.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ApplePy]

How much of our planet's fossil fuel resources should we continue to mine for large-scale agriculture, before we have the conversation about why there are so many starving third-worlders, and what we might do to control overpopulation?

I see this assertion time after time -- that we must feed 8, 10, 15 billions of people -- without asking the question, "Does the planet need that many people?"

GMO is a non-solution to a problem that we could much more easily prevent.

The only winner in GMO is the patent holder who collects the royalties.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ackthpt]

We know this. GMO-free is a marketing term for affluent pananoid yuppies. It is not something that will ever feed mass numbers of needy people.

No, it's about being open and honest about what goes into your food. We in California had such a staggering amount of BS inserted into a campaign season, regarding GMO product labeling, that consumers were completely baffled what the impact was going to be and voted with the most convincing and well backed ads. Therefore we do not have a state statute requiring the labeling of food as containing all or part GMO components.

That was pretty damn insidious by Pro-GMO Big Ag.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Applehu Akbar]

So...why are you people ripping up GMO crops that have nothing to do with Monsanto and its legal bullying?

http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/nation/regions/08/09/13/militants-wreck-gm-rice-test-farm

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Mr. Flibble]

If you actually study the green revolution and agriculture, it is indeed an accurate figure.

The only difference between modern GMO food and previous versions, is that radiation mutation was used to create the variants. Now, with targeted gene sequencing and replacing there is no need to use messy, time consuming and partially random radiation mutation methods.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Mr. Flibble]

Have you actually looked into the actual court cases surrounding Monsanto?

You would be surprised. The examples that people trot out of "Farmer Brown" as you say, had the farmers lose in court as they were deliberately and knowingly taking GMO seeds.

Monsanto will in fact, pay farmers for any crops contaminated via cross pollination for farms that do not have an agreement.

The truth of the matter in agriculture is much more complex than all the IT people here on Slashdot would have you believe.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[erroneus]

The existence of GMOs have NOT boosted production in the slightest. What GMOs do is make the plants immune to a particular herbicide. This herbicide immunity, by the way, is an immunity being acquired by other "pest" plants which were the original target of the herbicide.

In the absense of GMOs the people would still be fed. GMOs do not represent a world-saving technology. What they represent is a danger to the world's food supply not only because it comes under control of a small collection of companies, but because it reduces the varieties of plants available. In the event a disease develops to wipe out these GMOs, there may be extreme starvation and human suffering due to the continual growth of GMO use.

Please shill for Monsanto elsewhere. You're just wrong about so much.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Oligonicella]

Quiet - does not fit political narrative.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[cayenne8]

What is gained through product labeling when consumers don't have anywhere near the background or understanding to interpret the labels?

I'm all for people being able to make well-informed and rational decisions about what they put into their bodies, but avoiding GM foods because of perceived health risks is NOT making a well-informed and rational decision.

Well, so far, we're not too stupid to have labels required for ingredients, for % of nutrients...

We're not too stupid to have labels required on things like fish, to know what their country of origin is....

So, what's the deal with giving us a label to know if it is GMO or not? I'd dare say, most people too stupid to study this and make an "informed decision" are likely not ever going to bother looking at the labels.

But for those that do want to know..what's the harm? When is having information about your food ever a bad thing?

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[NoNonAlphaCharsHere]

The original poster gave ALL the credit for feeding a billion starving people to (only) Genetically Modified/Engineered seeds, completely ignoring the better irrigation, fertilization, insect control, and crop rotation practices, and yes, hybrid seeds that have been being exported to the third world for the last 60-or-so years. I was simply taking exception to his outrageously false claim. Yet somehow, he's Insightful, and I'm Overrated. I think many people would have much less of a problem with GMO foods in general if Monsanto's business practices weren't so oppressively evil, and the notion of routinely spraying Roundup on all our cereal grains (both for humans and livestock) weren't quite so heinous.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[WOOFYGOOFY]

What is to be gained by informing consumers when they just can't really understand the issues! This is what you're saying and not even in other words- that's just what you're saying. It's disgusting. I can see why you posted AC.

It's called having faith in democracy and the ability of the polity to sort out issues. If that doesn't sound reasonable to you, then why not head off to N. Korea where the leaders think just like you do.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[lgw]

What is a non-GMO food anyhow? Aren't all of our modern foodstuffs heavily modified through centuries of selective breeding? Labeling food with made-up categories doesn't seem to help.

Let's face it: what the hipsters really want is food labeled "not associated with any Evil Corporation", as if inefficiency were something to be proud of. We already have the "Organic" label for you losers, can't you be content with that?

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Jherek Carnelian]

I'm seriously sick of this ignorant crap. There is absolutely no known possible mechanism for GM foods to cause cancer because they're GM.

That's kind of like all the anti-drug people who say that there is no scientific proof that marijuana has any medicinal value. It was absolutely true. But the reason it is true is because you needed the DEA to give you a permit to work with banned drugs and they only like to give out permits projects researching adverse effects, not beneficial effects.

Same thing with GMO's -- the testing coverage of GMOs is very weak. There is this get out jail free card they use to legally avoid testing called substantial equivalence - the theory is that if you are just mixing genes from two different kinds of food, then its all good. They do very limited testing to make sure there is nothing obviously wrong (like the potatoes genes haven't turned the new GMO crop into belladonna) but the basic testing is all that's ever done if they can claim equivalence. Of course they do this because comprehensive testing would be really, really, really expensive. So, you know, let the customers beta test it.

