Comments on: COOL-ing Down Monsanto

By: Monsanto’s image takes a beating | Cult of Green

Monsanto’s image takes a beating | Cult of Green — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 17:31:41 +0000

[...] counter that wave of bad publicity on every medium. As this entertaining Twitter exchange involving Civil Eats’ Rob Smart demonstrates, however, when your back’s against the wall, sometimes it’s best to remain [...]

By: Monsanto greenwashing | Cult of Green

Monsanto greenwashing | Cult of Green — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 17:29:36 +0000

By: Sinclair

Sinclair — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 05:44:28 +0000

COOL is very important to consumers, and I AWLAYS look for country of origin on anything packaged that I purchase. Consumers have a right to know from whence their food came, and we have a right to know if our food has GMO ingredients. I personally do not believe GMOs to be safe, and I want to use my consumer dollars to send the message that I do NOT support GMO food/crops. I cannot effectively do this if I do not know which to boycott. I will not knowingly eat GMO food, nor will I feed it to my family. Monsanto wants to hide behind this false shield of reasoning because it knows what consumers want and that the profits would shrink with shrinking sales of GMO foods. Isn’t a “free market economy” supposed to be consumer driven? Oh, except we do not truly have a free market economy…

By: Rob Smart

Rob Smart — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 01:04:53 +0000

An interesting labeling parallel was brought to my attention today – tobacco.

I am willing to bet the tobacco industry had an attitude much like the GMO industry does today when cigarettes were not labeled as hazardous. Just consider that in 1944 cigarette production was at 300 billion cigarettes per year. It wasn’t until Big Tobacco had to start defending its product from a health perspective, which started 21 years later in 1965 when warning labels were mandated by the US Congress, that big money was spent convincing the public that cigarettes were cool, refreshing or whatever. It still amazes me that the FDA allowed such advertising of a known killer.

Which brings me to the importance of not discounting peoples’ concerns of GMO foods. The industry is still way too young to know whether there are serious risks, although a number of sources are already making such claims based on the available history and related research. What if they are right? What if people are slowly getting sick due to unknown side effects associated with specific GM ingredients? Is it worth letting something that over 90 percent of Americans want labeled to remain a mystery?

I for one can’t stand by waiting for the downside, which if left unchecked will create massive health and social issues for a large percentage of Americans.

Can you?

By: Kim Carlson

Kim Carlson — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 19:23:31 +0000

“I don’t want food companies passing along cost of labeling to me for something they say has no bearing on my health or safety.”

How expensive is it to label foods? Is this really a significant cost?

By: Erica

Erica — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 16:56:04 +0000

If the leaders in Washington are not willing to step up for consumer choice (those of us that are educated know about the “revolving door”), then it is up to citizens to spread awareness to citizens. It’s truly something that Monsanto thinks people are this stupid. If we cannot get GMO-labeling, the best way to hit Monsanto where it hurts is to continue to push the agenda through blogs, support local farmers markets, etc. I live in California, where we are at a particular advantage because of the year-round growing season. If Monsanto and its chums in Washington won’t give us a choice, we’ll educate ourselves. It will certainly take time, but supporting our local farmers is a start. Thank you for publishing this.

By: Katya

Katya — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 14:42:42 +0000

Also, in defense of mandatory labeling, while GMO crops might not, in specific, differ from their non-GMO counterparts in health and safety qualities, GMO farming practices and the potential spread of patented GMO crops are of great significance to the health and safety of the American agriculture system and ecosystem in general, and I for one would like to be notified so as not to participate in GMO crop systems.

By: Shaun Haney

Shaun Haney — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 12:15:38 +0000

As a Canadian producer that has been dramatically affected by COOL I would like to lend some thoughts. I find it interesting that COOL is now being sold to people as a marketing tactic and is about food awareness. COOL has always been and will always be nothing more than a non-tariff trade barrier which was pushed through the system based on supposed health concerns by anti trade groups like R-Calf. Don’t try and sell COOL as some great way for the US to be honest with the consumer. COOL is trade distorting and is being challenged at WTO by Canada and Mexico.