I recently answered some questions on a survey for the Canadian Government about Consumer Nutrition, Food Labelling, and what they can do to help.
The survey was poorly laid out for most consumers to actually answer; Questions were unclear and the survey was too long. It likely cost us a lot of money to put on though, no doubt.
I thought I would share some of my answers which reflect my opinions on consumer nutrition responsibility and food labelling requirements.
Of more importance than the post on consumer nutrition responsibility, today I want to cover GMO food labelling.
GMOs are a hot topic for debate these days. On one hand they allow farmers to grow more food, with less effort, and generally with the use of herbicide sprays that would kill the non-GMO versions of the plants. Other GMOs have nutrients added in to the food to help prevent some malnutrition in children in poorer countries. Golden Rice is the best example of that.
But that is exactly the issue, do we want to eat this food that has been heavily sprayed with roundup? Do we want to eat food that has been modified at the genetic level with fish genes and a virus?
I won’t go into my beliefs on whether GMO foods are good or bad. In short I think the research is good but I don’t want to consume them. But there’s the problem, how do I know what foods have GMO ingredients in them and what foods do not?