So yeah, there is no known mechanism because no one is looking for one.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[WOOFYGOOFY]

You're not getting it. It's not about the absolute rightness or wrongness of GMO . It's about the fact that a very significant portion of the people WANT GMO labeling.

People also want a lot of things I could do without, but so what. Who am i? Who are you? Who is Monsanto to decide we can't know true facts about the things we put in our bodies???

The worst disasters in history haven't been because people had too much information some of which was useless. The worst disasters come about because some small segment of our population thinks it knows what's good for the rest of us and tries to impose it's will on us. So that's shit like Vietnam and all kinds of imperialism generally. People want this- it means something to them. People also want kosher shit because it MEANS something to them. People want country of origin labeling for meat for GOOD reason- because some nations practice poor CJD defense and some don't. People want dolphin free tuna because it MEANS something to them and their value system. Stop telling people what should and should not be significant to them.

Just. Stop it.

Also, as a matter of fact, you don't know that all present and future GMO products are not unsafe in ways people fear. I know what because I looked into it and decided for myself that the risk it low, but by no means zero. By no means.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[danlip]

The first world generally has negative population growth, not counting immigration. So yes, it is the third world that needs population control, and there is nothing racist about that statement. I suppose you could debate whether the first world should be putting pressure on them or just let them figure that out themselves, but the pressure is applied via strings attached to foreign aid: are you suggesting we should stop giving them aid and just let them starve?

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[TrollstonButterbeans]

>What idiot modded this insightful?

Doesn't matter.

The important part is that you located him --- his village has been notified and arrangements have been made for his return.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[icebike]

True, the so called "Green Revolution" is not principally due to Genetically Modified Organisms, at least not in the sense those words are used today. (The above referenced wiki article on this subject is about as biased as anything I've ever seen on wiki, bordering on the vitriol normally seen regarding political campaign.)

However, there is no doubt that prior methods of gene selection (breeding) resulted in massive increase in grain crop yields, with Rice crops developed in the US saving many different countries in South East Asia from huge famines. Resistance to pests was accomplished by selective breeding long before gene splicing was invented. But there is no doubt that these grains were genetically modified.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[icebike]

Radiation mutation in agriculture is a myth, it was the favorite whipping boy of the same people who cry about current GMO gene splicing technologies.

The actual truth is that the major advances in the Green revolution was by good old fashion selective cross breeding by (mostly american) scientists to increase wheat, rice and corn production, and developed new strains that changed India from the famine capital or the world to a large net food exporter.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[icebike]

Sometimes it's a matter of transport. Iowa has no shortage of pork at all, but the cost of shipping it to China before it loses its freshness may sometimes be more than the Chinese feel like paying.

Its not like China has any problems raising pork of their own. Half the world's pig population is in China.
The problem is their back-yard farming techniques are inefficient. Its often more efficient to import from the US.
They are buying US Port producers lock stock and barrel simply to gain efficiency.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Rhacman]

Nobody needs to kill themselves to control population, just not reproduce so much. You first? Sure. Who's next?

Many developed countries already have low or declining population growth so again; us first? Working on it. Who's next?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_growth_rate

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[HiThere]

There's reasonable evidence that the prevalence of obesity is related to the liberal use of high-fructose corn syrup on prepared foods. And a part of the reason for that use of corn is GM corn. More of the reason, of course, is government subsidies, Of course the government subsidies are totally unrelated to lobbying from Monsanto, the vendor of the GM corn seeds. And the only legal vendor of those seeds.

Yeah, I'd have a lot less problem with GM foods, if they weren't leading to monopolization of the food provision chain by one or a very few companies.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Bing Tsher E]

The 'White Man' feedling the third world is part of the problem. When the UN air drops in tons of free grain, it completely decimates any motivation on the part of the local population to grow their own grain, because it drops the price of the grain to near zero. It wipes out local producers completely.

The solution is technology transfer: help the local producers obtain the means to locally grow the food the local people need.

This, however, does not give the large Agribusinesses in the first world tons of money from the government buying their grain and/or collecting it in exchange for price-support subsidies. In fact, it enables the people in other parts of the world with the ability to complete with said large Agribusinesses.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[TheRealMindChild]

Right, but apart from the sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ChromeAeonium]

I think many people would have much less of a problem with GMO foods in general if Monsanto's business practices weren't so oppressively evil

While I am not a fan of finding myself defending some big multinational, here's the problem with that thought: it didn't start with Monsanto. The fear mongering surrounding GE crops started with the Flavr Savr tomato, developed by a small company called Calgene. Then Monsanto come along and people say 'GMO foods are bad because of Monsanto.' Well, that is clearly ignorant of the history of the matter, and furthermore, a lot of the 'evil' things Monsanto does, like suing farmers for being cross pollinated, are mostly myths spread by, you guessed it, the anti-GMO groups.

Fact is, if there were no Monsanto, it would be necessary for the anti-GMO moment to invent it. When your argument largely revolves around everyone disagreeing with you being paid shills, and most scientists disagree with you, you need a conspiracy. Doesn't matter if we're talking evolution, climate change, vaccines, or GMOs. Same thing. In this case, it is Monsanto who ties together the GMO conspiracy. Clearly, I am a paid shill, because the facts have a pro-Monsanto bias.

and the notion of routinely spraying Roundup on all our cereal grains (both for humans and livestock) weren't quite so heinous.

