Dairy farmers benefit from new GMO labeling law

By John Holevoet
Government affairs director

Congress has approved a compromise measure on GMO labeling that would be favorable to dairy farmers and processors. President Obama has indicated that he intends to sign the bill into law soon.

Ever since Vermont enacted its first-in-the-nation GMO labeling law in 2014, politicians in Washington have been trying to reach a deal on a federal law that would stop Vermont and other states from creating an unmanageable patchwork of labeling regulations. There have been previous attempts to pass measures on this issue, but none were successful.

Senate rules require that a measure be able to garner 60 votes in order to have a chance of passing. A past House proposal could not meet this threshold. After months of heated negotiations, the chairman of Senate Agriculture Committee, Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas, and his Democratic counterpart, Sen. Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, announced that a compromise had been reached.

This announcement came just days before the 2014 Vermont law was scheduled to go into effect at the beginning of July. Even though Vermont’s law is now active, it still provided an additional grace period prior to any enforcement actions or fines, and the new federal law will be signed in time to prevent any of those negative impacts.

DBMMC joined with more than 1,000 other groups in supporting the bill’s passage. Our membership in the National Council of Farm Cooperatives (NCFC) provided DBMMC with an excellent resource throughout the fight to pass the legislation. NCFC was on the front lines of this effort and was one of the main groups coordinating the pro-compromise movement nationwide.

The dedicated effort of DBMMC and other agricultural organizations can be seen in the vote totals in favor of passage. The vote in the Senate was 63 to 30. The vast majority of the 21 Democrats who voted for the bill come from states with significant agriculture production. Many were from the Midwestern and Plains states where DBMMC has members. The margin of victory in the House was even greater, 306 to 117, with the majority of representatives from both parties supporting the measure.

In addition to stopping Vermont or other states from enacting their own labeling standards, the new law also defines GMOs in a uniform way. This definition excludes milk or meat derived from cattle that were fed GMO crops as part of their ration. This common sense approach will hopefully keep dairy farmers from being dragged into the labeling debate in the future.

Unlike the previous House proposal that called for voluntary labeling, this bill does require mandatory disclosure of GMO ingredients that fit the established federal definition. Again, milk does not fall within that definition, which significantly limits the impact labeling requirements will have on dairy foods.

The food processors that will need to comply with labeling requirements can do so in several different ways. Text or a label could appear directly on the product being sold, but companies will also have the flexibility of making their disclosure statements available digitally. Products may have a smart code on them than can be scanned to access full GMO ingredient information.

Holevoet can be reached by email at jholevoet@widba.com or phone at 608-358-3941.