Grand Forks Herald: OUR OPINION: Support Senate's Compromise on GMO Labeling

Press Release

When two sides compromise, neither gets everything it wants.

Which is why the U.S. Senate should pass the new bipartisan compromise on labeling food with genetically modified ingredients.

But the bill doesn't give label backers the no-excuses label they want. Instead, "it would be more lenient than Vermont's law, allowing food companies to use a text label, a symbol or electronic label accessed by smartphone," The New York Times reports.

"Vermont's law would require items to be labeled 'produced with genetic engineering.'"

In other words, the bill announced June 22 by the top Democrat and Republican on the Senate Agriculture Committee incorporates the concerns of both sides. But it does so in a way that leaves neither side fully satisfied.

That makes it a winner in American politics. Here's more evidence of the same thing: In a test vote last week, the bill cleared a procedural hurdle by a supermajority, 68-29.

Voting "yes" were all four of North Dakota and Minnesota's senators, including not only Republican John Hoeven but also Hoeven's fellow North Dakotan--Democrat Heidi Heitkamp--and Minnesota Democrats Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken.

It's a rare and praiseworthy agreement on a controversial issue that can draw the unanimous support of those four.

The senators should stick to their guns and vote "yes" on Wednesday as well, when the Senate will decide whether to stop a filibuster. Then they should approve the bill on the Senate floor.

This bill needs strong bipartisan support, because that will boost the odds of both House passage and the president signing the bill into law.

Moreover, there's real urgency to this bill. That's because on July 1, Vermont's mandatory labeling bill took effect--the one referred to in the New York Times story above; the one that would require items to be labeled "produced with genetic engineering."

By passing its law, Vermont set an intolerable precedent. The state was wrong for two reasons: First, it indulged rather than refuted consumers' unscientific fears. There simply is no scientific reason to identify GMO ingredients.

As a letter last week stated, "Scientific and regulatory agencies around the world have repeatedly and consistently found crops and foods improved through biotechnology to be as safe as, if not safer than those derived from any other method of production. There has never been a single confirmed case of a negative health outcome for humans or animals from their consumption."

The letter was signed by 107 Nobel laureates.

Second, the Vermont law raised the prospect of 50 food-labeling laws--one for each state. That's why farm groups and food manufacturers nationwide (including the American Crystal Sugar Co.) support the Senate bill, which would pre-empt Vermont's law.

"We need consistency across the country," said a spokesman for General Mills, which supports the bill even though the company has started GMO labeling on its own.

Of course, backers of labeling found a strong argument of their own: the idea that consumers simply have a right to know what's in their food.

By itself, that argument didn't persuade Congress. But it persuaded the Vermont Legislature, and Vermont's action in turn pushed the Senate to act.

The American political system is set up to deliver one thing: Compromise. That trait has been in short supply in recent years. But now it has surfaced in a challenging national issue--and North Dakota and Minnesota's lawmakers should see it through.

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