What gets me about that is it isn't! I'd much rather glyphosate be sprayed than one of the nastier herbicides out there. And what are your other options? Tillage and hand weeding mostly, and the first destroys the soil while the second is economically preposterous. The problem is that people are so damned disconnected from agriculture that what should be seen as a good thing is instead demonized. I'm not saying that it is an ideal situation, but realistically, you have to deal with weeds somehow. weed control is not optional, if it were farmers wouldn't bother spraying in the first place, but for not, herbicide tolerant systems are the best we've got.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[stenvar]

So, what's the deal with giving us a label to know if it is GMO or not?

Because "GMO" is not a scientifically meaningful category of food. It's like labeling food for whether it was at one point stored in containers with the number "13" printed on them, or whether it was ever touched by a Mennonite priest.

When is having information about your food ever a bad thing?

When it's not actually information and instead reinforces superstition and irrational fears.

If you are going to have food labeling laws, then make them rational: have the food labeled according to actual content. Of course, a lot of "organic food" would end up with the same content labels as GMO foods.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[erroneus]

Try again:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/04/business/energy-environment/04weed.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

There was an article right here on slashdot which served to announce the problem which had been speculated to happen eventually has been confirmed.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ChromeAeonium]

No, it's about being open and honest about what goes into your food.

Okay, what gets labeled? Personally, I want to know if my peanuts have genes for nematode resistance bred in from other Arachis species? Or maybe what resistance gene (Ph-3, Ph-5, ect) is in my tomato. Maybe I'd like to know what rootstock my pear was grafted onto. I'd also like to know if my carrot was the result of a doubled haploid hybrid. Tell me what line of wheat is in my bread, and if it is the result of a mutation breeding line. Is my banana the result of tissue culture? What bud sport of apple am I eating?

Here's another thing to think about: GE corn has higher levels of fungal toxin. If Monsanto, in the name of consumer education, lobbied for non-GE corn labeled as having increased mycotoxins, would you think them scummy? What if they pushed for a clear label on organic food if I was grown in manure? Now reverse that, and when organic producers and organization try to push labels on things they conveniently sell the alternative to, then suddenly it is out of their own benevolence? Bollocks to that.

Why is no one advocating those? I'll tell you why. You could label all sorts of things about food, but they are not required because that is as meaningless as labeling the day of harvest. You want to know if something is GE or not; it is easy, corn, soy, canola, cotton, alfalfa, sugar beet, papaya, summer squash. If it has them, with some nuance, and isn't organic, it is likely GE. With a little education, no labels needed, so why push for them? Why not just do voluntary labeling for those who care, like Kosher and Halal? Because the organic companies funding those initiatives are looking to get government mandated marketing, that's why. There is a reason they are pushing for labeling and not education (although their versions of education are about as scientific as creationism). There is a reason they are singling out a single thing and not giving any of the background information to understand the significance of that thing.

That was pretty damn insidious by Pro-GMO Big Ag.

Well, considering that the anti-GMO guys tried to manipulate the law to benefit their own organic businesses, I'd say there's more than enough anger to go around. Sure, I'm mad at Monsanto too, but organic producers tried to irrationally demonize a beneficial technology that could be saving lives simply for their won profit, and that's way worse than Monsanto's anti-prop 37 campaign.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ne0n]

Feel free to be part of Monsanto's unpaid alpha-testing group. Those of us who plan to be around for a while and care for the environment will stick to real food. The "organic craze" is not just about avoiding Monsanto's blunders - it's about sustainable ecology and doing your part for a better earth. Less pesticides is a huge win (ie, not poisoning your kids and pets and anybody in a windspeed*time radius). Organic typically means you have to rotate your crops, leading to healthier soil (ie, no dust bowl effect) and better nitrogen fixation for healthier more disease-resistant crops all round. Growing organic also means composting instead of imported fertilizers so kids in foreign countries don't have to sweat in bat-shit mines.

In addition to saving the topsoil for future generations (a big deal if you know squat about American farming) there's less runoff to poison neighboring fields.

Ultimately there's a ton more to organic than you know about, and I tend to blame your incurious child-like ability to believe anything told you by people in white coats. Oh, and Monsanto too, for being the biggest lying fucktard organization on the planet. They have no safety track record, have contaminated just about every crop market they enter beyond reasonable salvage while their marketing droids to spew out the same nasty jizz so fools like you can lap it up like old dirty hookers. Enjoy that on your GMO cereal.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ApplePy]

And yet, no one would say the same of breeding for higher yield or disease resistance, but suddenly when you use technology, it is wrong.

Not "wrong". Untested, unproven, with insufficient research on safety. Also, GM crops have thus far failed to deliver on the higher yield claims: http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agriculture/our-failing-food-system/genetic-engineering/failure-to-yield.html

And the farmers, and the people, and the environment.

Well, let's see. Your first link leads to a German academic paper that would cost me 40 bucks in PDF to debunk. But the summary provides a few bar graphs which immediately give the lie to the text -- at best, pesticide use is only *slightly* reduced on Bt cotton.

