Interested in whether or not Maine will require labels for genetically-modified organisms (GMO)? Here’s news:

On Tuesday, May 21, the Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry Committee (ACF) voted “Ought to Pass” after a final review of language in LD 718: An Act To Protect Maine Food Consumers’ Right To Know about Genetically Engineered Food and Seed Stock, which Representative Lance Harvell (R-Farmington) sponsored. This vote pushes LD 718, a bill requiring labels for many GMOs, to the House of Representatives.

Jim Gerritsen, owner of Wood Prairie Farm in Bridgewater and GMO labeling advocacy leader in Aroostook County, has closely followed the bill’s progress and believes that the full legislature will vote on LD 718 within the next couple weeks.

ACF held a work session yesterday that resulted in positive results for pro-labelers, when legislators voted down a last-minute amendment to the bill that read “A food product derived from an animal is not considered misbranded if the animal was not genetically engineered but was fed genetically engineered feed or a food product derived from any highly refined ingredients where the effect of the purification process is to remove DNA and/or novel protein is not considered misbranded.” [amendment emphasized]

To pro-labelers, it seemed the amendment “snuck in” to the bill and was connected with a baby formula company who claims their formula uses GMO ingredients that are stripped of their GMO-ness through processing. However, the injected language created the potential for interpretation highly valuable to other companies and their products.

“Based on the language, it would have been 100 times more far reaching than just baby formula,” said Gerritsen.

The amendment removed, the committee approved language adjustments that required that four out of nine nearby states also mandate GMO labeling before the law is enforced in Maine.

Out of 13 members on the committee, eight legislators voted ‘ought to pass’ with inserted language that stipulated a pool of trigger states, including Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey.

According to Gerritsen, Representatives Timberlake and Black supported an additional requirement that the four states be contiguous to Maine, but the majority felt this was an unnecessarily high bar.  He also said it appeared the three legislators who voted “ought not to pass” wanted the federal government to handle such labeling requirements.

Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association reported via Facebook status update, “Senator Sherman and Representatives Cray and Marean voted to send the discussion to Congress.”

Representatives Black and Timberlake claimed that without waiting for nearby states to require labeling, Maine was setting itself up for economic upset, when distribution centers in southern Maine contend with shipping to areas that have different regulations.

Regarding whether the labeling of GMOs would impact the efficiency of distribution, Gerritsen said, “I don’t believe that for a minute.”

Gerritsen provided the example of Coca-Cola, who manages to work with different bottle deposit regulations that vary across states and exhibit very little geographical consistency. He said that we are capable of managing such massive logistics.

According to Gerritsen, people start out with a negative position and then grasp at reasons to support their position and instilling fear over distribution problems is a reach.

“Their arguments are weak,” said Gerritsen.

Senator Troy Jackson (D-Aroostook), Chair of ACF, said he’s heard from numerous constituents regarding this issue and “the majority are in favor of labeling.”

However, Jackson has also spoken with Aroostook County farmers that are concerned about the costs of labeling, and other issues.

Jackson didn’t mention distribution, but did say that a concern for the committee was whether companies would choose to forego business with Maine if they had stricter regulations.

“We don’t want to be the outlier,” said Jackson.

Jackson explained that the inclusion of language for four additional triggering states addressed this concern, with the presumption that companies may continue business as usual if a critical mass of five states in an area require labeling.

“Quite honestly it’s a very tough bill,” said Jackson on Wednesday.

According to Jackson, the federal government prohibits states from requiring labeling unless there is a health concern. Jackson said that there are currently no studies that point to GMOs as a health concern, but continued by saying the companies that use GMOs are usually responsible for conducting studies.

“I think the FDA [Food and Drug Administration] has dropped the ball on studying GMOs,” said Jackson.

At this stage, the most important action a concerned voter can take is to contact their legislative representatives, and communicate the nature of their concerns.

To Gerritsen, he is concerned with his right to know.

“Information and transparency are hallmarks of democracy,” said Gerritsen.

For more information on Jenna and links to her writing, visit her About page.

For book and reading lovers, winter seems the season most conducive to marathon reading sessions. Yet somehow, during the summer months, those who love reading draw out little bits of time to lose themselves in the written word. Summer months are typically active, dynamic, and border on chaotic. There’s always a book though, to help us folks, drained by humidity and too many picnics. If you’re looking for a good book to read this summer, I recommend any of these ten.

