How can I avoid GM food? | Lucy Siegle

Call me old-fashioned, but I refuse to eat or support GM food. How can I avoid it?If you have an ethical dilemma, email Lucy at [e-mail]-fashioned? The environment secretary Owen Paterson might call you "wicked", as being anti-GM is seen as being anti-science and to deny the world a solution to hunger. David Cameron, the PM, has also said we need to revisit our stance on GM. In short: we should stop biting the hand that could feed us (transgenically). Critics say this is a concerted campaign to soften us up until we give in to biotech corporations.Actually GM haters in other nations look at our supermarket shelves with envy. This may not be the land of GM-free milk and honey it once was, but multinationals think there's enough of an anti-GM audience to provide products that are explicitly GM-free. "Want non-GMO Cheerios? Move to Europe!" says the headline to one US consumer piece.Here products that "intentionally" contain genetically modified ingredients must be labelled by law, but there exists a tolerance threshold of 0.9% per ingredient, per product containing "accidental" authorised GMOs (some 50 GMO products are authorised in the EU), and a 0.5% tolerance threshold for non-authorised materials. This freaks out some consumers, like you, who believe these "hidden" GMs pose a health risk and may cause allergies.Your options are to a) move to Bhutan (it has a goal of becoming wholly organic by 2020) or b) buy only from the organic system, specifically So...

Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - November 10, 2013 Category: Science Authors: Lucy Siegle Tags: Farming Food Food safety GM Features Ethical and green living Life and style The Observer Food science Environment Source Type: news