There is one overwhelming reason to oppose Ballot Measure 92, which would make Oregonians the first voters to require labels on some genetically engineered foods.
That reason: Product labeling is a national and global issue, and that is where the requirements should be established. It is unrealistic to impose a patchwork of state-by-state requirements on food manufacturers. …
Even among scientists, there is disagreement on what constitutes a GMO product, let alone whether genetically engineered products should be labeled as such. An editorial in Scientific American last year noted:
“We have been tinkering with our food’s DNA since the dawn of agriculture. By selectively breeding plants and animals with the most desirable traits, our predecessors transformed organisms’ genomes, turning a scraggly grass into plump-kerneled corn, for example. For the past 20 years Americans have been eating plants in which scientists have used modern tools to insert a gene here or tweak a gene there, helping the crops tolerate drought and resist herbicides. Around 70 percent of processed foods in the U.S. contain genetically modified ingredients.”
The editorial went on to say, “Compared with conventional breeding techniques — which swap giant chunks of DNA between one plant and another — genetic engineering is far more precise and, in most cases, is less likely to produce an unexpected result.” …
The more rational, honest argument is that this is an area where national, even global, decisions make sense. State-by-state regulations do not, which is why Measure 92 is a bad idea for Oregon.
