This executive order ignores all the science showing the effects of GMOs to health, and directs federal agencies to streamline the approval process for GMOs to reduce or eliminate regulation and oversight mechanisms to simplify the regulatory maze for producers of genetically engineered crops.
“The move comes as companies are turning to newer genetic engineering techniques that make it easier to tinker with the traits of plants and animals,” reports the Associated Press. In other words regulations are be dropped exactly when easy and low cost genetic modification methods are emerging which places genetic engineering technology into the hands of small companies and determined individuals.
Under this new executive order GMO corn and soybean crops would have never been subjected to safety testing at all, and regulatory oversight will relax on oversight of genetically engineered animals. Those items should scare anyone, not just the health conscious.
This streamlining will relax oversight of genetically engineered animals, without limits this could enable launch of animal organ factories, which could benefit organ harvesting and the transplant industry, that is a potential plus.
“Last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture proposed changing its regulations in a way that would mean much of the genetically modified corn and soy grown in the U.S. today would not necessarily have been subject to special oversight. Crops produced with newer gene-editing technologies also wouldn’t automatically be subject to special oversight under the proposed rule, unless they posed a risk as plant pests” according to the Associated Press.
Americans have been showing that they do not want GMO foods, and that they do not want to be guinea pigs. But here we have it, and this coincides with the roll out of 5G to which we will all be guinea pigs with no choice. This brings the question to mind of what is next?
When it comes to science and the promise of changing the status quo and draining the swamp the GMO industry has gone past ripe to rotten. Those who care about health and food transparency are not making unreasonable demands to have safety oversight on genetically engineered foods, pesticides, and animals, along with honest detailed food labeling. It is very difficult to explain this move of pushing GMOs streamlining away, Americans deserve to know what they are eating and that it is safe.
To put a positive spin on this, without any real regulations Monsanto/Bayer stand to lose their dominance due to new market entry from smaller organizations; reducing regulations could reduce old barriers to enter the GMO industry allowing the smaller companies to introduce seeds and crops that will take revenue away from the giants monopolizing the industry. That being said the environmental risks that could be unleashed may be catastrophic given that GMO crops are self replicating and non-natural organisms that could spread with unknown consequences which could cause health and economical harm to US agriculture over the long haul.
Impact of this streamlining will depend on the details of how it is carried out by federal agencies. Genetically engineered animals and plants are regulated differently currently depending on the exact methods used to produce them, and federal agencies are working to clarify these polices as technologies emerge. However, aspects of the current administration’s approach have worried consumer advocacy groups.
Simply deregulating GMOs will make people lose even more confidence in GMOs, there needs to be an assurance of safety for these products. The order also notes that trading partners should be urged to adapt similar approaches, most likely because with loosened regulations companies will be hampered by regulations from other countries with their own stricter regulations. Additionally gene editing could be used to make even more changes including those that would have never happened in nature, oversight is necessary.
“Some of this is what I call a faith-based approach, and not a science-based approach to regulation. They have faith that none of these things are going to cause any problems,” says Jaydee Hanson of the Center for Food Safety.
