Fwd: Kucinich moves GE debate to presidential politics

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Fri, 21 Feb 2003 01:11:32 -0800

News Update from The Campaign

Kucinich moves GE debate to presidential politics

 

News Update From The Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Foods

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If you would like to comment on this News Update, you can do so at the

forum section of our web site at: http://www.thecampaign.org/forums

 

Dear News Update Subscribers,

 

Representative Dennis Kucinich, primary sponsor of the Genetically

Engineered Food Right to Know Act in the House of Representatives,

announced on Monday that he is running for president of the United

States.

 

The Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Foods has a policy of not

endorsing any particular candidate for political office, president or

otherwise. But we are quite enthused about Representative Kucinich's

decision to run for president since it is likely to elevate the issue of

genetically engineered foods to one discussed by the presidential

candidates.

 

As a matter of fact this is already beginning to happen according to an

article posted below from the Madison, Wisconsin Capital Times titled

" Kucinich More Than Anti-war Candidate. "

 

The article also makes reference to an attempt to " undermine newly

enacted labeling rules for foods that are grown organically. " Some of

you may not be aware of this recent development.

 

In the spending bill that was passed by Congress last week, a provision

was added that would allow non-organic feed to be fed to animals raised

for organic meat. I am including an article below from the New York

Times last week titled " Weakening of Organic Standard Is Considered "

that will provide more detailed information.

 

Also posted below is a third article that is from the Thursday edition

of the Boston Globe titled " Corn-belt farmers find modified crops tough

to sell. " This article is a good review of many of the various issues

that have developed in the past year regarding genetically engineered

foods.

 

Craig Winters

Executive Director

The Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Foods

 

The Campaign

PO Box 55699

Seattle, WA 98155

Tel: 425-771-4049

Fax: 603-825-5841

E-mail: label

Web Site: http://www.thecampaign.org

 

Mission Statement: " To create a national grassroots consumer campaign

for the purpose of lobbying Congress and the President to pass

legislation that will require the labeling of genetically engineered

foods in the United States. "

 

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Kucinich More Than Anti-war Candidate

 

The Capital Times - Madison, Wisconsin

Tuesday, February 18, 2003

 

John Nichols

DES MOINES

 

The shorthand description of Congressional Progressive Caucus

co-chairman Dennis Kucinich's platform for his just-launched

presidential bid is that he is the anti-war candidate for the 2004

Democratic nomination. And the Ohio representative who last week joined

five other congressmen to sue President Bush in a move aimed at blocking

a unilateral attack on Iraq is certainly that.

 

But when Kucinich made his first swing across Iowa - where next

January's caucuses will begin the Democratic Party's nominating process

- some of the loudest applause was for his position on an issue that

most other candidates have never even discussed: food labeling.

 

Since his election to the House in 1996, Kucinich has been the most

outspoken advocate in Congress for labeling food products that have been

genetically altered or that contain genetically modified organisms. He

has yet to prevail on that front, but Kucinich has been a key player in

struggles to win federal approval for consumer- and farmer-friendly

labeling of food that is grown organically.

 

Kucinich's first speeches in Iowa have focused primarily on his

opposition to war and on his criticisms of the corporate free trade

pacts that have done damage to Midwestern manufacturing and agriculture.

But at virtually every stop, he has been asked about his food fights.

 

When he finished speaking at a party in Iowa City, for instance, an

organic farmer ran up to the candidate, grabbed his hand and said, " I

just want to thank you for being our champion in Congress. "

 

Kucinich, who has struggled for years to get food labeling issues taken

seriously in Congress, responded by telling the crowd, " I've always

figured that if we are what we eat, it's good to know what we're

eating. "

 

Later that night, when he was asked about Bush administration attempts

to undermine newly enacted labeling rules for foods that are grown

organically, the Ohio congressman said, " We have to do everything we can

to protect organic farming in particular. It's part of the bigger

question of how to protect farmers and consumers in a rapidly changing

global economy. Farmers need an advocate - someone who understands the

economic dynamics, who understands what the food and farming issues are,

and who isn't beholden to the corporate interests. "

 

By framing the debate over food labeling as a battle between farmers and

consumers on one side and agribusiness conglomerates that oppose

labeling and other forms of regulation on the other, Kucinich could push

the dialogue about food safety and food quality to a point where it has

never before been in presidential politics.

