For Senate Agriculture chairman Pat Roberts, the need for federal pre-emption of GMO food labeling authority is clear. “This country will be hit with a wrecking ball that will disrupt the entire food chain” if states are not blocked, he said, warning of a “patchwork of biotechnology labeling laws that will soon be wreaking havoc on the flow of interstate commerce.”
Not so, says the pro-labeling camp. Talk of a welter of conflicting laws “is the second-biggest mischaracterization of the debate,” says Scott Faber of the Environmental Working Group (EWG), topped only by estimates of tens of billions of dollars in costs for food processors to comply with state laws.
Only one state, Vermont, has an active labeling law, which takes effect on July 1 with a six-month grace period for compliance. Roger Lowe of the Grocery Manufacturers Association says the food industry has sound reason to push for a national standard. “Several other states have passed mandatory laws with triggering mechanisms and additional state legislatures are trying to enact GMO on-package labeling mandates,” said Lowe.
Connecticut and Maine have label laws on the books but they will not take effect unless four other states enact similar laws. Connecticut needs at least four other states with at least a combined 20 million residents. Maine requires four contiguous states to ratify label laws. The Maine law automatically expires in 2018 if there is no bloc of GMO-labeling states. But Some lawmakers in Maine want to remove the trigger provision so the GMO label law will take effect now and others want to delay the automatic repeal to 2022, says the Associated Press.
The phrase “produced with genetic engineering” on the package would be enough to put food makers in compliance with all three of the New England states, says EWG. And it would be sufficient to satisfy bills under consideration in Massachusetts, New York state and Rhode Island, said Faber.
No state has approved a label law since Vermont in May 2014. Maine enacted its law in January 2014 and Connecticut was the first state, in June 2013. GMO labeling has dwindled as a statehouse issue. There are 31 labeling bills pending in state legislatures this year, a sharp drop from 101 in 2015, says the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). Eleven of the pending bills are carry-overs from 2015 that probably have little chance of advancing.
Legislators may be waiting to see the outcome of a food industry lawsuit against Vermont’s law, said Faber. The protagonists in the labeling debate, the food industry and advocates such as the Just Label It campaign, also moved their focus to Congress after the expensive battles of 2014. Tens of millions of dollars were spent on the Oregon referendum alone.
A GMO labeling bill was approved by the New York State Assembly’s consumer affairs committee in early February and was referred to a second committee for consideration. A state Senate version of the bill was in the consumer protection committee, said Long Island Business News.
Little mentioned is Alaska’s decade-old law for labeling of genetically engineered salmon. No GE salmon is on the market although FDA approved the AquAdvantage salmon last November. The FDA is obliged to craft a labeling system for it, thanks to a rider approved last December by Congress. Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican, voted against Roberts’ pre-emption bill, saying “it really does threaten the progress we have made.”
In a roll call that split along party lines, senators rejected the Roberts bill, 48-49. All but three Democrats voted against the bill while Republicans generally supported it.