The Battle in Boulder County Over GMOs is Over for Now, with an Unexpected—and Disappointing—Outcome

If there was any place in the United States where you would think the banning of GMOs would be a no-brainer, it would be Boulder. With its liberal leanings, health-conscious attitudes, and natural food persona, it makes sense, right. And yet, though the majority of residents seem to be in favor of a ban, Boulder County commissioners voted unanimously on Tuesday, December 20, to “allow some genetically modified organisms to be grown on county-owned open space,” according to the Boulder Daily Camera.

This came after an earlier decision by the Food and Agriculture Policy Council and the Parks and Open Space Advisory Committee of Boulder County, both who voted 5-4 to phase out GMOs in an economically viable way. After this decision was made, however, it appears a group of farmers who grow GMO crops rallied together, with the help of the oft-vilified—with good reason, according to many sources—Monsanto Corporation.

After pressure from pro-GMO forces, the commissioners agreed that farmers should be able to keep planting corn that has been engineered to withstand glyphosate, the key ingredient in Roundup, which was first approved in Boulder County in 2003. In addition, they supported Roundup Ready sugar beets, which is what sparked this whole debate in the first place.

From the Camera: “‘I don’t believe we should ban GMOs, but I do think we need to be very careful and limited in allowing them,’ (Boulder County) Commissioner Will Toor told the packed hearing room.” The commissioners reserve the right to approach any other GMO crop that gets introduced on a case-by-case basis.

The fight has raged on for almost three years, with the December 20 decision apparently marking the end to the debate. But not the contentious nature of what folks were fighting over in the first place.

Groups who support a ban vow to continue fighting. They believe that genetically modified plants are dangerous to human health, are harmful to the land, and that they support corporations that are harmful to the fabric of society. Proponents of GMOs insist that the science says they are safe and pose no imminent threat and that they help farmers get larger yields with fewer chemicals.

It seems odd that proponents and scientists would be able to claim matter-of-factly the safety of GMOs. This would presume that they could account for every highly complex interaction of the modified organism within the human body. The scary part is, if there are long-term effects, which seem almost a foregone conclusion, it might be too late at that point to do anything about it.

Other countries have already taken steps to ban and uproot GMO crops. Hungary, for instance, has destroyed all Monsanto corn fields that contain GMO crops. Peru has also taken a stand, passing a 10-year ban on genetically modified foods.

Could it be that these countries are onto something?

What is a GMO?

A genetically modified organism is a plant or animal that has had its genetic code altered. To create a GMO, scientists physically transfer a gene from one organism to another to give the receiving organism a trait it would not naturally have.

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Hi, This is Boulder County Commissioner Will Toor. I would like to explain the thought process that went into my vote on the cropland policy. It had nothing to do with “pressure from pro-GMO forces” but with an effort to make a decision that I believe is in the best interests of the land and people of Boulder County.

