Labels for GMO foods are a bad idea.

Labels for GMO

            This article is about the argument whether GMO foods should be labeled or not. People have different ideas, but this article stresses the bad side of labeling GMO foods. People say that they want this information on their food because it will be useful, but all this label would do is intensify the misunderstanding of GMO foods being unhealthy. The American Association for the Advancement of Science and the World Health Organization both agree that genetically modified foods are just as safe as other foods. Also, by putting labels on GMO foods, people may not buy them as often and would have to buy premium non-GMO foods, which would be more expensive because they require more water and pesticides. Although people don't think so, GMO foods can be very helpful to both the consumer and the producer. It would help the producer because a study of Indian farmers showed that genetically modified crops increased their yield per acre by 24%, and profits were increased by 50%. An example of a GMO helping the consumer would be researchers creating golden rice, which has lots of vitamin A in it to prevent blindness and death caused by vitamin A deficiency.


Relevance:  This article relates to our previous unit of Molecular Genetics. During this unit, we learned about GMO's in the lab that we did about GMO's. We studied the constant fight of whether it should be labeled or not. This article talks about this and relates to the struggle of consumers seeing that foods are genetically modified and not buying it.




Link: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=labels-for-gmo-foods-are-a-bad-idea
Published on September 6th, 2013