The third link is an advertisement, full of lies, damned lies, statistics, and weasel language. Its authors, Graham Brookes and Peter Barfoot of
PG Economics Ltd., Dorchester, UK, trace back to here -- http://www.pgeconomics.co.uk/who-we-are.php -- where it says things like: "PG Economics Limited is a specialist provider of advisory and consultancy services to agriculture and other natural resource-based industries. Our specific areas of specialisation are plant biotechnology, agricultural production systems, agricultural markets and policy." and "...on-going management consultancy and advice in the following core areas: Commercialisation of new technology/biotechnology". Translation, in case you didn't catch it: they're selling something.

The advertisement's premise is that chemical use is reduced because of herbicide-tolerant GM crops. Sounds great. Except, well... it's bullshit. A quick Google search kicks out 14 million results for "pesticide use up", this one from Reuters at the top: Pesticide use ramping up as GMO crop technology backfires: study The chemical companies are selling more herbicide than ever, because farmers didn't used to spray herbicide on crops because it would fucking kill them! Topping that off, the weeds are developing herbicide resistance... so... now what?

Things look pretty grim when you ignore a lot of facts.

Try harder next time; I've got plenty more ammo.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ranton]

You're not getting it. It's not about the absolute rightness or wrongness of GMO . It's about the fact that a very significant portion of the people WANT GMO labeling.

People also want kosher shit because it MEANS something to them. People want country of origin labeling for meat for GOOD reason- because some nations practice poor CJD defense and some don't. People want dolphin free tuna because it MEANS something to them and their value system. Stop telling people what should and should not be significant to them.

I'm confused. Are you advocating that all food should be labeled "Non-kosher" if it isn't kosher? And that all seafood should be labeled "May have dolphin" if it may have dolphin?

I am perfectly fine with kosher shops labeling their food kosher, and for EarthTrust and the Earth Island Institute creating dolphin free labeling. I am also perfectly fine with food producers using GMO-free labeling if they wish. Forcing people to put a big GMO label on all food that uses it is where I draw the line. Just like I draw the line at labeling all foods Non-kosher.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Solandri]

The examples that people trot out of "Farmer Brown" as you say, had the farmers lose in court as they were deliberately and knowingly taking GMO seeds.

Have you actually read the case? Schmeiser lost because he was indeed using Monsanto's seed without a license, but was fined only $1 because he did not benefit from the GMO seed in any way. He used RoundUp to kill weeds in the ditches surrounding his crop, but not on the crop itself. There was no motive for him to "deliberately and knowingly take GMO seeds." That's just the way Monsanto's PR spun the case.

Essentially the case established a precedent (in Canada) that the burden of preventing accidental spread is on the farmer - even if you're just farming with no intent of using GMOs, you must pay to test your seeds to insure that you weren't accidentally contaminated. IMHO this is contradictory to a fundamental tenet of responsibility most of us learned in grade school - if you make something and benefit (profit) from its positive aspects, you are also responsible for its negative effects. If Monsanto is benefiting from selling GMOs, they should be the ones paying to prevent its unwanted spread, not the farmers.

Monsanto will in fact, pay farmers for any crops contaminated via cross pollination for farms that do not have an agreement.

Interesting. First I've heard of it. Do you have a reference? The last I heard on the topic was that Monsanto's lawyers had gotten a combined cross-contamination case thrown out of court because the plaintiff (an organic farmers organization) lacked standing (were not the directly injured party - the farmers were). A quick google search only turns up cases of Monsanto suing farmers for cross-contamination, or promising not to sue if the contamination is "slight" and squelching any legal attempts to assign a definite amount.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[Urkki]

Selecting something is not modifying it. Genetic modification (in today's context) is about producing individual specimens with modified or new genes, not just differently mixed genes of its parents. Trying to muddle this is dishonest.

Actual genetic modification is going to be the biggest revolution in human history, possibly biggest revolution in the history of life on this planet if we don't destroy our civilization before it becomes as ubiquitous as cell phones are today. Saying it's just extension of what we've been doing for millenia is like saying updating globally accessible Wikipedia article with mobile device on-location and real time is just extension of prehistoric people drawing stuff in sand with a stick. Sure, it is, if you select your viewpoint carefully.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ChromeAeonium]

Untested, unproven, with insufficient research on safety.

Ignoring all this perhaps. Hey, if they are so untested, why is it that all those things currently awaiting approval listed on the APHIS site are not yet on the market? Is it our of Monsanto's altruistic concern? And why can't university labs muster up the funding to jump past the regulatory hurdles? Which is it, not tested, or Monsanto cares?

Also, GM crops have thus far failed to deliver on the higher yield claims

Note how they specify 'in the United States' with the implication that GE crops were supposed to improve yields. You do realize there is more to agriculture than yield, yes? If you are already tilling and spraying insecticides/herbicides, as is the case in developed countries, do you honestly expect insect resistant and herbicide tolerant crops to improve yields? Of course not, though if you talk to a farmer about the Round-Up/LibertyLink systems, they still prefer it (hell, there's even some evidence to indicate that sometimes they have lower yield in those systems, but railing on that makes the silly assumption that agriculture can be measured with a single number). If the UCS's report is news to you than you are pretty uninformed.