Introduction: The debate about the county cropland policy, and particularly about what policy the county should have regarding GMOs, has been fascinating and difficult. Any decision we made would have real world impacts – on the farmers, on the land, and on the open space program. I felt an n obligation to really understand the issues. At one level this meant doing a lot of reading, to try to get at least an overview of what we know about GMO crops – about the health impacts, the negative environmental impacts, the benefits to farmers, and the benefits to the environment. I also wanted to meet both conventional and organic farmers and try to understand their perspectives. I have become convinced that the issues are more complex, and far less black and white, than they are often portrayed.
Boulder County is in a rather unique situation. We have had 30 years of public policy aimed at preventing urban sprawl, directing development into the towns and, preserving natural habitats and preserving farm and ranch land. While some of this land is purely privately owned, there is a significant amount of publicly owned farmland, with the City of Boulder and Boulder County as the two biggest landowners. Boulder County has approximately 12,000 acres of irrigated cropland which is held in fee, on which the county makes the decisions about what type of agriculture takes place. Most of this land has been farmed for a long time, often by the same families whose ancestors homesteaded here a hundred years ago. The county does not farm land itself, but instead leases the land out to farmers. The revenues from the leases are reinvested in the open space agricultural land, in the form of irrigation improvements, hay barns, and other improvements. Successful management of open space agricultural lands requires a partnership between the county and the farmers. Successful management of open space agricultural lands requires a partnership between the county and the farmers. Farming is a difficult and complicated business, which requires hard work, knowledge, and investment. We need to work with the farmers who bring these resources to the table, and give them economically viable options, in order to successfully farm the land. We also should be actively working on nurturing new farmers, and helping small farmers grow their operations to larger scales, so that we will continue to have a viable farming community into the future.
One exciting development has been the recent explosion of interest in the local food movement. I think there is real value in people having a connection to the farmers and farms where their food is grown, and there is some real potential for local jobs in an expanded local food system. My family has been a member of local CSAs for nearly 15 years, and our home has been a drop-off location for the Monroe Organic Farm CSA for most of the last decade. This has been a very important connection, especially for my children, and one that I think is important to a lot of other people.
The County appointed a Food and Agriculture Policy Council a few years ago with the explicit direction to help us figure out how to support local food production, with a focus on how to improve the connection between farmers and local market opportunities, including value added processing. The County is a major supporter of the farmers market, providing a home for the Longmont market on the County fairgrounds, and has recently made significant investments in improving that location for the benefit of the market. The County conducts a new farmer training program to help folks who are interested in becoming farmers – typically small acreage, often organic, market farms. We have also developed a “Grower’s Association” program which makes it possible for farmers who want to start one of these small farms to lease small acreage with water from the county for very low prices, in order to encourage the development of these small farms providing local food.
We also have organic incentives in the bidding process for larger acreage farms, to encourage farmers to transition to organic. We have had some real success at increasing the acreage leased for organic production, including some substantial increases in the last 6 months, with growth from about 200 acres a few years ago to 1,600 acres after our most recent lease awards. This brings us to about 10% of our irrigated cropland (compared to a national average of approximately 0.7%). I believe that we should continue to expand the amount of organic farming on county open space. The cropland policy sets a goal of doubling the acreage in the next few years –20% by 2020, coupled with efforts to assure that there are appropriate markets, and continuing to expand beyond that time.
However, the large majority of acres are still farmed conventionally, and even with an aggressive policy push towards more organic production a substantial percentage of farmland will remain conventional for years to come.
Clearly, the most contentious issue in this process has been the debate about genetically modified food crops. I have tried to look at this in as fair and neutral a way as I can. I have read materials submitted by both opponents and proponents of GMOs, and have met with many supporters and opponents. There have been multiple public hearings before advisory groups, and a marathon hearing before the board of county commissioners. I have also spent a substantial amount of time on outside reading of the literature, to try to understand what the overall state of the science is around GMO food crops. Some of the major sources I have looked at:

The International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) synthesis report
Toward Sustainable Agricultural Systems in the 21st Century, from the National Academy of Sciences
Safety of Genetically Engineered Foods: Approaches to Assessing Unintended Health Effects, from the National Academy of Sciences
Modern Food Biotechnology, Human Health and Development: an Evidence-based Study, by the World Health Organization

Genetically Modified Crops for Food Use and Human health – an Update, Royal Academy of Sciences

Impacts of Genetically Engineered Crops on Pesticide Use: The First Thirteen Years”, by Charles Benbrook for the Organic Center (biotech opponents)

