Congress has only a few days left to pass a GMO labeling bill through the Senate and House before Vermont’s mandatory labeling law takes effect July 1. And while Maine, Vermont and Connecticut have clearly spoken on the issue, there is still discussion in Washington around developing a “compromise” piece of legislation that would pre-empt existing bills in those states.
Time is running out, and the next few weeks are critical to protecting the rights of Maine consumers.
Throughout households in Maine and across the country, this is a nonpartisan issue, with more than 90 percent of people polled reporting they believe they have the right to know whether their food contains GMOs. In Maine this number was as high as 97 percent. The Maine Legislature took notice and, together with our colleagues, Maine’s GMO labeling bill, LD 718, was co-sponsored by the remarkable number of 123 legislators and passed in 2013 by huge margins, 141-4 in the House and 35-0 in the Senate. Maine’s legislation was modeled closely after what had been done in Vermont to ensure consistency.
With years of notice before the July 1, 2016, deadline and without increasing costs to consumers or any doomsday impacts, companies have been taking the necessary steps to comply in Vermont and also to label products distributed across the country. Campbell Soup, ConAgra, Mars, Kellogg’s, General Mills and Dannon are companies that have announced they will label products containing GMOs in such a way that complies with the Vermont statute scheduled to go into effect in July and that they will not pass costs from doing so along to consumers.
In an effort to make the phase-in of the law even smoother for those involved, the Vermont legislature recently amended its GMO law, delaying for one year the right of consumers to file private lawsuits against food manufacturers, local grocers and others for noncompliance.
Still, Monsanto and big agriculture realize that successful implementation in Vermont will harm their efforts to impede consumer rights elsewhere across the country, and they continue to fight to buy their way out of any existing labeling requirements. Monsanto doesn’t want to take the chance that consumers won’t buy as many GMO products if labeling is required, and so it continues to put pressure on Congress to go against the will of consumers with one sweeping bad piece of legislation that will ensure we are kept in the dark nationally.
Luckily, in a recent vote to pass such legislation sponsored by Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas, Sens. Angus King and Susan Collins defended Maine consumers’ right to know and opposed the measure. With the clock winding down, Sen. Debbie Stabenow of Michigan and Roberts reportedly will attempt to reach a compromise and present another bill that undoubtedly will include language pre-empting the strong Maine and Vermont laws and replacing them with a weaker voluntary labeling system as a substitute.
We urge Collins and King to stand strong with the other members of the Maine delegation and oppose any legislation that would allow voluntary labeling or alternative labeling options, such as a QR code. As was our intent in the Maine law, allowing producers to choose any option other than clear, on-package labeling displaying the words “Produced with Genetic Engineering” will virtually ensure that consumers, especially those without access to internet or smartphone devices, will not have complete information about what is in the food they are buying.
This corrupts the very heart and intent of what it means to have the right to know.
Sen. Brian Langley, R-Ellsworth, represents District 7 in the Maine Senate. Rep. Michelle Dunphy, D-Old Town, represents District 122 in the Maine House.