Yoshie wrote: "Is it possible that, at least for some products in the USA, non-GM varieties are already niches, though they don't become niche markets since there's no labeling?"
It is certainly possibe, however the chances are getting slimmer every year since non-GM crops have difficulty economically competing with GM crops. Without niche marketing for organic foods, their market strength would seemingly disappear. While this article is from 2003 and its data may be a bit under-representative, it gives some idea of the amount of GM food on the shelves (and the percent of GM crops in existence every year increase substantially). "Approximately 76 percent of last year's American soybean crop was GM, as well as 32 percent of corn. (Some estimates place the corn figure closer to 50 percent.) As habitual label readers know, soybean and corn products are ubiquitous on grocery-store shelves, present in everything from Pop-Tarts to veggie burgers to Campbell's tomato soup (which lists "high fructose corn syrup" as a primary ingredient). No government body keeps precise statistics, but a popular guesstimate among university researchers is that around 70 percent of processed foods contain GM ingredients. Considering that about 90 cents of every dollar spent at the supermarket goes toward processed foods, chances are you've been unwittingly consuming GM victuals since the mid-1990s, when they began appearing in stores." Full article at: http://www.slate.com/id/2083482/ Jayson > On Jul 23, 2006, at 10:22 AM, Jayson Funke wrote: > >> This raises the issue of food labeling. As indicated in several of the >> recent posts, many people want to know what is in their food and >> how it >> is grown and where it is grown. >> >> An interesting debate revolves around labeling, and whether or not >> organic food should be labeled or (as I favor) if GM foods should be >> labeled. From my perspective, organic labeling has two effects: 1) it >> makes organic food into a niche market (making it more difficult to >> absorbed into the mainstream), and 2) it leaves the general public >> with >> the impression that GM foods are normal and thus not in need of >> labeling >> (in other words, why is there not a stronger movement to label GM >> foods, >> which might force them into a niche market instead of organic foods?). > > Is it possible that, at least for some products in the USA, non-GM > varieties are already niches, though they don't become niche markets > since there's no labeling? > > Yoshie Furuhashi > <http://montages.blogspot.com> > <http://monthlyreview.org> > <http://mrzine.org> > >
