What do you have when two tenths of the country’s population are able to dictate hundreds of millions of dollars of regulatory compliance cost on that country’s food industry?
Poor strategic leadership.
Articles like this one and this one have been cropping up over the last few weeks as the nation’s consumer food companies face compliance with GMO (Genetically Modified Organism) labeling requirements going into effect in Vermont this summer.
If you’ve stopped by here before, you know what I think of the thoughtless and immoral anti-GMO racket.
But what strikes me as particularly appalling in this case is not the fact that GMO labeling is mindless. Rather it is the ease with which major American corporations are practically laying over and taking it.
Yes, the Grocery Manufacturer’s Association sued, lost, and may get relief on appeal on restraint of trade grounds. And yes, the GMA got behind GOP senators who tried to pass some kind of bill to override Vermont. But that, predictably, failed. Now all the industry spokesperson “talking points” sound like “OK, we’ll do it.”
Who is advising senior managers in these organizations to go-along to get-along? How can they lay down after just one law suit?
The wiser strategy would have been (and still is) to force Vermont to prove its case. It might have taken some pain and treasure. And it would have likely required numerous individual company lawsuits (which would be a lot stronger than an industry association demonstration effort, since the suits would represent the interests of truly damaged parties … shareholders!)
An all-out effort would have more likely produced an injunction on restraint of trade grounds. More importantly, it would have eventually resulted in a finding of fact in court demonstrating that Vermont’s basis for action was unfounded.
The key point stands out in the WSJ article:
Though Vermont’s a tiny market for global powerhouses like Mars, it is having an outsize effect on the industry with the nation’s first GMO labeling mandate. Food makers say it would be too complex and expensive to create a separate distribution network for the 626,000-person state.
EXACTLY! But in addition to the restraint of trade and interstate commerce issues, you also have a potential “existential” problem for many food producers who now have to “guess” if they are or are not GMO-free.
I say “guess” because there is no rigorous standard to determine GMO status … or at least no standard that can’t be challenged by anti-GMO Jacobins.
While many will say it’s just a costly inconvenience for big food companies, no compliance effort will really mitigate risk … let alone improve or save lives. The problem doesn’t go away, it just gets pushed down the street a block or two.
And then what about the little guy? You know the one that makes the “organic”, “fair-trade”, “non-GMO”, “gluten free” foodstuffs that those same Jacobins love to eat?
Conceivably, if someone determines that their can of organic green beans was fertilized by manure from a cow that ate GMO corn, they could be toast! Their organic green bean brand will be pilloried as Franken-food. They will be called a liar and a cheat. Protesters will show up on their doorstep. Their livelihood will be ruined.
A more courageous, all-out effort to fight Vermont would have sent a clear message to other states eyeing GMO labeling and could have saved everyone from this continuing anti-GMO nonsense.
Who knows, it might even have given Chipotle the cover needed to nurse itself back to health?