Genetically Modified Foods, Right To Know or Refuse

It is safe to say that all of us consume food purchased from grocery stores, convenience stores, restaurants, and commercial outlets which have food products. With this in mind, virtually all of us consume genetically modified food products on a daily basis without even knowing it, even though most cringe at the thought of doing so.

Today it is almost impossible to find a food product, especially in the United States that either hasn't been genetically modified or has not been prepared with a genetically modified product.

Some genetically modified foods can easily be spotted, such as over sized carrots the size of yams and onions resembling soft balls, but most go undetected such as meat products, canned, and boxed goods where the genetically modified food product is a simple additive.

GMF is a big business here in the US which began in 1994, with a tomato genetically modified to delay ripening after picking. Since then, GMF has crept into every aspect of food we consume. If the food happens not to be genetically modified, more than likely it was prepared with a GM product.

The company totally responsible for introducing GMF into our lives is Monsanto, based in St Louis, Missouri. The company prides itself on GMF which vastly increases crop size and yield, making more crops resistant to pesticides and sustainability of meeting the needs of an ever increasing human population.

The two basic ways foods are genetically modified is through transgenesis and cisgenesis. Transgenesis is when plants have genes inserted into them from other species and cisgenesis is using genes from the same plant species or closely related species, so conventional breeding can occur.

The main concern of consumers in ingesting GMF products should be from the pesticides used during the growth period of the plant. Since most GMF plants were created to resist pesticides in the first place, this essentially means that such GM crops were exposed to chemicals which would still be present in the crop at the supermarket. Harmful chemicals are also present in all GMF; including most cooking oils, sugar and through indirect contamination such as meat products from animals which consumed grains from GM sources.

The main goal of Monsanto isn't increasing food production but, engineering crops to resist chemicals for the sole purpose of increasing its investments in the pesticides and chemicals themselves.

Aside from GMF and pesticides, Monsanto also is also highly invested in the pharmaceutical industry, as well with multi investments in this genre.

From pesticides to big pharm, Monsanto has cornered the market in products that will make you sick to the medications necessary to make you well. This company has literally been run out of Europe on a rail, with the public's disdain of GMF and the dangers to health that the bio engineering of crops brings with it.

On the ballot in California, this November is Proposition 37, Mandatory Labeling of Genetically Modified Food and state regulation of certain GMF. This measure would require labeling of all food that has been GMed or has additives which are GM. Not surprising to anyone Monsanto, Du Pont, and other chemical companies have spent millions to defeat this Proposition from passing.

As citizens having to buy food products here in the US, we have a right to know what food items have been genetically modified. We have labeling of caloric values of virtually all food items, including fast food products, as well as labeling of nutritional values of all food products. 

We therefore, have the exclusive right to know what food items have been genetically modified which indirectly lets us know which foods have been exposed to dangerous pesticides.

Above all, we have the right to refuse the use of genetically modified foods altogether.