Naturally of course, they conveniently ignore the Rainbow papaya that saved the Hawaiian papaya industry, which should undeniably demonstrate that GE crops can serve a purpose for yield gains, even if we assume that preventing insect damage, by some curiously unexplained phenomenon, does not reduce losses.

As for your criticisms, first off, you must be looking at a different graph that I am, second fails to point out anything of interest, and third your criticism is basically 'we might lose the benefits already provided by GE crops therefore GE crops are bad' which is pretty silly, especially considering that not all herbicides are the same, a fact Benbrook consistently ignores (sort of like a liter of wine has more mass than a line of cocaine but less impact, which is the true measure of a substance), that same scenario, and similar cases with respect to pests and pathogens, has happened with numerous crops in the past, yet it is only with GE crops that people direct criticism for basic issues of agriculture.

Re:GMOs feed over a billion people

[ChromeAeonium]

Yeah, I'd have a lot less problem with GM foods, if they weren't leading to monopolization of the food provision chain by one or a very few companies.

Then you should advocate for less restrictions of GE crops. Many in academia would love to be able to release new GE lines of crops, but cannot because the high regulatory burden favors large companies like Monsanto. Ironically, people who are ideologically opposed to GE crops and demand greater regulation are shielding Monsanto from competition.

Pointless at this poiht

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

> For its part, General Mills says, It's not about safety,' and will continue to use GMOs in other food products.

Correct. It's not about safety. It's about giving customers what they want, which is the result of scientifically illiterate scare tactics by talking heads making a career of it.

It's all one stupid cluster fuck anyway. Science keeps developing ways to make food even cheaper, and government keeps deliberately forcing the price up to help farmers.

Re:Pointless at this poiht

[MrBingoBoingo]

Well, when the major constituent of Cheerios (oats) doesn't have a GM variety, this seems like a cheap way to give the people what they want. Even if the reason the people want it is poor.

Re:Pointless at this poiht

[andydread]

For me its a result of Monsanto patenting food staples and suing world + dog. I don't agree with a few multinationals owning patents of the world's food staples so I will do everything I can to avoid GMO products for this reason and this reason only. And I will continue to warn everyone I know against purchasing GMO products until they are no longer patented and the companies stop abusing the patents. THe End.

Re:Pointless at this poiht

[jedidiah]

Quite right.

This is about politics rather than science. The corporate shills want to make this strictly about food safety in order to distract from the abuses of companies like Monsanto.

Any regime that doesn't allow for a farmer to save and replant his own seeds needs to be torn down, burned, and then bombed.

Re:Pointless at this poiht

[Applehu Akbar]

It'a exactly the same thing as providing fluoride-free toothpaste so that Oregonians need not corrupt their vital body fluids with godless Communism.

Re:Pointless at this poiht

[morcego]

For me its a result of Monsanto patenting food staples and suing world + dog. I don't agree with a few multinationals owning patents of the world's food staples so I will do everything I can to avoid GMO products for this reason and this reason only. And I will continue to warn everyone I know against purchasing GMO products until they are no longer patented and the companies stop abusing the patents. THe End.

Ok, this is the first argument I've heard against GMO that I can support. And with that, I just joined the anti-GMO boat...

Re:Pointless at this poiht

[fermion]

Is this one of those cases where conservatives love the free market when it does what they want, but hate it when it results in something that might hurt one of them? GMO has great benefit and is likely going to be big part of feeding a growing world. However, Cheerios has nothing to do with feeding a hungry world. The hungry cannot afford Cheerios. General Mills is not going to advertise Cheerios to markets where everyone lives on $1 a day.

No Cheerios is a premium product marketed to those scientifically illiterate who are willing to pay extra just be part of the cluster fuck that needs a brand to feel complete.Any rational, scientific person is going to buy a bag of fake Cheerios for half the cost. That is what intelligent people do. Look for value.

Here a scientific fact. The market for breakfast cereals is dying. The breakfast sector is being taken over by other items such as yogurt. Within the framework of the free market then, i.e. one where irrationality rules, not government overloads, how can they increase the market share? Add to this that Cheerios has an advantage in that it is not only a breakfast food, but also a staple for young children, and parent being stupid and irrational tend to want feel they are giving the best to the kids, even it is only a feeling.

The simple answer is by focusing on their premium nature, and the best way to do this is to use what are perceived to be premium ingredients. This is going to do nothing to move the markets. Poor people will still have plenty of cheap GMO food. But it may help push pretty boxes of junk to the stupid people who will pay excessive funds for it.

Finally, just to show I can be as offensive as anyone else, anyone who believe the cost of the grain and sugar has anything to do with the cost of a box of cheerios is truly delusional.

Re:Pointless at this poiht

[kumanopuusan]

Attack the real problem, then! We can feed the planet and get rid of patents on organisms at the same time. You're throwing the baby out with the bathwater!

Re:Pointless at this poiht

[TrollstonButterbeans]

What you should really be for is sensible patent laws ...

The problem isn't GMO

[krelvin]

It is the patents like what Monsanto is doing that are the problem. There is no health issues.

Re:The problem isn't GMO

[bill_mcgonigle]

There is no health issues.

You can't say that honestly. Initial indications are of harm from glyphosate residues and retained b.t. toxin, at least in pregnant women in the latter case. The truth is we don't know the effects very well and we do know that irresponsible farmers aren't using roundup-ready processes diligently.