• The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan: Considered one of the major works in a growing library of books about food and food culture, “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” is an excellent read about three very different ways of acquiring meals.
• Folks, This Ain’t Normal, by Joel Salatin: Salatin is proud to call himself a “lunatic farmer,” and his latest book is laden with tirades against the current ways of things, especially regarding land, local food, and individual freedom.
• Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver: This book acted as a hinge between all the books I read before I became interested in food and all the books I read after I became interested in food. Though I haven’t read it in years, it’s still in my library, and I’ve recently lent it to a friend. Many of the details of the book have lost their luster in my memory, but I recall that Kingsolver’s writing through the months of the year and how those months coincide with local food seasons was quite interesting to me.
• The Unsettling of America, by Wendell Berry: While Salatin (mentioned above) says he’s a farmer who writes, he believes Berry is a writer that farms. Berry is the author of numerous books about agrarian lifestyles, home economics, and the importance of community. The Unsettling of America is one of his most popular books and is a common required read for sustainable agriculture students.
• Appetite for Profit, by Michele Simon: Simon writes about her experience with and research into many public health agencies and food companies. I experienced a major coincidence while reading this book; I read about Big Soda buying scoreboards for small financially-strapped schools in the same week that Big Soda bought a scoreboard for a local school district currently shouldering a budgetary burden.
• The Dirty Life, by Kristin Kimball: The author finds love in farming and in a farmer. This books tells the honest story behind Kimball meeting her husband and how they built quite an impressive farm business together.
• The Good Life, by Scott and Helen Nearing: This book seems a must for any homesteading library. The Nearings write detailed instructions on how to build stone structures, garden in northern climates, tap sugar maples, and other self-sufficiency skills.
• Radical Homemakers, by Shannon Hayes: I read this book before attending a Hayes workshop at the Commonground Country Fair last fall. Hayes writes about how reclaiming domesticity should not be considered defeat for contemporary woman, but is a way of empowering a family.
• Mini Farming, by Brett L. Markham: How to be self-sufficient on a quarter acre?! and it comes with pictures?! Count you in.
• The Food of a Younger Land, by Mark Kurlansky: The subtitle to this book could easily be “random animals and lots of lard.” While I personally didn’t experiment with many of the recipes in this book, the history of our food culture and the variance between different geographical areas within the states is a worthy topic.

Any other suggestions? I’d love to hear them! Leave a comment and let me know some other good books about food and farming – I have a ripe and ready summer up ahead!

A week of perfect springtime weather gets the gardener outside sifting soil. Shovels make the lawn a gauntlet. Muscles dormant from a lazy winter are strained awake.

Wendell Berry has some favorite feelings, and work-weariness and earned rest are among them. Read his poem “Goods” here. I understand his sentiment. I doubt I would put so much physical effort into much else.

It’s curious to me that I don’t have a natural gardening inclination. I don’t really consider myself lazy. I anticipate vegetable growth and boxes of produce dirtying the kitchen table, but I fail to look at my backyard in the springtime with any sense of exaggerated joy. Gardening is so much work. Dirt is heavy. I think I lost my triceps. Oh man, I’m going to pull something. That’s not a threat, that’s a promise.

I can’t figure out a way to grow my own food without growing my own food. I could pay someone to perform the heavy manual labor, but that’d negate the whole “growing it myself” thing.

So, I hoist up my attitude and set myself to the task. My partner and fellow land steward is a good motivator and mentor. He laughs at me when I ask him to chase away the bees. He says “Just a little longer” with enough sweetness that I can’t help but keep working.

The laborious afternoon behind us, our backs ache in the deep places. I found my triceps. The raised beds in the backyard show our work and care.

I rediscover the awesomeness of a hot shower after hours moving dirt, just like I did last year in its second week of May.

Ezra Weston addressed the Massachusetts Horticultural Society in 1845 and said, “he who cultivates a garden, and brings to perfection flowers and fruits, cultivates and advances at the same time his own nature.”

Poet May Sarton, a Mainer, was also a gardener who lived by the sea. She is quoted for saying, “Everything that slows us down and forces patience, everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help. Gardening is an instrument of grace.”

Leave it to a gardener poet and a poet gardener to speak the truth.

