Last Thursday the House of Representatives passed HR 1599, the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2015. Those who oppose it call it the DARK Act—Deny Americans the Right to Know.
I’m not even going to try to explain the pros and cons of this here, you can search the internet for all kinds of information on this.
The point I want to make is that we don’t have adequate labeling of food in this country.
Here is a food label from Europe. It clearly states the produce contains genetically modified soyabean oil. By labeling this ingredient in this way, consumers have a choice to purchase GMOs or not.
I would love to see GMOs on the label in America, but in my opinion, it’s not enough. I think that pesticides should be noted on the label too, as well as country of origin.
Food labels today require most ingredients to be listed. I say most because the law requires all ingredients that “go into the pot” to be on the label. But it’s like if you are making soup at home, you might put in carrots and onions and ham, but that ham might contain sugar and nitrates. It’s the same for food manufacturers. If they put carrots and onions and ham in the soup, all they need to list is carrots and onions and ham, even if the ham contains sugar and nitrates. And the BPA in the can lining that migrates into the food isn’t required to be listed at all.
So you really don’t know what is in processed foods under the current labeling system.
We need to go far beyond GMO labeling. We need a major overhaul of food labeling.
In the meantime, my recommendation is to prepare your own food from fresh organic ingredients, local as much as possible. Doing this, you know what’s in your food and you could even meet the farmers. When I lived in California, I belonged to a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program, where I bought a share from the organic farmer and got a share of the harvest every week.
I love to cook! And I know what’s in my food.
Now even the labeling of fresh foods needs a revamp. Some stores voluntarily give country of origin, which is extremely important. And the more you can know about the growing practices, the better.
Many food producers now have a lot of information on their websites.
As a consumer, get curious. Ask. Find out as much as you can. The information is there, even if it’s not on the label.