Unfortunately, reckless use has caused unrelated crops like golden rice to be rejected out of fear, which very definitely causes harm (not to mention boatloads of corn bound for starvation areas rejected in Zimbabwe and Zambia out of similar fear).

Re:The problem isn't GMO

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't say that honestly.

There are literally hundreds of studies out there and most of them are either inconclusive or show no evidence of harm. See here: http://biofortified.org/genera/studies-for-genera/

Initial indications are of harm from glyphosate residues and retained b.t. toxin, at least in pregnant women in the latter case.

Citations needed.

The truth is we don't know the effects very well and we do know that irresponsible farmers aren't using roundup-ready processes diligently.

Actually, glyphosate is a very well-researched chemical. There are many studies on it that consider it safe for use when used properly.

With that said, farmers who violate the federal regulations on pesticide application are themselves to blame, not the pesticide producers.

Also, it needs to be pointed out that BT toxin is available as a spray (as opposed to plants that have been genetically modified to produce it) that is often used by organic farmers (it's approved by the USDA for use on USDA Certified Organic farms) and other farmers who may not be planting GM seed.

Unfortunately, reckless use has caused unrelated crops like golden rice to be rejected out of fear, which very definitely causes harm (not to mention boatloads of corn bound for starvation areas rejected in Zimbabwe and Zambia out of similar fear).

The people who are opposing golden rice are mainly misanthropic environmental extremists and other scientifically illiterate activists who come from privileged backgrounds. The blame for the sabotage of golden rice trials is squarely upon their heads, not anyone else, and it's rather shameful that you try to pin the blame on farmers.

Re:The problem isn't GMO

[the eric conspiracy]

Recent EPA regulatory actions have been to allow INCREASES in glyphosate residues in food because of proven long term safety.

From:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate

Epidemiological studies have not found associations between long term low level exposure to glyphosate and any disease.

The EPA considers glyphosate to be noncarcinogenic and relatively low in dermal and oral acute toxicity. The EPA considered a "worst case" dietary risk model of an individual eating a lifetime of food derived entirely from glyphosate-sprayed fields with residues at their maximum levels. This model indicated that no adverse health effects would be expected under such conditions.

Primary references available in Wikipedia article.

Re:The problem isn't GMO

[drinkypoo]

Not proving the association is not the same thing as proving safety.

The EPA is a bad joke.

Re:The problem isn't GMO

[Alomex]

There is no health issues.

That is my one beef (no pun intended) with GMOs. We don't know this since the new foods are not submitted to any set of standard safety testing protocols.

If you think about it GMO food should be treated even more strictly than a new drug because after all you take medicine just for a few days while you ingest GMO foods for the rest of your life.

Re:Setting a good example for transparency at leas

[Qzukk]

at least clearly label the option so the consumer can make an informed decision.

But then they'll make the wrong decision!!1!

TPP will make it illegal

[WOOFYGOOFY]

The TPP will make it illegal to label your food GMO free and no, it won't matter what your nation's legislature had to say on the topic or would like to say later. The TPP will supercede the laws of you nation's legislature:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/09/obama-trans-pacific-partnership_n_4414891.html

http://www.nationofchange.org/trans-pacific-partnership-and-monsanto-1372074730

http://action.fooddemocracynow.org/sign/stop_tpp_tafta_monsanto_protection_act_on_steroids/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ellen-r-shaffer/tobacco-symbol-of-corrupt_b_4439416.html

http://www.naturalnews.com/041965_tpp_gmo_labeling_monsanto.html#

Re:TPP will make it illegal

[mythosaz]

The TPP will supercede the laws of you nation's legislature:

No, it won't.

I made the mistake of reading a few of those links, and it's all crazy speculation and blatant misinformation to sell ad-space on sites that sell wheat germ and homeopathy in their spare time.

Re:TPP will make it illegal

[WOOFYGOOFY]

Yeah you're wrong. It will ban GMO labeling , country of origin labeling and many other of the same types of consumer information that, people think is important to them (which I actually don't except that other people do want these things and they have the right to know )

Letter form Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (CT-3), Ranking Member of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, to the United States Trade Representative, Ambassador Ron Kirk:

from: http://delauro.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=406:-delauro-food-safety-critical-issue-in-upcoming-trade-talks&catid=7:2011-press-releases&Itemid=23

First, past FTAs incorporate the WTOâ(TM)s sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) and technical barriers to trade rules, which are deeply problematic. These rules set ceilings on signatory countriesâ(TM) domestic food safety standards. As a result, WTO panels have ruled against the U.S. meat country-of-origin labeling requirements and voluntary dolphin-safe tuna labels in challenges brought by other WTO countries. We must learn from the record of WTO implementation and modify the food safety-related rules of U.S. trade pacts to best protect the public health, starting with a TPP FTA.

The FDA has also engaged in extensive harmonization of food safety standards, as required by the WTO SPS rules and our past FTAs. If a TPP FTA is to include food safety harmonization, then it must ensure existing U.S. standards are not weakened. I believe this should include requiring that harmonization may only be conducted on the basis of raising standards toward the best standards of any signatory country and that, with respect to the United States, such international-standard setting should provide the public an opportunity to comment while maintaining an open and transparent process.