Impact of genetically engineered crops on pesticide use: US Organic Center report evaluation by PG Economics (biotech advocates)
Failure to Yield: Evaluating the Performance of Genetically Engineered Crops, report from the Union of Concerned Scientists (biotech opponents)
One thing that was quite striking was the extent to which the major independent scientific bodies come to basically the same set of conclusions, which do not totally align either with the GMO boosterism of the biotech industry, or the very negative analysis of some GMO critics. After looking at all of this material, I have arrived at somewhat of a middle ground in terms of my views on GMO crops.
1) I am not convinced by the opposition to GMO crops based on food safety concerns, While there are food safety risks associated with any new food crops, whether created by conventional breeding or genetic engineering, these risks seem fairly low compared to other food safety risks, and the risks associated with genetically modified foods are not likely to be higher than those associated with a variety of types of conventional breeding. Unlike conventional breeding, there is at least some assessment of potential food safety risks associated with GMO crops. However, this is an arena where further research should be conducted and the federal regulatory process should be strengthened.
2) I believe that consumer choice is important. Whether or not GMO food crops are dangerous, there are clearly a large number of people who believe that they are dangerous, or who have a belief that they are an unacceptable alteration of natural processes, and they should have the ability to choose not to eat GMO products. Because of this, I support labeling. The County has formally adopted a call for GMO labeling into our legislative agenda.
3) I do find the argument compelling that there has been too much of a focus on GMO agriculture, and that sustainably feeding a growing world requires a much broader focus. Improved seeds are one important part of the picture, but there are a whole lot of other important pieces around agroecological practices, managing for healthy soil, etc.
4) I do think there have been some major public health benefits associated with Bt crops. In particular, the evidence seems pretty strong that Bt cotton has, at least for a period of time, dramatically reduced exposure of farmworkers in India and China to some very toxic pesticides.
5) Bt crop management seems to be better thought out than management of roundup ready crops. There has at least been thought put into resistance management, with the requirements for 20% of cornfields to be planted as refuges of non Bt corn in order to achieve cross breeding between resistant and non-resistant insects. Despite the emergence of resistant rootworms in some places, this seems to have been a successful resistance management strategy for European corn borer, which is the main corn pest of interest in this area. And since organic farmers in this area use Bt to control other pests on other crops, there is not really an issue with selection of Bt resistant insects affecting organic farmers.
6) Roundup Ready crop management seems to be very poorly thought out, with no restrictions in place to limit continuous use of roundup ready crops on the same ground year after year – essentially guaranteeing the rapid evolution of roundup resistant weeds. This has led to the phenomenon Charles Benbrook describes, where farmers who use these crops continually get a reduction in herbicide use initially, but then have increasing use over time, and start having to turn back to other, more toxic herbicides. It also seems to me that there are a variety of unknown risks that come from making such large-scale, continuous use of one herbicide, even one as nontoxic as glyphosate. And there are some ecological surprises that emerge. For example, research out of the University of Iowa suggests that there may be a significant negative impact on monarchs – not from any toxicity, but due to the simple fact that roundup is so effective at weed control that farmers have successfully eliminated the little bits of milkweed that were surviving in their fields.
7) This part of the country has largely escaped the issues associated with roundup ready crops, since farmers in this area typically engage in vigorous crop rotation, involving corn, sugar beets, alfalfa, barley, and wheat, so we do not have farmers who grow roundup ready crops continuously, either on public or private lands. Right now, the only roundup ready crop allowed on open space is corn. Even if sugar beets were added we would be far from any continuous use of roundup. However, the next crops likely coming on the market, roundup ready wheat and alfalfa, seem like they would tip the balance. The wheat would be in rotation with the corn and beets, and alfalfa is typically grown for years in one location, in order to rest the soil and add soil nitrogen, so roundup would be used over and over.
8) Sugar beets seem to me to be one of the crops where GMOs make the most sense. Conventional sugar beets are a very herbicide intensive crop. GMO sugar beets allow significant reductions in total volume of herbicide, a switch from very toxic to much less toxic glyphosate, a significant reduction in fossil fuel use, and since the crop is harvested the first year, but does not flower until the second year, there is very little potential for any pollen drift. The county should require that sugar beet farmers survey their crop for any beets that begin bolting (flowering prematurely), and that these plants be pulled before pollen is produced.
9) While numerous speakers have testified to worries that organic farmers will lose their certification if there is accidental cross pollination with a GMO crop, the National Organic Program certification standards only ban intentional use of GMOs. A farmer will not lose her organic certification due to inadvertent cross pollination. In the 8 years that GMO corn has been grown on county open space, we have not had issues with cross pollination.
Based on all of this, I ended up in a middle position, where I don’t believe we should ban GMOs, but also think we need to be very careful and limited in allowing them, based on the characteristics of particular GMO crops. I think the experience we have had with corn, under the protocols established in 2003, has been positive: we have seen the expected benefits, and have not seen development of resistant weeds or insects or conflicts with organic farmers. I also think that allowing the use of roundup ready sugar beets would have a net positive environmental benefit compared to the existing use of conventional sugar beets, so support allowing GMO sugar beets. However, I do not believe we should allow roundup ready alfalfa or other additional roundup ready crops that would be in rotation with corn and sugar beets – and this is reflected in the cropland policy that we adopted.
While the adoption of the cropland policy has been a challenging and divisive process, I do believe that the policy that we have adopted is a reasonable and balanced approach to managing publicly owned farmlands. I hope that the community will be able to unite around areas of common ground – expanding organic production, growing more local food for local consumptions, and reducing the environmental impacts of farming practices.

