Richmond-based Nature's Path Organics is the first company in Canada to obtain a new GMO avoidance certification, declaring its products to be as free as possible from foods derived from genetic engineering.
Packaging will appear on store shelves in the coming weeks bearing the Non-GMO Project verification label, signifying that the product's ingredients contain less than nine-tenths of one per cent genetically engineered material, the same standard applied by the European Union.
The Non-GMO Project is an independent product-testing program created three years ago by a consortium of natural-food retailers in Canada and the United States. Certified products first hit the shelves in the United States in March.
The non-profit organization's board includes executives from Nature's Path, Whole Foods and Toronto retailer Big Carrot Natural Food Market, among others.
"This is the first labelling program in Canada based on testing and standards," said Dag Falck, organic program manager for Nature's Path and a Non-GMO Project board member.
Canada's six-year-old voluntary labelling standard does not allow claims that any product is 100 per cent GMO-free, and that's just fine with the Non-GMO Project. Pollen drift from fields containing genetically engineered corn or soy and shipping contamination mean that few, if any, multi-ingredient food products can be completely free from genetically engineered crops, widely known as GMOs.
Genetically engineered crops are created by splicing genetic material from one plant into the DNA of another species, usually to improve the crop's resistance to pests or create plants that are immune to chemicals used to control weeds.
Two of North America's most widely grown GE crops, soy and corn, are used extensively in processed food products.
While Canada and the United States -- the world's main producers of GE crops -- do not require labelling of genetically engineered foods, many of this country's other trading partners do, including the European Union, Australia, Russia, Japan and Taiwan. Canada instead allows the industry to voluntarily label GE foods for sale in Canada.
The guidelines for declaring a product to be non-GMO -- drafted by representatives from the major food-industry associations, agricultural organizations, government agencies and the biotechnology industry -- are extraordinarily complex, said Falck.
"The voluntary labelling law is almost impossible to follow," he said. "I read it with a view to trying to follow the rules, but it's not possible for 90 per cent of Nature's Path products to follow the rules.
"We aren't attempting to follow the voluntary standard and I've seen no evidence of anybody following that standard," Falck said.
The Non-GMO Project seal is intended to signal to consumers that every effort has been made to avoid using GE foods in labelled products.
About 150 food manufacturers have enrolled products to be verified, a process that combines laboratory testing of ingredients with on-site inspections to ensure adherence with best GMO-avoidance practices. About 500 products have been verified to date, mainly in the United States, and at least 2,000 more are undergoing verification, according to the project's executive director, Megan Westgate.
"Because there is a voluntary [GMO labelling] standard in Canada, it took a little longer to make sure that the claims our members are making would be legal," said Westgate.
From the manufacturers' standpoint, a single standard that applies both in Canada and the United States is a huge advantage, in that packaging and advertising messages don't have to be tailored to individual markets.
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