Sugar in Halloween candy comes from several sources, including sugar beets. But this year, farmers are planting Monsanto’s Roundup-Ready GM sugar beets for sale to food producers for the first time. This beet is genetically engineered to survive multiple, direct applications of the weed killer, Roundup, and its active ingredient, glyphosate. What’s particularly appalling about the approval of this GM sugar beet is that at the time of its approval, Monsanto convinced the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to increase the glyphosate residues allowed on sugar beetroots by an astounding 5,000 percent. This opens up the possibility for excessive pesticide spraying on GM sugar beets. Now that’s scary news for our precious ghosts and goblins!

So how would you know if the treats you bought contained GM sugar? The short answer: You wouldn’t. That’s because sugar from GM beets like all other GM foods would not be labeled.

One of the most masterful tricks that the biotech industry has pulled off for more than a decade is keeping consumers in the dark about GM foods. Despite widespread consumer demand for labeling, the biotech industry has stubbornly refused to label its GM products. Why? Because if consumers could make informed choices about foods that contain GM ingredients, chances are they would not buy them. Poll after poll has confirmed consumer distaste for GM foods, particularly given the absence of human health studies that prove GM foods are safe for human consumption. Yet, the biotech industry remains arrogant in its refusal to give consumers the labels that they demand and deserve.

Food producers, like consumers, have also been held hostage by the biotech industry, which has steadfastly denied them the right to know if the food they purchase has been grown from GM seeds. GM beet sugar, which could be released into the food supply as early as 2009, will be combined with non-GM sugar and sold as "sugar," with no indication that some of it has come from GM beets. Manufacturers of candy, cereal, granola bars, baby food, breads — anything that contains sugar — would be hard-pressed to avoid using sugar derived from GM beet sugar once it’s introduced into the market. This "no label" policy eliminates food producers’ right to know, choose, or refuse to use non-GM sugar in its products. It also keeps consumers in the dark.

The biotech industry’s refusal to label is bolstered by the U.S. Food and Drug Administrations’ "no labeling/no testing policy." Did you know that the FDA admitted under oath that it has not made any scientific determination whatsoever about the safety of GM foods, when questioned in a lawsuit filed by the Center for Food Safety in 1998? Ten years later, the Agency still has done nothing to address outstanding food safety concerns. In fact, FDA took no substantive action to study the food safety risks of GM food even after it concluded that the GM supplement, L-tryptophan, was the possible cause of 37 deaths and 1,500 disabling illnesses from a rare condition known as eosinophilia myalgia syndrome. And, despite warnings by its own scientific advisors that new and unknown allergens and toxins synthesized during the GM process could pose significant health risks, FDA has chosen to remain silent on the entire food safety question. It’s scary to think that this is the same government agency that is charged with safeguarding our nation’s food supply!

If this isn’t enough to make you want to give up Halloween candy, consider the issue of crop contamination. Beets are wind-pollinated, which means that plants from one field routinely pollinate beets in other fields up to several miles away. GM contamination from cross- pollination would be unavoidable and that could put related vegetable varieties at risk such as green and red chard and golden and red table beets. Non-GM and organic farmers across the Midwest and western U.S., where GM sugar beets, seeds, and related varieties are grown, could be forced out of business due to domestic and oversees market rejection of GM contaminated crops. And, consumers wanting to eat non-GM and organic varieties of beets and chard would find these flavorful and nutritious vegetables in short supply.

Next Halloween, you can avoid this impending nightmare by buying candy labeled "made with sugar cane," "cane juice" or "certified organic." But, the real trick to avoiding GM candy corn, M&Ms, and other sugary treats next season is to write to your favorite candy companies and demand that they produce GM-free candy all year round. And, if they refuse to do so, don’t buy their products. Follow-up your action with a letter stating that you will not be tricked into buying unlabeled, GM foods, and that’s why you are no longer their customer.

Like the 600 or so other co-ops that flourish across Japan — providing food to more than 22 million people nationwide — SCCC is dedicated to offering wholesome, non-GM foods at reasonable prices. Unfortunately, as my visitors explained, it is becoming increasingly difficult to purchase non-GM feed corn, so they traveled to the U.S. to meet with Midwestern farmers in hopes of securing feed contracts.

Although supplies of non-GM feed corn have decreased in recent years, there is renewed hope for those not wanting to consume foods from GM-fed livestock and poultry. Research suggests that the trend among U.S. farmers to grow GM livestock feed is decreasing.

This reversal began with the comeback of conventionally grown soybeans such as those developed at the University of Missouri Delta Research Center. Agronomists there are leading the charge to develop new, non-GM, conventional varieties for livestock feed in response to an upsurge in farmer demand for non-patented, non-GM soybean seeds. Their newly developed Jake and Stoddard soybeans not only exhibit an adaptability to different soil types, but they also resist cyst and root knot nematodes, pests that have become problematic for farmers ever since Monsanto’s Roundup Ready GM seed became the dominant soybean planted.