-Will Toor, Boulder County Commissioner

Reply ↓

2 thoughts on “The Battle in Boulder County Over GMOs is Over for Now, with an Unexpected—and Disappointing—Outcome”

Kevin Williams on January 10, 2012 at 2:33 pm said:

Hi Mr. Toor,
Thank you very much for taking the time to write such a thorough, thoughtful response to our post. It definitely sounds like you’ve done your homework on what is obviously a very complicated, and at times contentious, subject. Please keep us posted on how things progress or on any new developments that come up.
- Kevin

Reply ↓
Will Toor on January 5, 2012 at 4:25 pm said:

Hi, This is Boulder County Commissioner Will Toor. I would like to explain the thought process that went into my vote on the cropland policy. It had nothing to do with “pressure from pro-GMO forces” but with an effort to make a decision that I believe is in the best interests of the land and people of Boulder County.

Introduction: The debate about the county cropland policy, and particularly about what policy the county should have regarding GMOs, has been fascinating and difficult. Any decision we made would have real world impacts – on the farmers, on the land, and on the open space program. I felt an n obligation to really understand the issues. At one level this meant doing a lot of reading, to try to get at least an overview of what we know about GMO crops – about the health impacts, the negative environmental impacts, the benefits to farmers, and the benefits to the environment. I also wanted to meet both conventional and organic farmers and try to understand their perspectives. I have become convinced that the issues are more complex, and far less black and white, than they are often portrayed.
Boulder County is in a rather unique situation. We have had 30 years of public policy aimed at preventing urban sprawl, directing development into the towns and, preserving natural habitats and preserving farm and ranch land. While some of this land is purely privately owned, there is a significant amount of publicly owned farmland, with the City of Boulder and Boulder County as the two biggest landowners. Boulder County has approximately 12,000 acres of irrigated cropland which is held in fee, on which the county makes the decisions about what type of agriculture takes place. Most of this land has been farmed for a long time, often by the same families whose ancestors homesteaded here a hundred years ago. The county does not farm land itself, but instead leases the land out to farmers. The revenues from the leases are reinvested in the open space agricultural land, in the form of irrigation improvements, hay barns, and other improvements. Successful management of open space agricultural lands requires a partnership between the county and the farmers. Successful management of open space agricultural lands requires a partnership between the county and the farmers. Farming is a difficult and complicated business, which requires hard work, knowledge, and investment. We need to work with the farmers who bring these resources to the table, and give them economically viable options, in order to successfully farm the land. We also should be actively working on nurturing new farmers, and helping small farmers grow their operations to larger scales, so that we will continue to have a viable farming community into the future.
One exciting development has been the recent explosion of interest in the local food movement. I think there is real value in people having a connection to the farmers and farms where their food is grown, and there is some real potential for local jobs in an expanded local food system. My family has been a member of local CSAs for nearly 15 years, and our home has been a drop-off location for the Monroe Organic Farm CSA for most of the last decade. This has been a very important connection, especially for my children, and one that I think is important to a lot of other people.
The County appointed a Food and Agriculture Policy Council a few years ago with the explicit direction to help us figure out how to support local food production, with a focus on how to improve the connection between farmers and local market opportunities, including value added processing. The County is a major supporter of the farmers market, providing a home for the Longmont market on the County fairgrounds, and has recently made significant investments in improving that location for the benefit of the market. The County conducts a new farmer training program to help folks who are interested in becoming farmers – typically small acreage, often organic, market farms. We have also developed a “Grower’s Association” program which makes it possible for farmers who want to start one of these small farms to lease small acreage with water from the county for very low prices, in order to encourage the development of these small farms providing local food.
We also have organic incentives in the bidding process for larger acreage farms, to encourage farmers to transition to organic. We have had some real success at increasing the acreage leased for organic production, including some substantial increases in the last 6 months, with growth from about 200 acres a few years ago to 1,600 acres after our most recent lease awards. This brings us to about 10% of our irrigated cropland (compared to a national average of approximately 0.7%). I believe that we should continue to expand the amount of organic farming on county open space. The cropland policy sets a goal of doubling the acreage in the next few years –20% by 2020, coupled with efforts to assure that there are appropriate markets, and continuing to expand beyond that time.
However, the large majority of acres are still farmed conventionally, and even with an aggressive policy push towards more organic production a substantial percentage of farmland will remain conventional for years to come.
Clearly, the most contentious issue in this process has been the debate about genetically modified food crops. I have tried to look at this in as fair and neutral a way as I can. I have read materials submitted by both opponents and proponents of GMOs, and have met with many supporters and opponents. There have been multiple public hearings before advisory groups, and a marathon hearing before the board of county commissioners. I have also spent a substantial amount of time on outside reading of the literature, to try to understand what the overall state of the science is around GMO food crops. Some of the major sources I have looked at:

