GMO initiative would be bad law

The growth of the genetically modified organism (GMO) seed development industry in Hawaii has generated a great deal of community anxiety, and the community has responded with efforts to curtail the activity. On Kauai, an ordinance was passed to impose restrictions, a law ultimately struck down for overstepping the county’s authority. On Maui, opponents of what’s also called genetic engineering (GE) have put a measure on the ballot that seeks to stop GE farming.

In both cases, the impulse to rein in the agribusinesses falters because the focus has been too broad. The proposed Maui charter amendment for a "temporary moratorium" in particular represents a blunt instrument, one that could do more harm than good as it is now configured.

Maui County voters should reject this amendment — which is called a moratorium but will ultimately play out as an outright ban — on the grounds that it’s bad law.

Genetic techniques have been part of farming for centuries, although now traits of the crops can be changed more directly through the lab. Much of the produce is familiar to shoppers — the seedless watermelon, the virus-free papaya, to name two. Such items now are being demonized in the marketplace without scientific evidence that the produce — what we consume, rather than how it’s grown — is materially different.

There are valid reasons for concern about the intersect of industrial agriculture with smaller farm operations and residential communities. There are worries that corporations such as Monsanto and Syngenta are dominating the seed businesses to the detriment of adjacent independent farms. Above all, there are concerns about the chemicals sprayed on these fields. A lot of profit’s at stake. These companies have plowed a lot of capital in defeating the Maui measure, countered to a lesser extent by advertising by the proponents.

But none of that negates reality. Court challenges have underscored that regulating the use of pesticides and herbicides is the jurisdiction of the state. Patent control of seed crops is under federal jurisdiction.

This measure ineffectually commingles these issues to bolster the case for its main objective of barring GMO farming in Maui County. The mechanism for ending the moratorium, should it pass, is so inoperable that farmers large and small will be denied what in many cases will be a good option for sustaining their business.

And all that will happen without accomplishing any inroads on what’s really needed: better and more transparent regulation of pesticide use.

Here’s what Maui voters will see on the ballot:

"Should the proposed initiative prohibiting the cultivation or reproduction of genetically engineered organisms within the County of Maui, which may be amended or repealed as to a specific person or entity when required environmental and public health impact studies, public hearings, a two-thirds vote and a determination by the County Council that such operation or practice meets certain standards, and which establishes civil and criminal penalties, be adopted for Maui County?"

According to the full text of the initiative, the Council can make that determination once an environmental and public-health impacts study is done, research funded by whatever entity seeks to have the moratorium lifted.

Clearly the initiative is aimed at the large-scale businesses that can tap such funding resources, but the small farmer would be affected, too — collateral damage of this measure.

The requirements for the study itself make it all but impossible to get any moratorium lifted. Here’s just one: The study must include "research and analysis evaluating the extent to which pesticide laden air and dust from GE operations and practices may be harmful to the people and environment." Such studies take decades to deliver a definitive answer — if that’s even possible in this arena.

What many Maui residents want is to advance organics and other more environmentally friendly techniques, and that’s a worthy end goal. But the means to achieve it should be an affirmative marketing campaign promoting those techniques, not depriving farmers of technologies that often prove to be more productive.