USA: Organic farmers pay for GMO contamination

Food & Water Watch in partnership with the Organic Farmers’ Agency for Relationship Marketing (OFARM) have released survey results  that show contamination from GMO crops is happening and it’s non-GMO farmers who are paying the price. The survey of farmers across 17 states, but primarily in the Midwest, is an effort to fill the data gap that was used to justify an inadequate policy recommendation by the USDA Advisory Committee on Biotechnology and 21st Century Agriculture (AC21). Heavily weighted with biotech proponents, the committee gathered for a series of meetings in 2011 and 2012 to establish a protocol for coexistence and to design a compensation mechanism for farmers who are economically harmed by contamination from GMO crops. Unfortunately, the committee was unable to estimate the costs associated with GMO presence on non-GMO and organic farms due to a lack of data. Their final suggestion for a compensation mechanism was a form of crop insurance that included, in one proposal, a premium to be paid by producers of non-GMO crops.

The survey results reveal that the risks and the effects of GMO contamination have unfairly burdened organic and non-GMO farmers with extra work, longer hours and financial insecurity, which has led to a general skepticism of coexistence amongst the organic community. Some even expressed the feeling that their chosen method of production is being seriously threatened. Meanwhile, GMO growers are not specifically required to mitigate the risk of contamination. Many of the producers who responded use the marketing assistance services of the OFARM member co-ops. “To try to avoid contamination, our member producers follow the expensive requirements of the USDA organic standards and take additional measures designed by OFARM,” said Oren Holle, a diversified organic grain and livestock farmer from Bremen, Kansas, and the President of OFARM. “But far too frequently, they still have to deal with costly rejections due to GMO contamination. More information is available here and here.