The International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) synthesis report
Toward Sustainable Agricultural Systems in the 21st Century, from the National Academy of Sciences
Safety of Genetically Engineered Foods: Approaches to Assessing Unintended Health Effects, from the National Academy of Sciences
Modern Food Biotechnology, Human Health and Development: an Evidence-based Study, by the World Health Organization

Genetically Modified Crops for Food Use and Human health – an Update, Royal Academy of Sciences

Impacts of Genetically Engineered Crops on Pesticide Use: The First Thirteen Years”, by Charles Benbrook for the Organic Center (biotech opponents)

Impact of genetically engineered crops on pesticide use: US Organic Center report evaluation by PG Economics (biotech advocates)
Failure to Yield: Evaluating the Performance of Genetically Engineered Crops, report from the Union of Concerned Scientists (biotech opponents)
One thing that was quite striking was the extent to which the major independent scientific bodies come to basically the same set of conclusions, which do not totally align either with the GMO boosterism of the biotech industry, or the very negative analysis of some GMO critics. After looking at all of this material, I have arrived at somewhat of a middle ground in terms of my views on GMO crops.
1) I am not convinced by the opposition to GMO crops based on food safety concerns, While there are food safety risks associated with any new food crops, whether created by conventional breeding or genetic engineering, these risks seem fairly low compared to other food safety risks, and the risks associated with genetically modified foods are not likely to be higher than those associated with a variety of types of conventional breeding. Unlike conventional breeding, there is at least some assessment of potential food safety risks associated with GMO crops. However, this is an arena where further research should be conducted and the federal regulatory process should be strengthened.
2) I believe that consumer choice is important. Whether or not GMO food crops are dangerous, there are clearly a large number of people who believe that they are dangerous, or who have a belief that they are an unacceptable alteration of natural processes, and they should have the ability to choose not to eat GMO products. Because of this, I support labeling. The County has formally adopted a call for GMO labeling into our legislative agenda.
3) I do find the argument compelling that there has been too much of a focus on GMO agriculture, and that sustainably feeding a growing world requires a much broader focus. Improved seeds are one important part of the picture, but there are a whole lot of other important pieces around agroecological practices, managing for healthy soil, etc.
4) I do think there have been some major public health benefits associated with Bt crops. In particular, the evidence seems pretty strong that Bt cotton has, at least for a period of time, dramatically reduced exposure of farmworkers in India and China to some very toxic pesticides.
5) Bt crop management seems to be better thought out than management of roundup ready crops. There has at least been thought put into resistance management, with the requirements for 20% of cornfields to be planted as refuges of non Bt corn in order to achieve cross breeding between resistant and non-resistant insects. Despite the emergence of resistant rootworms in some places, this seems to have been a successful resistance management strategy for European corn borer, which is the main corn pest of interest in this area. And since organic farmers in this area use Bt to control other pests on other crops, there is not really an issue with selection of Bt resistant insects affecting organic farmers.