What’s flatbread? It’s pizza without sauce. Maybe not, but that’s what it is for me. The common word is that it’s a very basic bread made from flour, water and salt. However, fresh or frozen pizza dough (not pre-baked) works just fine in my kitchen. Whenever I have pizza dough in the fridge or freezer, but no tomatoes or pesto or anything with which to make a sauce, I’m not very concerned.

Somehow the flat base of carbs is enough to push me into love with flatbread (almost as much as my obsession with pizza). With a simple pizza dough, there are a crazy amount of topping varieties for your cooking experimentation.

I’ve used ground turkey, ground beef, onion, tomato, feta cheese, cheddar cheese, and bacon in varying combinations on my flatbread experiments and my favorite combination so far involves lots of cheese, bacon (of course), tomato and onion (which surprises me, because I hated anything in the allium family as a kid).

Five ingredients: Bacon | Onion | Cheddar Cheese | Tomato | Feta Cheese

{All of these ingredients can be made in Maine and are made in Maine. I used bacon from a local farmer, onion from the food co-op, cheddar cheese from Sonnental Dairy in Smyrna, feta cheese from Pineland Farms in New Gloucester (even though it’s not labeled organic), and diced tomatoes from Northern Girl.}

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Cook bacon or other meats through before adding as a topping. Also, I prefer to cook my onions prior to baking.

Grease a pizza pan or cookie sheet and spread the pizza dough evenly into your desired size. Sometimes I go for thick crust, other times I like a crispy, thin crust.

I put my meat and veggies first, and then sprinkle my cheeses on. Want to do it the opposite way? You won’t get any disapproval from this messy sorta-cook.

Based on the cantankerousness of your oven, cook your flatbread anywhere from 25 to 35 minutes. 

Try this combination out, or go ahead and ignore my suggestion and make your own. I like cooking revolutionaries.

The Monsanto Protection Act – ever heard of it?

It’s actually called HR 933 and it’s been in the news a lot lately. Huffington Post covered it. International Business Times wrote about it in some detail and threw the modifier ‘terrifying’ into their headline to really catch folks’ attention. CBS threw in on the conversation, too, among many (many) others.

So, what happened?

Late in March, a continuing resolution, or spending bill, reached Obama’s desk and he signed it, much to the indignation of over 250,000 citizens who had signed a petition that Food Democracy Now hosted. Within this bill lurked scary language that, according to news reports, I’ve deduced to mean that Monsanto and other companies that create genetically-tweaked seeds are now allowed to plant that seed whenever they want, even if a court ruling barred them from such planting.

I’m confused about this. I didn’t know that a corporation could override judicial power.

Well, they couldn’t until now. That’s why I didn’t think it was possible. Though there are many opponents to this bill that are upset purely over handing more power to Monsanto and other big seed companies, there are protesters popping up along the cultural prairie who say ‘wait, no – that’s not okay. – this is setting a precedent for other corporations to trump judicial power.’

Below, in italics, is the portion of the continuing resolution that protesters have called ‘The Monsanto Protection Act.’ I have no idea how these words turn into an idea so significant and upsetting, but (somehow) they do.

Sec. 735. In the event that a determination of non-regulated status made pursuant to section 411 of the Plant Protection Act is or has been invalidated or vacated, the Secretary of Agriculture shall, notwithstanding any other provision of law, upon request by a farmer, grower, farm operator, or producer, immediately grant temporary permit(s) or temporary deregulation in part, subject to necessary and appropriate conditions consistent with section 411(a) or 412(c) of the Plant Protection Act, which interim conditions shall authorize the movement, introduction, continued cultivation, commercialization and other specifically enumerated activities and requirements, including measures designed to mitigate or minimize potential adverse environmental effects, if any, relevant to the Secretary’s evaluation of the petition for non-regulated status, while ensuring that growers or other users are able to move, plant, cultivate, introduce into commerce and carry out other authorized activities in a timely manner:Provided, That all such conditions shall be applicable only for the interim period necessary for the Secretary to complete any required analyses or consultations related to the petition for non-regulated status: Provided further, That nothing in this section shall be construed as limiting the Secretary’s authority under section 411, 412 and 414 of the Plant Protection Act.

