May 10, 2000 / CropGen
The ruling by the Advertising Standards Association (ASA) against two
supermarkets in respect of their GM and organic foods leaflets raises
critical
questions about information and choice.
In its May adjudications, the ASA criticised the supermarkets for misleading
consumers about the safety of GM foods and the properties of organic
products. The ASA ruling might suggest that supermarkets are guilty of
contributing to the misinformation that surrounds biotechnology but, in
truth, they are victims of the anti-science, anti-reason environment that
campaigning groups continue to promote.
Anti-GM campaigners consistently invoke the right of consumers to choose
what they eat. But what choice is there if GM foods are kept off the
supermarket shelves by anti-GM rhetoric? For real choice there also has to
be
an option to buy GM.
Those who believe in the potential benefits that biotechnology can bring in
terms of health and the environment, in the UK and abroad, also have a right
- the right to express their support for biotechnology at the checkout. For
the
time being at least, campaigning groups have managed to compel some
supermarkets to turn their backs on biotechnology. Several chains have been
forced into defensive and sometimes untenable positions as they scramble to
maintain competitiveness.
"Those who support biotechnology and believe in the benefits it can bring
must provide supermarkets with evidence that they too are a force to be
reckoned with," said Professor Vivian Moses, Chairman of the CropGen
Panel. "Not through stunts or gestures, but through patient yet insistent
action at local level."
(posted without permission)
