General Mills to start labeling food products with GMO ingredients

General Mills yesterday said it would start labeling products across the country that contained genetically modified ingredients to comply with a law set take effect in Vermont.

According to the maker of Cheerios and Yoplait, it was impractical to label its products for just one state. Also with no deal yet for national legislation on GMO labelling, the company said it decided to add the disclosures required by Vermont starting in July to products throughout the US.

According to a spokesman for General Mills, Mike Siemienas, the labeling would appear on products over the next several weeks.

The move comes after legislation regarding the labeling of genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, had stalled in Congress. The food industry had called for leaving it to companies to label GMOs and sought to prohibit states from enacting a patchwork of laws around the country.

According to a statement by the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which represents the nation's largest food companies, the decision by General Mills highlighted the need for a national law.

"One small state's law is setting labeling standards for consumers across the country," the association said.

Breaking ranks with the industry, in January, Cambell Soup Company said it supported federal legislation for mandatory labeling, and that it would start disclosing the presence of GMOs in its products if a national standard was not established in a "reasonable amount of time."

The US food industry had spent millions of dollars fighting mandatory GMO labeling efforts at state and federal levels, as consumers call for increasing transparency on what exactly was in their food.

"Vermont state law requires us to start labeling certain grocery store food packages that contain GMO ingredients or face significant fines," Jeff Harmening, General Mills' chief operating officer of U.S. retail, wrote on the company's blog.

"We can't label our products for only one state without significantly driving up costs for our consumers and we simply will not do that," he wrote.