Syngenta Thrive - 4Q/2013 - 9

providing necessary safety information to consumers who have health
issues that require careful monitoring of the foods they eat. Food made
from GM ingredients is not a safety issue.”
More than 400 scientific studies have shown that foods made with
genetically engineered ingredients are safe. The federal Food and Drug
Administration agreed more than two decades ago when it ruled that
genetically engineered foods are not “materially different” from their
traditional counterparts and do not have to be labeled.
Syngenta also recognizes that labeling creates additional costs for
food manufacturers and could leave them vulnerable to litigation if a
product labeled as “non-GMO” were found to contain genetically
engineered ingredients. That is a real possibility, since roughly 90
percent of the nation’s corn, soybean, canola, cotton and sugarbeet
acres are planted using GMO seeds.
Education Is Key
The stakes of the GMO labeling debate are high. According to the
American Soybean Association (ASA), exports of genetically modified
soybeans have fallen 70 percent in the last 15 years. ASA largely blames
mandatory GMO food labeling rules in Europe for the decline. That
means educating American consumers and lawmakers, who are
considering adopting similar laws on either a state or national basis,
is an important priority.
Last year, biotech companies and grocery manufacturers spent
nearly $45 million to help defeat California’s Proposition 37. However,
in the long run, reaching out to community and legislative leaders to
discuss their concerns about GMO foods is a more cost-effective way
to fight food labeling laws than state-by-state campaign ads.
Farmers who grow GMO crops and ag retailers who carry those
products need to talk more about how Bt corn or herbicide-resistant
soybeans make farming more productive and reduce agriculture’s
footprint on the environment, while keeping food costs low, says Greg
Conko, executive director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
“My fear is that we may not fully appreciate the nature of the threat in this
renewed effort, which is well-financed and well-coordinated,” adds Conko.
To help educate the public, Syngenta has teamed up with other
ag biotech companies to launch a website to answer consumer
questions about how food is grown. The GMO Answers website
(www.gmoanswers.com) serves as a central resource about GMOs and
their use in agriculture.
“We at Syngenta think our products are quite valuable to society,
and we would like people to know more about them,” says Thies.

The latest expert
agronomic insights –
directly from the field into
your homes and hands

Go to www.KnowMoreGrowMore.com
for a bird’s-eye view of what’s happening
across crops throughout the country to
aid management decisions.
Features of the site include:
• Updates from fields, orchards,
vineyards
• Highly sortable content
• Categorization by geography, crop,
agronomic topic
• Agronomic resources
• Photos and videos
• Field trial updates

story by cindy snyder

For more inFormation about GMOs and proposed food labeling
laws, go to these websites:
> Academics Review, www.academicsreview.org
> Biotechnology Industry Organization, www.bio.org
> Competitive Enterprise Institute, www.cei.org
> GMO Answers, www.gmoanswers.com

ResouRce diRectoRy

©2013 Syngenta. The Syngenta logo is a
registered trademark of a Syngenta Group Company.

syng enta thr ive.com |

7
Syngenta Thrive - 4Q/2013

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Syngenta Thrive - 4Q/2013