In addition, the past FTA model includes the establishment of new SPS committees to speed up implementation of mechanisms to facilitate increased trade volumes, including âoeequivalenceâ determinations. The equivalence rule requires the United States to permit imports of meat, poultry and now possibly seafood products that do not necessarily meet U.S. food safety standards. I firmly believe that all food sold to American consumers must be required to meet U.S. safety standards, and that a TPP FTA should not include equivalence rules as the basis for the United States accepting food imports.

Finally, past FTAs allow for private enforcement of extensive foreign investor rights. Under these rules, foreign food corporations operating within the United States are empowered to demand compensation from the U.S. government in foreign tribunals established under the United Nations and World Bank if U.S. regulatory actions undermine their expected future profits. Even when the United States successfully defends against such attacks, such as in the NAFTA investor-state case brought by the Canadian Cattlemen for Fair Trade over the U.S. ban on imports of live Canadian cattle after the discovery of a case of mad cow disease in Canada, the initial filing of the challenge has a chilling effect on policymaking and the U.S. government must spend millions on a legal defense. Accordingly, I believe a TPP FTA must not include investor-state rules that would allow corporations to weaken U.S. food safety in foreign tribunals thereby unnecessarily placing American consumers at risk.

The food safety issues raised by the TPP FTA negotiations are expansive and in many instances already controversial. Failure to deal with these issues during the negotiations will only create more opposition to a prospective agreement. I therefore urge you to act in the interest of public health and maintain the United Statesâ(TM) strong lea

Glad to hear it - Cheerios now on my shopping list

[WillAffleckUW]

The consumer is always right, no matter what those who think they are our Lords and Masters say.

Re:The corn starch? Gimme a break!

[sjames]

Most consumers don't have a scientific background. What they do have is a memory of how many 'harmless' things turned out to be anything but. For example, the trans fats in margarine. For another, cigarettes. So when consumers see a bunch of agribusinesses fighting tooth and nail to not label GMO foods, it naturally makes them wonder what they're trying to hide.

They may be wrong, but they're not idiots. They've just been lied to far too many times.

Re:Once again the gut beats the mind

[PolygamousRanchKid]

It would also be cool to have an ass hole on my forehead.

. . . Google can help you out with that . . .

Re:The corn starch? Gimme a break!

[Tanktalus]

All corn is GM corn. The stuff we call "corn" did not evolve naturally, but by extreme pressure by human farmers. The stuff we eat cannot grow without human intervention and is anything but natural. Just because we didn't modify its genetics through a test tube doesn't make it non-modified genetically.

Re:The corn starch? Gimme a break!

[andydread]

My problem with GMOs is the patents and the patent abuse. SOrry will not support GMO until the companies such as Monsanto stop abusing patents. Also i have a problem with the superweeds that are now cropping up as a result of drenching crops with roundup. Also when patented seed contaminates non GMO crops the non-GMO farmer has to pay Monsanto for a license or get sued out of business. Its the practices of the companies that turn me against it and until they stop i will avoid and tell everyone to avoid these patent encumbered crops. NO one company should be allowed to own all corn or all soybean because their patented crap has displaced natural crops.

Free Market Works

[pubwvj]

Bravo General Mills and thank you for making my favorite breakfast cereal without GMOs. The market place works. Consumer demand is a far better way to set things than regulations. All we're asking for as consumers is to know what's there so we can make decisions. It worked. Bravo to the free market and capitalism.

the ultimate sign of affluence.

[Connie_Lingus]

for almost all of human history, we all lived on the edge of starvation...one bad crop or inablilty to hunt due to injury or migration, and we were starved...to death.

read malthus.

now, we have so much food we attack those who supply it for us....the irony is unreal.

i don't know if GMO food is "dangerous" or not....i don't think anyone here really does....but i do know one thing.

only a population with WAY more food then it could possibly dream of needing could ever have this debate.

Good On You, GM!

[organgtool]

Since this is mostly blowback from the assholes at Monsanto, I fully support removing the GMO ingredients. However, when it comes to Cinnamon Toast Crunch, GM really needs to stop using that whole wheat shit or at least take the word "Crunch" out of the title.

Re:Here it comes...

[Anonymous Coward]

How big do you have to be before you get to have shills?

I mean Whole Foods profit rose 20% in Q2 of 2013, and Hain Celestial, the owner of Earth's Best Organic, boasted a 21% increase in net sales in Q1 of 2013. I have no idea what Michael Pollan made in 2013, but I doubt it would be a tenth as much if he wasn't a big name in the (insert preferred adjective)-foods circle, selling books to concerned eaters, and getting appearance fees from talking on shows and at events.

Does Monsanto have some patent on having shills, or are we willfully overlooking the fact that there's plenty of people who would rake in the cash by overblowing concern with respect to "natural" and "organic" foods?

GMO is worse than heavy processing?

[zerobeat]

So, GMO is scary, but the fact that Cheerios barely resemble the produce they are derived from, no problem. All that processing couldn't possibly "change" the food in a bad way. The consumer is an idiot.

Re:GMO is worse than heavy processing?

[TrollstonButterbeans]

Cheerios have to be genetically modified!

I have seen Cheerios commercials where the Cheerios talk --- and I was like "Talking Cheerios? WTF --- that can't be natural?" --- so all this talk about Cheerios being natural but yet some of them talk. I know the truth.

And Cheerios are made by a the GM company --- and we all know GM stands for "genetically modified".

