(NaturalNews) Most Natural News readers are sufficiently wary of the terms natural or all-natural on packaged foods, even in health food stores. Too many who aren't aware think that natural means "organic" or at least "GMO-free." Surprise, not only are they not organic, but they often contain some GMOs.

Consumers are being misled by the "natural" label, reported Urvashi Rangan, PhD, executive director of the Food Safety and Sustainability Center of Consumer Reports. Although there were no issues with packages marked "organic" or "non-GMO," packages marked "natural" were not organic, and many of them contained GMOs. And most of the unmarked packages also contained GMOs.

Exposing the food industry's misleading label racket

The report included 80 samples of products with any amounts of soy or corn found in cereals, chips and even baby formulas. Many products that are not totally soy or corn contain some element of either one, and either one can be genetically modified. Partial GMO is GMO.

The Consumer Report limit line for whether it should be labeled GMO was just under 1 percent (0.9) GMO in the whole product, which is the EU standard used to require GMO labeling. None of the items labeled "organic" or "non-" or "no GMOs" exceeded that mark. Most of the items marked "natural" did.

Interestingly, this Consumer Reports testing result came out just as the Grocers Manufacturers Association has begun pushing for loosening federal policies on label rules to allow labeling foods "natural" that are known to have GMO contents. Why would they do that?

Some of the Association's over 300 member companies have been sued for not revealing GMO content when their product labels showed "natural" or "all-natural", and this Association must protect their food production and grocer clients by changing the rules instead of curbing their enthusiasm for deceptive marketing.

Several of those company members in the Grocers Manufacturers Association have been among the biggest financial contributors against GMO-labeling legislative proposals in every state that goes to the ballot over the issue. Now you know why. Most of their packaged and processed foods contain some levels of GMOs.

Labeling laws

Let's face it, most American consumers want only cheap, tasty foods served quickly and easily. They don't care about GMOs or dangerous pesticides and herbicides or how dairy cows are fed. If you observe a fast food drive-thru lane around the end of a work day you'll see their priorities.

Maintaining their expensive SUVs and getting home from working their jobs with fast food to watch Monday Night Football or Dancing with the Stars. Food quality is not an American thing, and that won't be changed soon. So is all the hassle and expense of campaigning for GMO labels really worth it?

First of all, a labeling system is already in place. It's from the Non-GMO Project, a non-profit third party that tests processed foods for GMO content; if clean, their packaging gets their Non-GMO Project's blue and green with orange butterfly logo to certify that it's GMO-free. Even some organic food sources can be contaminated.

Sure, the Non-GMO Project labels are mostly confined to health food store products. But those stores have more folks shopping who do care about avoiding GMOs. So there's where raising money should go, to an independent third-party product survey and testing group, and for buying those products that have the verification labels.

Those food industry people have plenty of money to throw at consumers bringing GMO labels to ballot on a state level who have to dig into their own pockets. Consumer campaign efforts require a lot of effort from volunteers, while the hired PR boys simply do their disinformation campaigns on a gullible public, as they normally do, and profit.

It's like the school yard bully with 25% more reach and height who puts one hand on a kid's head while yawning with the other as the good kid continues swinging at the air between the two of them.

Sources:

http://www.greenerchoices.org ^[PDF]

http://truthwiki.org/Genetically_modified_cr...

http://www.consumerreports.org

http://www.baltimoresun.com

http://www.inspirationgreen.com

http://www.nongmoproject.org