After reading this, I don’t know exactly how Monsanto and other seed companies can plant whatever they want without an ethical obligation to anybody, but folks all over the place are up in arms.

All I know is – now I really want to know. Maine’s LD718 would require food producers and manufacturers to label foods that contain genetically modified ingredients. I wanted to know before, just because I didn’t think it’d hurt to have a little more information about my food options. Now I really want to know, for the simple reason that, should they (They?) decide to plant against the interest of public safety, I’d at least like a gateway of knowledge, a label, that tells me there’s genetically-tweaked ingredients in my food.

Let’s do this, Maine. Contact your representative. Tell ‘em what you want to know.

Need more info? MOFGA’s on it.

FMI on Jenna and her writing, click here.

I landed on a new term to identify certain foods – gutbane. Bane, also known as death, or poison, is an apt term to describe many of the things I choose to eat, since they provide little to no nutritional value and are packed with a long list of ingredients that are harmful to my body.

Though I aim to eat local, seasonal produce, I’m imperfect at my aspirations. I eat a yummy breakfast, I might eat half-healthy/half-bad for lunch time, and I eat locally-raised, grass-fed beef for supper, with a side of locally-grown potatoes and some Maine-grown rutabaga.

Sounds like I deserve a gold star (as far as I know, no department or association has yet to designate themselves as the distributors of said gold stars).

It’s all good and fine, until the TV’s turned on and my feet are thrown up onto the coffee table.

Picture the evening: my gut, relatively happy with a steady source of actual food fuel, is settling, along with the rest of my body, into the couch. It’s pleased – digesting at a healthy rate, not causing me any problems at all.

Suddenly, a bag of Sour Patch Kids ends up in my hands. Obviously someone bought this bag, someone grabbed it out of the pantry and put it in my hand, somebody opened up the bag and let the smell of artificial dye and sugar waft up to my nose.

I did all these things. During any one of those steps, I had the opportunity to recognize that I didn’t need to eat this fake food and I could choose something healthy instead (like fruit, which always amazes me with how delicious it is – try cranberries! they’re nature’s Sour Patch Kid).

Yet somehow I decide on many food choices in a state of oblivion. As much as I’ve read up, studied, argued and advocated for better food choices, it seems I still fail, almost every night, caught with my hand in a brightly-colored bag, grains of sugar scattered around me on the couch cushion.

After a day of good eating, I end the evening in a state of upset. My gut feels awful, my teeth hurt, and my conscience is berating me for giving in to childish cravings for straight-up sugar.

Junk food is my gutbane. I know to say no, I forget to say no, and once I’ve eaten way too much of the stuff, my stomach (had it words) would whine “nooooo” to me for my upsetting choices.

This morning I woke up with a junk food hangover. My stomach, uncooperative, remained poised on the brink of upheaval. And, just like a hangover of any sort, I couldn’t help but wonder why (WHY) I had done this to myself.

What’s the appeal? Why is it so wonderful to eat junk food, even though it’s empty calories, fake food, and makes me feel terrible afterwards?

Junk food, you’re my gutbane. One of these days, I just might best you. It might all sink in and I’ll say ‘no’ to the bag of candy or the chocolate egg.

In some hopeful future, I might not become a bit too excited about the oncoming Easter season, just for the sheer variety of jellybeans at my purchasing disposal.

In that same bright time, I might actually prepare all the delicious foods in my fridge and pantry, rather than reaching for convenience and letting the real food rot.

I’m being gentle on myself. Lacking a drill sergeant, a hyperactive nutritional trainer, or a mom who still lives with me, I’m responsible for myself now. The only way to improve myself is to, well, improve myself.

One real bite at a time.

 Click here for more information on Call Me Old Fashioned author Jenna Beaulieu.

When it comes to breakfast, I have great intentions that don’t seem to pan out. Even though I determine almost every night to eat a good-tasting, healthy breakfast the next morning, it’s quite difficult for me to make breakfast for myself.

I’m a morning person, but I prefer to spend my early morning hour writing, reading, or talking on the phone with my sister. Hanging out in the kitchen, rolling sausage in a pan and flipping eggs, does not come naturally to me in the morning.

I have to eat, though. I’ve tried many times to make it until lunch without eating anything, solely based on the fact that I’m too lazy and/or uninspired to make myself some food. That never works out – usually by 10:00 a.m., my body is asking for food by throwing some unpleasant symptoms my way, like a lack of focus, a feeling of weakness in my body, and the telltale wooziness of low blood sugar.