I smell a conspiracy and I am sharing the evidence. What did they do to those Cheerios to cause them to be able to speak? The answer is obvious.

And oh yeah

[WOOFYGOOFY]

If you want thew ability to distinguish GMO from non-GMO in your grocery store then you better act fast because Obama is about to try to ram through the Trans Pacific Partnership which will permit the WTO to ban GMO labeling the way it bans meat country-of -origin labeling and dolphin-safe labels:

Letter excerpt from

Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (CT-3), Ranking Member of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, to United States Trade Representative, Ambassador Ron Kirk,

full letter:

http://delauro.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=406:-delauro-food-safety-critical-issue-in-upcoming-trade-talks&catid=7:2011-press-releases&Itemid=23

First, past FTAs incorporate the WTO's sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) and technical barriers to trade rules, which are deeply problematic. These rules set ceilings on signatory countries' domestic food safety standards. As a result, WTO panels have ruled against the U.S. meat country-of-origin labeling requirements and voluntary dolphin-safe tuna labels in challenges brought by other WTO countries. We must learn from the record of WTO implementation and modify the food safety-related rules of U.S. trade pacts to best protect the public health, starting with a TPP FTA.

Contact your Congressperson right NOW! :

http://www.exposethetpp.org/

quadrotritiCherrios

[turkeydance]

Tribbles Unite! take Oats and Wheat!

Re:Question. Is ANYONE eating plants that aren't G

[drinkypoo]

Every time this subject comes up, someone comes to raise the objection you're raising.

Those people are trolls.

So are you.

Breeding is not the same as GMO, and no amount of claiming that it is will make it so. It simply isn't. You can get results with GM that you cannot get by breeding, which proves the difference. And before GMO, nobody was splicing animal genes into plants, period. It may have happened in nature, but nobody then went on to plant a whole field of that organism.

Re:Here it comes...

[ApplePy]

But there's nothing *inherently* worse about GMO products than products modified through regular, boring, done-that-way-for-thousands-of-years artificial selection.

In a strictly moral or practical sense, I agree. My issue is that regular, boring seed selection has a millenia-long safety record; GM does not. We have not had enough time to ascertain any long-term effects, if there are any. We are rushing headlong into a new technology that a not insignificant amount of research shows might not be wise to rush into.

Basically, I urge caution, research, safety. And that's where most of us "anti-GMO nutjobs" actually stand.

Re:Here it comes...

[AK Marc]

We've found a number of "impossible" things to be possible, such as gene leakage cross-species (spliced genes ending up in unrelated but nearby plants, with unknown, untested results). How do you assure us of 100% safety for eternity when genes mutate and organisms evolve? Those types of unknowns are why slower is better. We aren't smart enough to know all the unintended consequences.

FUD...

[bayankaran]

Quite contrarily, GMO seeds have been repeatedly used for market domination through legislative bullying, most infamously ending in the suicide of farmers in india due to non-affordable seed prices after Monsanto cleared the market from other companies by undercutting and legal bullying before rising the cost.

I have been following farmer suicides in India for a long time. The reasons are complex. They include crop failure at an inopportune time, non-seasonal and extended droughts, and inability to pay debts from unscrupulous moneylenders and so on. Monsanto or its pricey or unaffordable seeds directly causing a farmer to suicide - you might be able to find one or two examples, but that's not the norm.
Monsanto is famous (or infamous) in India for their GMO Bt Cotton https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bt_cotton. But Bt Cotton is only cultivated in the state of Maharashtra...suicides happen in many other states too. And given the options for cotton seeds, BT Cotton may not be that bad an idea.
I agree Monsanto is borderline evil and creepy. There are valid reasons to argue genetically modified crops are a bad idea (or a good idea), but you should not add Indian farmer suicides to make a point. That's FUD.

Re:The corn starch? Gimme a break!

[ChromeAeonium]

They may be wrong, but they're not idiots.

Same could be said of the top dogs in the anti-GMO movement, to some degree. You could write a book on the things most people don't know about plants and agriculture. But only one issue gets singled out, genetic engineering. That makes it look undesirable. It is a weasley thing to do, to single out one thing and, in the name of 'consumer freedom' give absolutely no background information or necessary context, but that's the frustrating situation.

Sense of scale

[Firethorn]

You have to keep sense of scale in mind here. Consider that in the year 1000 there was an estimated 310M humans on the whole planet. The USA alone exceeds that today. It only hit 3B in the '60s, and is up to 7B today.

As such, in order to gain credit for 1B people, GMO only needs to be about a 14% productivity boost over all the other methods you mention in order to be able to be credited with 'saving' 1B from starvation. If you consider that starvation need not be fatal, the necessary boost to simply keep people from 'experiencing starvation'*, due to uneven productivity and such is much less.

*Say, a period of 30 days or more without sufficient nutrution = 'experiencing starvation'.

Re:Question. Is ANYONE eating plants that aren't G

[drinkypoo]

No one cooked with microwaves until recently; that doesn't mean that microwave cooked food and oven cooked food are substantially different.

You're engaging in prevarication by using as an example a situation which is not remotely congruent. That's a cheap tactic for cheap people. We know that microwave ovens lack the energy to twiddle DNA, which is ironically precisely what we're doing when we create GM organisms, which makes your example especially stupid. For stupid people.