Grocery Manufacturers Association pushing FDA to allow GMOs to be labeled 'natural'

Wednesday, January 08, 2014 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Tags: Grocery Manufacturers Association, GMOs, natural label

(NaturalNews) Not content with just hiding unlabeled genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in the general food supply, the biotechnology industry now wants to freely add GMOs to food products bearing the "natural" label as well, according to new reports. The Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) back in December reportedly sent a letter to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) asking for permission to basically trick health-conscious individuals into buying transgenic foods by deceitfully hiding them behind "natural" labels.

Though quite a few so-called "natural" food products already contain GMOs due to the fact that the FDA has never issued definitive guidelines as to the legal definition of the term "natural," the GMA wants this regulatory failure to become official policy. According to The New York Times, the GMA is pushing the FDA to allow biotech "frankenfood" to bear the "natural" label in grocery stores -- "natural" foods, as you may already know, typically fetch a higher price than conventional foods.

"Last month, 'Big Food,' in the form of the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA), a trade organization that represents more than 300 businesses, sent a letter to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advising that it intends to petition the agency to allow foods containing GMOs to be labeled as 'natural,'" writes Cookson Beecher for Food Safety News about the issue.

The letter comes as public awareness about GMOs is soaring, with consumers increasingly keeping an eye out for all those transgenic lurkers hiding throughout the food supply. Many food manufacturers are now being exposed for taking advantage of the loosely regulated "natural" label, which has become something of a crafty inroad for mass biotech deception, hence GMA's sudden interest in altogether redefining the word "natural."

"Audacious" is the word chosen by Scott Faber, vice president of the Environmental Working Group, to describe the situation. "It's like they're trying to get the government to say night is day and black is white."

Biotech industry claims GMOs are 'natural' while hypocritically insisting they are unnatural enough to be patented

This is hardly an exaggerated assessment, of course, as there is literally nothing natural about GMOs. Their entire genetic blueprint, as you probably already know, has been reorganized in a laboratory to express certain unnatural traits while subduing other natural ones. GMOs are the antithesis of natural, in other words, which is why biotech companies claim to hold patents on them.

But somehow, in the eyes of the industry, GMOs magically become "natural" when it comes to the rest of us eating them unlabeled in our food supply.

"Earlier this year, more than 200 members of the European Network of Scientists for Social and Environmental Responsibility signed a statement declaring that there is no scientific consensus on the safety of GMOs," stated Katherine Paul, director of communications for the Organic Consumers Association to Food Navigator USA about the issue.

"Yet the FDA continues to put consumers at risk by siding with industry. Fortunately, consumers are having a direct impact on the sales and brand images of manufacturers who continue to put GMO ingredients, unlabeled, into their products."

As far as public pushback against this latest affront to truth in labeling, the GMA admits that at least 65 class-action lawsuits have been filed against food companies for deceptively using the term "natural" on GMO-containing food products. If GMA has its way, however, these lawsuits will ultimately be struck down, and consumers looking for truly natural food will be forced to ditch all those "natural" imposters in favor of their certified organic and non-GMO counterparts.

Sources for this article include:

http://www.foodsafetynews.com

http://www.care2.com

http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com

http://science.naturalnews.com