GMO and Buying Local American in Food

Food Ethics

One might think that there are not a lot of ethical standards and policies that could and do apply when it comes to the manufacturing and selling of food. However, that is far from being the case and this has been true for a rather long time. Whether it be whether the food is genetically modified, the country of origin for a food, when the food expires, how the food is generally labeled and so forth, people that manufacture or sell food products have a litany of ethical standards and rules that they can and should follow. Indeed, the safety of the consumers are in play and there are also some "right to know" factors involved that consumers have a right to. While some people overplay their hand when it comes to the ethical selling of food, there are absolutely some valid concerns and they should be addressed.

Analysis

Perhaps the biggest buzzword in the food-selling market is what is known as "GMO," which is short for genetically-modified organism. When it comes to food, this would be whenever food is altered at a genetic level for some reason. The reasons for these modifications are often beneficial but they are controversial nonetheless. Reasons for modifying food include elongating the shelf life of the food, making the food healthier to eat (e.g. enriching with a vitamin), or making the food easier to harvest and manage during the production process. Backers of the GMO revolution assert that there is no cause for concern when it comes to safety and that the GMO tinkering is all for a good reason. Opponents of GMO's suggest that more organic foods are safer and that some of the GMO changes center on things that are extremely concerning like resistance to pesticides (e.g. Roundup) and so forth. They also generally suggest that eating foods that are not genetically "original" could pose unknown safety risks to the people that are eating the foods. While there is seemingly not a "smoking gun" either way, the debate at this point is very rigorous and is far from settled (Waller, 2015).

Other food ethics issues are much more general and less controversial, but they are concerns nonetheless. One topic that comes up more than once would be the location from which a food comes from. Indeed, many foods come from foreign sources and there are quality control concerns about the growing and other production practices in other countries. There is obviously also an element of nationalism and protectionism when it comes to the country of origin. Indeed, many people like to "buy American" when given the choice. There is even competition within the United States as "buy local" has become a common refrain. It is rather ubiquitous, right up there with the organically grown foods that do not make use of the aforementioned GMO technologies or pesticides. Even national stores like Wal-Mart and Kroger will have features that indicate foods that are grown in or around the immediate location of the store in question. To be fair, healthy food is healthy food but many people are worried about the economics and/or safety of buying foods that are made outside of the United States and/or of the local market in which the food is ultimately sold. Economic downturns and international grudges have made this back and forth all the more dicey and contentious. However, some areas are not conducive to growing crops like desert regions and the like and there is an economic reason why foods are often bought from foreign sources. Indeed, many shoppers go for the lowest price they can find without fail and this would often mean buying a foreign-produced food (Dean, 2015).