Companies not sweet on GM beet sugar

A group of food companies, mostly small co-ops, has pledged to avoid using sugar from genetically modified sugar beets.

Organizers of the registry insist that not enough is known about the long-term health and environmental effects of genetically modified beet sugar.

"We need to avoid the all-too-common situation of finding out a product is harmful after it has been approved and widely distributed," said Jeffrey Smith, director of the Institute for Responsible Technology, one of a dozen sponsors of the registry.

The Institute for Responsible Technology opposes all use of genetically modified organisms for food purposes.

Signers of the registry would prefer that genetically modified foods be labeled. But because that's not required in the United States, they created the registry.

The 70 companies that signed on pledged to "seek whenever possible to avoid using GM sugar in our products."

Signers include Organic Valley, Bozeman Community Food Co-op and Skagit Valley Food Co-op.

The group is opposed to Monsanto's Roundup Ready technology, which allows farmers to kill problem weeds with little or no harm to the crop as it grows.

Last year marked the first widely grown Roundup Ready sugar beet crop in the United States.

Tom Stearns, president of High Mowing Organic Seeds, said genetically modified sugar beets could cross-pollinate with related crops such as chard and table beets, potentially affecting their marketability.

"Overseas markets have already rejected other GM products, so the economic future of many of our nation's farmers is being needlessly risked," Stearns said.

High Mowing Seeds is a signer of the registry and a plaintiff in a lawsuit opposing the release of Roundup Ready sugar beets.

Companies on the registry said they don't support "the introduction of genetically modified sugar from GM sugar beets."

But growers of Roundup Ready sugar beets insist that there's no such thing as genetically modified sugar.

Sugar is sugar, regardless of how it's grown, according to the Sugar Industry Biotech Council.

Sugar is the same, whether it comes from sugar beets, sugar cane, or from crops grown using conventional, biotech or organic methods, council officials said.