 

" Government has a moral responsibility to ensure the purity and safety

of the food supply, " he argues. " We cannot abdicate this responsibility

to global corporations whose goals may be limited to profit

orientation. "

 

* It is unlikely that debates about organic labeling or regulations on

genetic modification of food will move all the way to the forefront of

the 2004 political agenda. But if Kucinich makes them a part of the

dialogue in Iowa - a state that takes farming and food seriously - he

may yet be proved right when he tells Democrats here:

 

" Iowa has a chance to change the debate in this presidential election.

You have a chance to expand the debate, to make it be about the issues

that matter in people's lives. "

 

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Weakening of Organic Standard Is Considered

 

The New York Times

February 14, 2003

By MARIAN BURROS

 

Buried within the $397 billion spending bill passed last night by

Congress is a provision that would permit livestock producers to certify

and label meat as " organic " even if the animals had been fed partly or

entirely on conventional rather than organic grain.

 

Under the provision, if the Agriculture Department certifies that

organic feed is commercially available only at more than twice the price

of conventional feed, then the department cannot enforce regulations

requiring that livestock labeled organically raised be fed only organic

feed.

 

" This is an example of someone doing an end run to manipulate the

government with disregard for the public's wishes, " said Katherine

DiMatteo, executive director of the Organic Trade Association, which

represents the organic industry.

 

The provision was added to the omnibus spending bill behind closed doors

on Wednesday night with only Republicans present. It was included on

behalf of a Baldwin, Ga., poultry producer, the Fieldale Farms

Corporation, which has been trying since last summer to get an exemption

that would allow it to feed its chickens a mix of conventional and

organic feed. The company says there is not enough organic feed

available.

 

Congressional officials on both sides of the aisle say Speaker J. Dennis

Hastert added the last-minute provisions at the request of

Representative Nathan Deal, Republican of Georgia.

 

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, which monitors campaign

contributions, Mr. Deal received $4,000 from employees of Fieldale,

which is in his district, during his last campaign. Calls to the offices

of Mr. Deal were not returned.

 

When Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, who wrote the

organic standards program, learned of the last-minute addition to the

spending bill he sent a letter to his colleagues urging them to defeat

the provisions. Both he and Representative Sam Farr, Democrat of

California, plan to introduce legislation to strike the provisions from

the bill.

 

" This whole thing is absolutely outrageous, " Mr. Leahy said. " After

years and years and years of work, to have someone sneak it in in the

dark of night and wipe it out makes no sense. It's a poke in the eye of

a lot of very hard-working organic farmers. "

 

Ed Nicholson, a spokesman for Tyson Foods, which is test marketing

organic chickens, said: " We opposed adding this language to the omnibus

spending bill. We think it is important to meet the organic requirements

because otherwise it will compromise the integrity of the organic

standards. "

 

The organic rules, which took effect in October, are an attempt to

standardize a hodgepodge of regulations for an $11 billion industry that

has been growing at the rate of 20 percent a year for a decade.

 

The 2002 Farm Bill directed the agriculture secretary to assess the

availability of organically produced feed for livestock and poultry. The

report has not been released, but information from Organic Trade

Association members indicates that organic feed is commercially

available at prices lower than those in the language of the exemption.

 

" I think this jeopardizes the whole organic industry in the United

States, " Mr. Farr said of the provision before Congress.

 

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Corn-belt farmers find modified crops tough to sell

 

By Hannah Wolfson, Globe Correspondent, 2/20/2003

 

GARRETSON, S.D. - Jim Solheim's fields are sown with technology, and

that makes him nervous.

 

Like most corn-belt farmers, Solheim expects to plant much of his

1,000-acre spread with genetically modified corn and soybeans come

spring. His soybeans have DNA implanted that makes them resistant to a

popular herbicide, and his corn contains a gene that makes it toxic to a

common pest.

 

The altered crops make farming easier, and he's sure they're safe. But

with European countries placing a moratorium on approving genetically

modified crops and some concern among American consumers about potential

health and environmental risks, Solheim is worried he won't be able to

sell his produce.

 

''It's a big issue,'' Solheim said. ''We've lost our European export

business. We've lost a few other small countries. I'm not worried about

eating genetically modified food. But the long-term effects ... I don't

know.''

 

Some of biotech's biggest supporters are worried that consumer concerns,

as well as wariness about experiments using modified crops to grow

pharmaceuticals, will lead other countries to embrace Europe's

moratorium, which already costs US farmers an estimated $300 million a

year in lost sales.

 

''We're concerned that the multinational food companies will react

because of the hysteria, because the food companies are our customers

and we have to listen to our customers,'' said Tom Slunecka of the

National Corn Growers Association. ''You can only stand on premise till

your belly's hungry.''

