GMOs innovating the food industry
GMOs are everywhere, in our plants, animals, and food, and now Harvard medical students have genetically modified bacteria to be totally resistant to disease; but what exactly are GMOs?
GMOs are genetically modified organisms. This means that in a lab the organism was given a trait of another organism. In the fields it was selectively bred with other organisms, or that its genomes (DNA) were altered (i.e. removing an unwanted gene).
GMOs are more common than most people think. In the David Douglas cafeterias, multiple different packaged foods labeled “contains bioengineered ingredient” were found. However, that does not include the unlabeled foods and ingredients used in the hot meals served to DDHS students every day.
In fact, there are no regulations surrounding the GMOs in foods fed to students at DDHS., mandatory labeling of GMO food products began In 2022. This rule means that any food product intended for human consumption that contains more than 5% GMO ingredients must be labeled as either "Bioengineered" or as "Derived from Bioengineering." However, any foods derived from animals (eggs, meat, milk) along with some oils or sugars do not need to be labeled as genetically modified.
On the David Douglas School District website, a menu with all the foods served at the high school can be found. It lists the calories per serving and other nutritional information about any given item served in the cafeteria. However, nowhere does it list whether or not the foods have been bioengineered.
GMOs are incredibly popular with farmers and major corporations for the sheer range of what they can do. They can increase shelf life, increase food production-per-crop, improve flavor and quality, make organisms resistant to disease, viruses, and bacteria, and make crops pest resistant.
Pests are not only harmful to agriculture because of their surface-level threats (disease, virus, bacteria, crop damage), but also because of the negative effects that pesticides have. Not only do pesticides make people really ill, they kill off entire populations of insects that are vital to ecosystems. They are harmful to almost every animal that encounters them. GMOs alter crops using genes from the pests to make them resistant to pests. This potentially eradicates the usage of pesticides altogether.
For example, bananas, amongst many other fruits, have been genetically modified to last longer. Bananas typically would last only a few days before becoming rotten and inedible. Thanks to genetic modification, they can last up to multiple weeks.
There are downsides to genetic modification. Many have protested the usage of GMOs because they are unnatural and negatively impact biodiversity. There have been major protests and destruction of property/research relating to GMOs.
For example, in 2013, (according to science.org) Protestors from two anti-GMO groups, KMB and Sikwal-GMO, vandalized a field of genetically modified (GM) "golden rice" in the Bicol region of the Philippines.
This event set back the development of golden rice (a genetically modified nutrient-rich grain developed to help malnourished children in low-income countries to prevent blindness by supplementing vitamin A).
“Since GMO foods were introduced, research has shown that they are just as safe as non-GMO foods,” the FDA officially stated.
That statement, among many other statements backed by research, shows that GMOs are in fact safe to eat.
GMOs do pose a threat to biodiversity, however, because of the way that foods are specifically altered to have special traits. All types of food can’t be genetically modified to hold those traits, so typically foods are narrowed down to one ‘“type” that is then genetically modified.
GMOs aren’t only scientifically genetically edited organisms. GMOs are also created through crossbreeding, which has been an agricultural practice for hundreds of years. As early as 8000 BCE, humans were crossbreeding both plants and animals for desired traits (i.e. domestication of animals and creating more viable crops).
If a food is organic, that means there are no GMOs. GMO-free foods can often be found in places like Trader Joe's or Whole Foods, but in a regular commercial grocery store (such as Fred Meyer), organic foods may be slightly harder to find. This is because GMO foods are most often cheaper to mass produce than organic.