Have your say
Take a stand against GM foods by avoiding foods which contain GM ingredients and writing to the manufacturer to let them know about your decision. If only a small percentage of the population did this, it could lead to manufacturers losing sales and possible changes in policy.
Choose organic
If you want to avoid GM foods, buy organic. Although there are a percentage of non-organic ingredients allowed in foods labeled organic, none of the ingredients are allowed to contain GM material.
Modify your choice
About 80% of processed foods contain maize or soya – or their derivatives – and so could potentially contain GM ingredients. Any label saying “modified maize starch” or “modified soya protein” is almost certainly GM.
Half truths
There could be more genetic modification in your food than you thin. Genetically modified bacteria and fungi are used in the production of enzymes, vitamins, food additives, flavourings and processing agents in thousands of foods as well as health supplements. Check with the manufacturer if you’re unsure.
Avoid processed the most-est
The best way to make sure you avoid GM food is to avoid heavily processed foods, which are more likely to contain modified soya or crops. In fact, 75% of processed foods are thought to contain GM ingredients. The worst culprits are ready meals, followed by foods such as bread, biscuits, sausages, pies and chips.
Sweetening you up
Aspartame, the diet sweetener, is a product of genetic engineering. By buying low-fat or “diet” alternative drinks or foods, which may contain this substance, you could inadvertently be giving your support to genetic modification.
No Guarantee
Did you know there is a threshold of 0.9% GM ingredients that foods can contain and still be labeled as GM free in Europe? This means that even foods that aren’t labeled as GM could contain nearly 1% GM foods. Recognized organic foods, however, are guaranteed to contain none.
The honey trap
The most difficult areas to control GM in foods are items like honey, where free-reaming bees may have visited GM-crop fields, inadvertently contaminating the honey. This is why Canadian honey is not on sale in Europe. Check labels carefully to be sure.
Buy organic dairy
Dairy products like milk, meat, cheese and eggs that come from animals fed on a GM diet do not have to be labeled as GM, so it is impossible to tell if the animals have been produced using GM or not. Buying organic will assure that they are GM free.
Back your local
It can be difficult for those catering for high numbers – in schools, old people’s homes and other mass-catering events – to be sure their food is GM free because of the large suppliers they have to use, but it’s not impossible. Encouraging people to use locally sourced ingredients helps.
Corny business
In the western world, many crops are now routinely grown using GM seeds or processes. This includes 45% of corn and 54% of canola, which show up on ingredients lists as corn meal, corn syrup, dextrose, maltodextrin, fructose, citric acid, lactic acid and of course, corn oil.
The butcher’s business
Many animals are now fed a GM diet. Visiting a local butcher will help you to remove these products from your diet because they work on a smaller basis than supermarkets and therefore should be able to tell you what diet the animals consumed, helping you avoid GM if you want to.
So sorry
Most packaged foods contain soy in some form, which can show up on ingredients lists as soy flour, soy protein, soy lecithin and textured vegetables protein. A staggering 85% of these will be GM. Check the ingredients list, then scour the shelves for non-GM alternatives.
Stay off the hormones
About 22% of cows in the USA are injected with genetically modified bovine growth hormone (rbGH0, so if a dairy product is not labeled organic, non-GMO or hormone-free, it is likely that some of it came from cows injected with rhGH. Which is thought in Europe and Canada (where it is banned) to have adverse effects on health.
Log on to be sure
If you live in the USA and aren’t sure about whether you usual food items contain GM ingredients, you can check them by logging on to www.truefoodnow.org, a site which offers an extensive list of foods by brand and category, indicating whether or not they contain GM ingredients.
Get political
If you’re worried about GM foods, it’s a bit a of a geographic lottery. In the USA, many foods contain GM ingredients whereas in Europe it’s a much lower number. Visit your government’s health advice pages to find out more about the area you live in.
Check your oil
Most generic vegetable oils and margarines used in restaurants and processed foods are made from soy, corn, canola or cottonseed – the four major GM crops in the USA. Unless these oils specifically say “Non-GMO” or “Organic” they are probably genetically modified. Non-GM substitutes to try include olive, sunflower, flaxseed and hemp oils.
Wordly wise
More than 50% of papaya (paw paw) from Hawaii is genetically modified to resist a virus so choose papays grown in Brazil, Mexico, or the Caribbean, where there are currently no GM varieties.
The facts
There is currently no real evidence that any GM crop or ingredient has a negative effect ton human health or on the environment. But as there’s no evidence to the countrary either, many pressure groups advocate avoiding GM until we can be sure.
Look out for HVP
Watch out for the ingredient “hydrolyzed vegetable protein” (HVP) on ingredients lists, particularly for processed foods such as cakes, biscuits and other sweet snacks. This is a commonly used flavour enhancer, which is derived from corn and soy, so could therefore be GM.
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