The resurgence in farmer demand for non-GM soybeans is driven by economic necessity. As costs associated with growing GM soy have risen sharply, yields have stagnated and even fallen since the widespread introduction of RR seeds. All the while, the price of Roundup weed killer, required to be used with Monsanto’s GM RR seeds, has steadily climbed from $15 a gallon to $40 or even $50 per gallon. Weed resistance to Roundup has upped the need to increase both the volume and toxicity of agrochemicals used by farmers to keep weeds in check. Add to this the growing annual cost of purchasing RR soybean seeds ($40 to $50 per 50-lb. bag, which covers roughly 2 acres) because Monsanto prohibits farmers from saving and planting its patented seeds, and GM soybeans are no longer economically viable for farmers.

Since non-GM crops receive a higher market price when grown for export, it’s not surprising that farmers are looking for ways to tap into conventional and organic soybean export markets. Corn feed farmers may soon follow this same path, given the escalating costs associated with growing GM corn and the limited supplies and steady global demand for non-GM corn, as my Japanese visitors have experienced.

Consumer rejection of GM foods overseas continues to galvanize non-GM markets. And since most countries, Japan included, do not grow GM crops domestically, consumers in those countries know that their preferences can influence market supply. That’s why SCCC representatives brought to the U.S. a statement from the “No! GMO Campaign,” comprised of 53 farmer, consumer, and public interest groups opposing the U.S. cultivation of GM sugar beets and the import of its byproduct, beet pulp, for livestock feed. Their message to U.S. food and feed producers is clear: Beware of international market losses if GM sugar beets are used in products exported to Japan.

GM sugar beets are the newest major GM crop in the U.S. pipeline that could be added to food and feed as early as 2009. This is likely to happen unless the Center for Food Safety’s lawsuit against the USDA prevails. If it does prevail, it would halt future plantings of GM sugar beets until USDA produces an Environmental Impact Statement, as required by law. And, if the Agency demonstrates that significant environmental and/or related economic impacts could result if GM sugar beets are planted, then USDA could prohibit the planting and market introduction of GM sugar beets. But if USDA decides not to take action, then it will be up to all of us to hold the Agency accountable.

The future of the GM food industry remains uncertain at best. And as history has shown, farmers and consumers have the power to keep GM crops at bay even in the face of tremendous economic and political pressures to do otherwise.

Public opposition to milk and meat from clones has caused 20 major food companies, restaurants, dairies, and supermarket chains to refuse to produce, use or sell food from clones. These companies have taken action despite FDA’s claims that food from clones and their offspring is safe.

Last January, FDA announced that it would allow clones and their offspring to enter the food supply despite the lack of scientific studies available to prove that clones are safe for human consumption. The FDA won’t require any special procedures for tracking and handling food products from clones and their offspring or require product labeling. This unfortunate situation not only deprives people of their right to know the processes used to produce the milk and meat they consume, but it also deprives them of their right to choose or refuse such foods.

U.S. consumers are not alone in their opposition to food from clones. Yesterday, the European Parliament overwhelmingly passed a resolution calling for an E.U.-wide ban on the use of animal clones and their offspring in food. They also voted to prohibit the import of clones, their offspring, semen, embryos, and milk and meat derived from cloned animals or their offspring. In January, the European Group on Ethics released a report which stated that it didn’t see any convincing arguments to justify the use of cloning for food production, particularly given the suffering and health problems surrogates and clones experience.

Imagine a U.S. government agency calling for the prohibition of a food technology, staunchly supported by agribusiness, because it deems the technology “ethically questionable”! That resolution simply would never happen here, but that’s exactly what happened in Europe.

In this country, we have neither a standard nor a process for assessing the ethics or cruelty of a given food production technology. That’s not surprising given the fact that the U.S. leads the world in unencumbered and unregulated corporate behavior. For the most part, ethical considerations in food production are only taken into account if citizens manage to put them to a vote on a ballot initiative, like Californians did for this November’s election. If passed, Proposition 2, the Prevention of Farm Animal Cruelty Act, would halt the use of battery cages for laying hens, and crates for veal and pregnant and nursing pigs. Clearly, the FDA and USDA are not prepared to take this type of ethical action, so concerned citizens have no other choice but to put the issue to a vote and force companies to change their production practices through public mandate.

FDA’s failure to pursue its primary mission as protector of our nation’s food supply is also the reason why food safety, animal welfare, environmental, and consumer groups have decided to take matters into their own hands with respect to clones. This past May, the Center for Food Safety and Friends of the Earth began surveying companies about their position on clones. So far, 20 leading food processors, restaurants, retailers, and dairies have said that they won’t produce, use or sell milk or meat products from cloned animals. Action taken by these companies represents a growing industry trend of responding to consumer demands for better food safety, environmental protection, and animal welfare practices in the absence of FDA protections.