While a host of easy-to-prepare “breakfast foods” are available at the grocery store, I’d prefer not to start my day with processed foods, GMOs, corn syrup, and partially hydrogenated oils. Even a regular old bowl of cereal gives me the heebie-jeebies now: the cereal itself commits many a food sin in my book and the milk I pour over it comes from an industrial dairy operation.

Coffee can’t fill the hole in my stomach that’s begging for real food. I’ve tried. I may accomplish quite a bit on those coffee-for-breakfast mornings, but all my tasks are performed on the cusp of passing out.

Thankfully, I discovered some tasty treasure a couple months ago. Through my bi-weekly orders from Crown O’ Maine back in the early part of the this year, I collected a few ingredients that I thought might make a yummy combination.

I love being right.

It started with Tide Mill Creamery greek yogurt, also known as “the best food ever.”

Tide Mill Farm has been in the same family for nine generations and the creamery was established in 2010. The yogurt, or the base of my breakfast, is created on the Maine coast.

I’ve had greek yogurt before – the more expensive little tubs from the supermarket are tastier and richer than conventional yogurts, but can’t compete against Tide Mill Creamery’s product. I buy it plain and add flavor to it.

My first experiment in flavor involved adding a spoonful of Kountry Kettle strawberry preserves to the yogurt. At first I was concerned that it wouldn’t taste very good, but it took me about four seconds to remember that many of the yogurt containers in the supermarket boast “Fruit on the Bottom.”

That’s the day I discovered you can pretty much eat strawberry cheesecake for breakfast. It’s a day that went down in tastebud history.

For a couple weeks I ate yogurt with preserves with complete delight. Though the taste never let me down, I figured ‘Breakfast is the most important meal of the day!’ (right?) and that adding a little more heartiness to the mix couldn’t hurt.

Now I add Moose Bee‘s Strawberry Granola to the yogurt and preserves and it’s what I eat for breakfast every morning (at least until my ingredients run out and I have to wait for the co-op truck to come again).

It’s super quick to prepare.

1. Spoon yogurt into bowl.

2. Spoon preserves into bowl.

3. Pour granola into bowl.

4. Mix. Eat.

It’s delicious on a level that seems unreal (but is actually the opposite) and it’s very filling.

I feel good at breakfast. It’s a cheap meal (when I figured out how much a serving cost, it’s less than $2). It’s real food (minimally processed), organic and from my state.

I support my tastebuds, my wallet, and my health, along with supporting real food, small farmers and businesses, and a state-wide distribution system that aims to provide Maine food to Maine consumers….

…all while I’m still half-asleep.

There’s this one story I heard as a teenager – a guy had fast food french fries on the floor mat in the back seat of his car and he just decided to leave them there awhile. I don’t know why seven years went by without this guy cleaning out his car, but it did, and the fast food french fries looked exactly the same after all those years.

I don’t know the origin of the story or where I read it or saw it. It’s something that’s stuck with me for years. I can’t place the last time I ordered french fries from that particular fast food place, but it’s been a very long time, at least five years or so. I can’t stomach them, probably because of that one story I read or heard that one time.

I’ve been reading “Folks This Ain’t Normal” by Joel Salatin for the past week or so – very interesting, funny and thought-provoking. In his chapter “No Compost, No Digestion,” Salatin wrote, “We as people can only be as vibrant as the vitality in the food we’ve decomposed in our digestive system.”

Salatin shares a story he heard from some conference attendee who told him he had a burger museum in his house – he bought a burger every year for twenty years and they all still look the same.

Now that’s right up there with the french fry story. There go fast food hamburgers.

The concept of real food as food capable of decay is troubling to me for two reasons.

First off – I know it’s true. Every week I throw out fridge foods I didn’t use in time.

Secondly – Many of those foods that decayed in my fridge or pantry could have been consumed before they went bad. However, I fed myself processed foods, “plastic” foods, foods that come in boxes with a list of ingredients six-inches long in size six font that carry an expiration date so far in the future I wonder how many wrinkles I’ll have by then.

My body mustn’t thrive with those processed foods. Sometimes I personify my stomach and impersonate its complaints – “Macaroni and cheese from a box? Guess you’re okay with funky food science ingredients and virtually no nutritional value.”

