The Government Accountability Office (GAO) is stirring things up in agriculture these days, first with its report on U.S. farm subsidies and now with a report on the government's oversight of transgenic crops.

The GAO cites steps the three agencies responsible for oversight -- USDA, EPA, and FDA -- can take to enhance coordination and monitoring, including:

• establishing a coordinated program for monitoring transgenic crops once they're commercialized to determine if the transgenic traits are contaminating other crops and food, and causing detrimental effects on the environment, conventional and organic markets, or food safety; and

• creating a formal method for sharing information that could strengthen FDA's voluntary food safety review. (Notice the word "voluntary." In 2001, FDA proposed a requirement that transgenic food manufacturers notify the agency before putting their products on the market. It hasn't finalized the rule because it thinks the voluntary procedure is good enough, meaning, new transgenic food ingredients can legally be placed on grocery store shelves without FDA's knowledge.)

The GAO recognizes that unauthorized mixing of transgenic crops with non-transgenic crops has "caused controversy and financial harm" and that the "total number of unauthorized releases into the environment is unknown."

Let's hope the new administration starts with these recommendations, followed by even stricter measures that put the burden of contamination on the shoulders of biotech crop manufacturers, not conventional and organic growers and taxpayers.

Source: Reuters, GAO

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