The list of companies rejecting clones reads like a page out of “Who’s Who” in the food industry: Kraft Foods, General Mills, Gerber/Nestle, Campbell Soup Company, Gossner Foods, Smithfield Foods, Ben & Jerry’s, Amy’s Kitchen, California Pizza Kitchen, Hain Celestial, PCC Natural Markets, Albertsons, SUPERVALU, Harris Teeter, and Clover-Stornetta, Oberweis, Prairie, Byrne, Plainview, and Cloverland dairies. Nine of these companies also refuse to use ingredients from the offspring of clones, while the other 11 remain silent on the issue. Those industry leaders include: Ben & Jerry’s, Amy’s Kitchen, Clover-Stornetta, Oberweis Dairy, Prairie Farms Dairy, Plainview Dairy, Gossner Foods, PCC Natural Markets, and Hain Celestial.

Obviously, the struggle to keep food from clones and their offspring out of America’s food supply is far from over. Since we can’t rely upon FDA to ensure safe food, it’s up to all of us to use our consumer power to keep our food and farm animals protected from the use of cloning technology.

Even if you’ve heard the above quote many times before, the sentiment expressed is so powerful that I think it’s worth repeating. All around the world, small groups of people are organizing public support for improved food safety and successfully challenging large corporations to change their behavior.

That’s exactly what Flint Michigan residents Kathleen Kirby and Mark Fisher are banking on: their power to influence change. They’re participating in a nationwide consumer boycott of Kellogg’s Co. instigated by the Organic Consumers Association. By boycotting the world’s largest cereal company, they hope to pressure Kellogg’s into rejecting the use of sugar from genetically engineered (GE) sugar beets and to spark widespread market rejection in products ranging from cereal to baby food to candy.

As you may know, Roundup Ready sugar beets are genetically altered to resist Monsanto’s toxic weed killer, Roundup, and its active ingredient, glyphosate. But here’s the scary truth about these beets:

When the USDA first approved GE sugar beets for commercial planting in 1998, the EPA also increased the maximum allowable residues of glyphosate on sugar beet roots from just 0.2 parts per million to 10ppm. That’s a staggering 5,000 percent increase of allowable toxins on beet roots. And, it’s little surprise that EPA made this policy change at the request of Monsanto.

Sugar beet roots contain sucrose that’s extracted, refined, and processed into the sugar used in the foods we eat. What this means is that the more GE ingredients that find their way into our food, the greater the likelihood that we are ingesting more toxic chemicals.

Thankfully, GE sugar beets have never been grown in the U.S. for sale to food manufacturers — that is, until this year, when Western farmers planted their first crop of Monsanto’s Roundup Ready sugar beets. Right now, over half of the sugar used in U.S. processed foods comes from sugar beets, with beet and cane sugars combined in those products. What’s most disturbing is that once GE sugar beets hit the market, which could be as early as next year, there will be no way to know if we’re eating GE sugar because GE ingredients are not labeled.

Currently, only four major GE crops are sold commercially — corn, cotton, soy, and canola. Most of these are engineered to withstand repeated, large doses of herbicides. For the most part, these crops and their byproducts are largely fed to animals with the exception of some minor food ingredients and oils. GE beet sugar breaks with this tradition in that it could become the first major GE ingredient added to almost all processed foods on our grocery store shelves.

Last week, Hershey’s in Brazil announced that it would not source ingredients from Cargill, one of the world’s largest food providers, because the company could not guarantee that soy, lecithin, and oils were not GE. This successful public pressure campaign, led by Greenpeace, influenced the company to reject GE beet sugar. It also demonstrates how individuals who care about food safety can mobilize collectively to make a difference.

Several years ago, Hershey’s in the U.S. publicly stated that it would refuse to use GE beet sugar, but the company has been noticeably silent on the issue ever since. A double standard is not likely to prevail in the U.S., where organizations such as Don’t Plant GMO Beets have helped to generate more than a hundred thousand protest letters. These letters, from people like Kirby and Fisher, show companies that there’s strong opposition to the use of GE sugar beets in our food.

Like Hershey’s, Kellogg’s is only one of thousands of companies that may soon be using GE sugar — perhaps without even knowing that they are doing so! That could be the case unless, of course, consumer pressure forces the market to reject GE beet sugar.

Kirby and Fisher know that as a market leader, Kellogg’s could lead the charge in rejecting GE beet sugar and influence other companies to follow suit.

They also know that although they are just two people living in a small, Midwestern city north of Detroit, and with the Internet at their disposal, they are on their way to changing the world, one e-mail message at a time.