“Jelly beans?!? I don’t even know what to do with this!”

I am an advocate for real food consumption, but I certainly stumble in this regard quite often (if not daily).

Typically it’s laziness that influences the bad choice. I have bags of root vegetables in my pantry that are Maine-grown and packed with nutrients, but I opt for something quick-to-make and that requires virtually no preparation.

Meanwhile, the real food decays, right where it sits and in a reasonable amount of time, just like things filled with life that have been cut off from their source are supposed to do.

Every day is a challenge – to say ‘no’ to convenience and ‘yes’ to the right choice, to admit – fully, finally – that fruit snacks are not a form of fruit, and to gravitate steadily towards real foods that are one ingredient (carrots! beets!) or a collection of easily-identifiable ingredients.

My struggles to date do not negate the impact of the ‘Real food that decays’ challenge. Even though my stomach is filled with unnatural, uncompostible things at the moment, I still have the opportunity to make a good choice for my next meal.

Something that I couldn’t save for the next generation, uncovered on a dusty shelf, watching the world change as it remains, unreal.

(Do we ignore toddlers because they’re not full-grown adults yet? Nope.)

An Act to Protect Maine Food Consumers’ Right to Know

We as Mainers have an opportunity to support a very worthy movement.

We as Mainers can demand that we are allowed to know if our food items and produce are genetically modified organisms or genetically engineered foods.

The thing about our ‘right to know’ is… we’re not refusing GMOs outright. We’re not mandating their removal from our grocery stores. We’re not even claiming that GMOs will turn us all into mutants or genetically-altered freaks.

It’s just that, as Mainers, we like to be in the loop. We support our freedom and right to choose. 

This freedom and choice is supported by communities and a state population that vote and voice their concerns to government officials based on knowledge available at the time (at least, that’s how its supposed to work).

Right now, we as Mainers don’t know which foods in our markets are genetically modified. Organic ears of corn are stacked next to non-organic ears of corn. It’s likely that conventional corn is genetically modified, but what about the organic corn? If it’s labeled 100% organic, it should be GMO-free. But if it doesn’t say 100%, there’s some room for GMOs to squeeze in there. Does the term ‘organic’ automatically lull me into a comfortable food purchase? Should it?

I want to know.

Give me the “gorey deets” on this corn ear and let me decide.

I’m not waging a war against GMOs across the board and I don’t expect everyone to armor up against such a mighty Goliath of technology.

I simply want more information about food items. I can read ingredient lists and nutritional information, but I can’t find out if my cereal is a mash-up of genetically engineered ingredients.

Of course I want to know.

In Maine, we have the Freedom of Access Act. It allows us to follow local government proceedings and access a wide variety of records that are considered public by way of a simple request. It allows us to research our town’s budget and identify where our property tax dollars are injected into community services if we so desire.

A Maine parent has a right to know when pesticides are applied in or near their children’s school and, by golly, schools are required to inform parents of a pesticide application nearby five days prior to its application.

A parent’s right to know about pesticide application doesn’t prohibit pest controllers from applying pesticides. It just brings parents into the loop so they can make personal, informed decisions about their child’s attendance at school that day.

Mainers’ right to know maintains an informed public that can initiate and support real, respectable changes in local and state government.

Last November, a lot of Californians wanted to know if their food was genetically modified. They had pretty good momentum towards passing the bill, until an army of corporations who were invested in maintaining GMO-invisibility stepped up with a big ole bat and struck the bill off the books.

As concerned as we are about our state, our government, our laws, our freedom, it doesn’t surprise me that Maine may just be the first state to say, “Hey, I want to know what’s going on with my food.”

Will everyone stop buying GMO foods once they’re labeled? Maybe. Or perhaps companies that manufacture GMO foods could simply explain why they use those GMO ingredients in the first place – that explanation might be enough to keep some of their customers.

Some GMO corn grows larger kernels, or have internal resistance to troublesome pests. We can ask these manufacturers what the benefits are and make an informed decision.

Personally, I don’t see why we need to create plumper corn kernels through genetic modification, because I’ve done enough research to know we’re growing too much corn anyway (to feed the wrong things, like cows and cars). And I don’t agree with modifying corn genetics with internal repellents to pests, because I know that such large-scaled pest problems are mainly a result of monocultures.