 

A shift in food policy could leave farmers in the lurch. According to

the US Department of Agriculture, about 75 percent of last year's soy

crop in this country was genetically engineered, up from 68 percent in

2001 and 54 percent in 2000. About 32 percent of the corn crop included

biotech varieties.

 

Midwestern states like South Dakota, which leads the nation in the

percentage of biotech corn and soy it grows, would be hit particularly

hard. Two-thirds of the corn planted here is genetically engineered, as

is 89 percent of the soy.

 

American food companies took an unprecedented stand this month against

another type of genetically modified crop: those designed to produce

pharmaceuticals. The technology that allows Solheim's corn to fight

caterpillars also lets scientists turn it into a protein factory, making

medicines for humans or animals.

 

''Biopharming,'' as it's called, is still in the experimental stage, and

none of these products have government approval for commercial

production yet. Most are still being grown inside university greenhouses

and in tiny test plots.

 

Yet biopharming has garnered a great deal of attention, especially since

last fall, when one company violated the strict procedures for growing

what opponents like to call ''Frankenfoods.''

 

Texas-based ProdiGene was hit with a record fine for its mistake, which

may have contaminated up to 500,000 bushels of Iowa and Nebraska

soybeans with pharmaceutical corn. The company paid $250,000 in

penalties, plus $3 million for the cost of buying and destroying the

polluted soy.

 

Industry spokespeople say ProdiGene was an isolated incident. The

government says it shows the system works because none of the

pharmaceutical corn got into the food supply, and the USDA has new

regulations in the pipeline.

 

But critics ranging from environmentalists to consumer groups say last

fall's harvest shows that biopharmaceuticals are too hard to control.

 

Part of the problem is the crop. Scientists like to use corn because

it's easy to grow and the seeds - think of popcorn - store well. But

because corn spreads its pollen on the wind, it can jump easily from

field to field.

 

Growers are required to take certain precautions, from building physical

barriers to planting at off times. But the drift is still so

unpredictable that last year the Biotechnology Industry Organization

urged its members to stop biopharming in corn-belt states. The trade

group has since backed off under pressure from the region's lawmakers.

 

''Is it proper to tell these farmers, our best farmers, who've been

growing these products for a number of years, that now there's a chance

to make some money they can't have any part of it?'' said Catherine

Carter, a plant science professor at South Dakota State University.

''They're understandably opposed to being shut out.''

 

Now the pressure is coming from the industry's biggest customers.

Earlier this month, the National Food Processors Association declared a

zero-tolerance policy for pharmaceutical crops, and the Grocery

Manufacturers of America asked the government not to issue any

commercial permits for biopharming.

 

That's a significant policy change, said Jane Rissler of the Union of

Concerned Scientists. ''It's the first time that there's a wedge between

the food industry and the biotech industry. The food industry has gone

along with the biotech industry without complaint,'' she said.

 

Indeed, about 70 percent of the products on American grocery store

shelves already include some kind of biotechnology, mostly in the form

of soy oil, corn oil, or corn sweetener.

 

A small percentage of consumers already have decided to go without

genetically modified - or GMO - crops, paying premium prices for

organically grown conventional corn or soybeans. But organic producers

say that line is getting harder and harder to maintain.

 

Take Solheim's neighbor, Dave Johnson, who grows organic corn and

grass-fed beef. He sells his corn as GMO-free for animal feed, but he's

certain his fields already have been contaminated.

 

''It's a major problem and it's only going to get worse,'' Johnson said.

''There is no GMO-free corn growing in this country now, it's just a

matter of whether you can find it.''

 

That means that if US consumers follow Europe's, farmers could be in

trouble, said GianCarlo Moschini, an economics professor at the

University of Iowa.

 

''The minute consumers start caring whether it has GM traits or not,

then the entire system breaks down,'' he said. ''If some consumers don't

want them, there is a problem. And there have not been enough efforts to

determine what consumers accept and don't.''

 

The biotech industry disagrees, saying that Americans trust government

regulators and are sure the food is safe.

 

''Clearly the farmers think there is a market for their crops,'' said

Lisa Dry, spokeswoman for the Biotechnology Industry Organization.

''There are no signs that this is slowing down in any way, and certainly

as farmers have access to the technology they are eager to use it.''

 

But some farmers, like Solheim, say there isn't really any other choice.

 

''If you don't want to go with the new modern high-tech stuff, it's

pretty hard to compete,'' he said.

 

This story ran on page A3 of the Boston Globe on 2/20/2003.

 

 

 

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