No consumer backlash expected on GM foods

Sunday, February 6, 2011

In a series of shows in early December, popular and influential NBC television talk show host Dr. Mehmet Oz focused on genetically modified foods and touted organic eating. In spite of that, Gord Surgeoner, Guelph-based president of Ontario Agri-Food Technologies, doesn't see a consumer backlash on the horizon nor a significant change in perceptions about the safety of food. There isn't close to the level of concern about genetically modified foods that there was a decade ago when Europe banned imports of genetically modified corn. "I didn't see a lot of follow-up press and newspaper articles associated with it," he says.

He allows that the show "did have both sides of the story. As with any media, in my opinion, they did tend to sensationalize more than the facts would justify."

In the United States, AquaBounty Technologies, based in Waltham, Mass., is trying to get Food and Drug Administration's approval for a genetically modified salmon that grows faster than regular farmed salmon. Surgeoner says the rest of the food industry is watching the proceedings carefully.

According to the show's official website, the most popular questions posed to Dr. Oz are "how can I save money on prescription drugs?" and "how can I spice up my sex life?" Dr. Oz's biography says he is a professor of surgery at Columbia University/New York Presbyterian Hospital.

"In Canada we regulate on the basis of novelty," Surgeoner says. "A novel soybean nowadays is a non-GMO soybean." BF