There are other ways to get rid of pests besides frankensteining the corn’s genetics. Somehow, organic farmers get by. It’s difficult to apply organic practices to mega-farms that produce GMO corn for Kellogg, because more human labor is involved and we’ve effectively replaced most of the farming workers with machines. Mega-farms likely consider switching from machinery to human-power as a step backwards. However, smaller farms are more capable of maintaining awareness of biological practices and the ecosystem of their farm and may not have to bow to GMO seeds to produce valuable food.

They may need to hire a few folks to help, but I hear that about one in seven people are looking for a job anyway.

Our right to know doesn’t change the overall weather of our state and national food system.

But labeling GMOs is an act of fairness. If corporations don’t want us to know, there’s something sinister afoot. Perhaps they’re concerned about the questions that will be born by our new knowledge. Maybe they’re afraid of what we’ll think about all those packaged foods that look like a healthy choice but are labeled ‘GMO.’

The thing is, I’m not concerned about their fears. I’m concerned about what they don’t want to admit.

Labeling GMOs may decrease their profits and expose them to scrutiny regarding their buying and selling practices, but that’s not a primal concern of mine either.

American capitalism demands adaptation to the market. Adaptation evolves from knowing what works and what doesn’t.

It’s time for us to know, y’know?

It’s not the time to vote yet – it’s the time for learning and using our voice. 

Learn about GMOs.

Contact legislators – tell them what you think – overcome your skepticism that such outreach to legislation will actually matter and try anyway.

Join the citizens campaign – attend public hearings, etc.

Donate your voice – however you use it. Blow up Facebook and Twitter with your opinion and link your friends and followers to useful info. Talk to your loved ones about our right to know. Contact your local newspaper and ask them to do a story about it. If they reject you, write a letter to the editor.

Various organizations and associations around the state will frequently update the public on the process of this bill – to stay in the loop, subscribe to their newsletters or check back habitually.

Click here for more information on Call Me Old Fashioned’s Jenna Beaulieu.

For the past couple weeks, I’ve had the pleasure of taking a Coursera course titled “Introduction to the U.S. Food System.” I say “pleasure” because this topic is obviously interesting to me and it’s a privilege for me to learn from the good brains of the field, teaching out of the John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

More honestly? The course content is upsetting. The statistics are troublesome and it’s impossible to call it doomsday, because that’s just the way it is. It’s not like the ruin of our topsoil or the increasing rates of childhood obesity are just made up. They’re happening and they’re getting quicker about it. Ugh. It’s enough to turn my mouth upside down.

Here’s something that really upset me:

Let’s say these little dashes are people.

|     |     |     |    |

One of those people? Undernourished.

(actually, 1 billion people are undernourished. Something else awful to think about – a child dies every five seconds from starvation – totals five million a year.)

Another one of those people?  Suffers from a disease of over-nutrition, such as obesity, diabetes and heart disease.

(One billion people suffer from diseases of over-nutrition, such as obesity, diabetes, and heart disease.)

Such over-nutrition occurs mostly in more developed countries.

Does this make sense to me? No. Does this make sense to you?

I live in a developed country and I know that obesity is hitting Americans hard. But, I also feel that most people in my life are from a developed country and are also kind and compassionate people. I bet there’s a lot of people in other developed countries that are kind and compassionate people (along with developing countries, too).

I’m not saying we should pull the whole “There’s kids starving in Somalia” card with kids who are glaring at the meatloaf that’s full of cooked onions. I’m also not saying that I think we should each send a bag of rice to a family in need, whether it’s local or across our country’s border.

Those mentions of troubled children to teach your child the variance of life experience and that compassionate act of donation to another family are positive actions. Definitely.

But what about if all the kind, compassionate people figure out a way to simplify our complex global food system so that our nation isn’t burdened with an excess of available calories that we can’t so “no” to while other people in the world scrape to get a daily bite?

I’m trying to spin some goodness to these recent numbers that hurt my brain and my heart. I believe there’s a way to improve and I know that just a few kind, compassionate folks could make a bit of a difference. That’s enough to turn my mouth right back up to smiling.

Anyone with me?

(…anyone else picturing that awkward moment in Jerry Maguire? We can start our own agency!)