Week 6 - Genetically Modified Foods

During the spring I took an agriculture capstone class that covered the topic of Genetically Modified Foods.  This course was one of my favorite classes that I have taken at NDSU.  The class was heavily discussion based and covered a lot of information that is talked about in the news.  The class was filled with a lot of students that we agriculture majors, but there were students from other areas of study as well.

To start off, we discussed the different between genetically modified organisms and genetically engineered organisms.  Genetically modified organisms contain DNA segments that are from organisms other than the species of interest.  Genetically engineered organisms contains DNA that is from the species of interest, but just incorporated into a different part of the genome.

  In the past genetic modification has been seen as creating a foreign, "frankenfood" organism.  In reality this is far from the truth.  Genetic modification may be as simple as using a trait of a specific wheat plant that in known for having a strong stem and incorporating that into a plant that is know for having a high kernel weight. 

GMO labeling is also a topic that we spent a lot of time reviewing.  The news media has had a lot of talk about labeling all foods that contain genetically modified organisms.  There is a non-GMO movement that is pushing for the USDA to require labeling of all foods that have GMOs in them.  If you go to the grocery store, you will find many items that have the label "non-GMO" on them.  In reality these items contain ingredients that do not even have the potential to be genetically modified.

Currently, there are only 8 crops that are grown that have modified genomes.  These crops are corn, soybean, cotton, canola, sugar beet, alfalfa, papaya, and squash.  The next time you go to the grocery store keep your eyes peeled for items that have labels indicating "non-GMO." It is interesting to compare the ingredients list versus the actual crops that are GMO.