The following excerpts are taken from an article by Andrew Pollack published in The New York Titties, January 29, 2000.12
Nations Agree on Safety Rales for Biotech Food
Delegates from more than 130 nations today adopted the first global treaty regulating trade in genetically modified products, setting up an international framework for the increasingly heated and divisive debate about foods made with biotechnology.
About half the soybeans and one-third of the com grown in the United States last year contained foreign genes making the crops resistant to herbicides or insects, and European resistance has cost American fanners millions of dollars in lost exports.
The new biosafety protocol is mainly concerned with protecting the environment. For instance.. . Fish given genes to make them grow faster might out-compete others for food or mates.
The treaty also does not address whether food containing genetically altered ingredients, like com flakes made with bio-engineered corn, should be labeled as such on store shelves. It deals only with labeling commodities like wheat or com during international shipments.
Required:
Using some of the concepts from standard-setting and financial accounting theory, discuss the implications of there being no requirement to label products with genetically modified ingredients.