6) Roundup Ready crop management seems to be very poorly thought out, with no restrictions in place to limit continuous use of roundup ready crops on the same ground year after year – essentially guaranteeing the rapid evolution of roundup resistant weeds. This has led to the phenomenon Charles Benbrook describes, where farmers who use these crops continually get a reduction in herbicide use initially, but then have increasing use over time, and start having to turn back to other, more toxic herbicides. It also seems to me that there are a variety of unknown risks that come from making such large-scale, continuous use of one herbicide, even one as nontoxic as glyphosate. And there are some ecological surprises that emerge. For example, research out of the University of Iowa suggests that there may be a significant negative impact on monarchs – not from any toxicity, but due to the simple fact that roundup is so effective at weed control that farmers have successfully eliminated the little bits of milkweed that were surviving in their fields.
7) This part of the country has largely escaped the issues associated with roundup ready crops, since farmers in this area typically engage in vigorous crop rotation, involving corn, sugar beets, alfalfa, barley, and wheat, so we do not have farmers who grow roundup ready crops continuously, either on public or private lands. Right now, the only roundup ready crop allowed on open space is corn. Even if sugar beets were added we would be far from any continuous use of roundup. However, the next crops likely coming on the market, roundup ready wheat and alfalfa, seem like they would tip the balance. The wheat would be in rotation with the corn and beets, and alfalfa is typically grown for years in one location, in order to rest the soil and add soil nitrogen, so roundup would be used over and over.
8) Sugar beets seem to me to be one of the crops where GMOs make the most sense. Conventional sugar beets are a very herbicide intensive crop. GMO sugar beets allow significant reductions in total volume of herbicide, a switch from very toxic to much less toxic glyphosate, a significant reduction in fossil fuel use, and since the crop is harvested the first year, but does not flower until the second year, there is very little potential for any pollen drift. The county should require that sugar beet farmers survey their crop for any beets that begin bolting (flowering prematurely), and that these plants be pulled before pollen is produced.
9) While numerous speakers have testified to worries that organic farmers will lose their certification if there is accidental cross pollination with a GMO crop, the National Organic Program certification standards only ban intentional use of GMOs. A farmer will not lose her organic certification due to inadvertent cross pollination. In the 8 years that GMO corn has been grown on county open space, we have not had issues with cross pollination.
Based on all of this, I ended up in a middle position, where I don’t believe we should ban GMOs, but also think we need to be very careful and limited in allowing them, based on the characteristics of particular GMO crops. I think the experience we have had with corn, under the protocols established in 2003, has been positive: we have seen the expected benefits, and have not seen development of resistant weeds or insects or conflicts with organic farmers. I also think that allowing the use of roundup ready sugar beets would have a net positive environmental benefit compared to the existing use of conventional sugar beets, so support allowing GMO sugar beets. However, I do not believe we should allow roundup ready alfalfa or other additional roundup ready crops that would be in rotation with corn and sugar beets – and this is reflected in the cropland policy that we adopted.
While the adoption of the cropland policy has been a challenging and divisive process, I do believe that the policy that we have adopted is a reasonable and balanced approach to managing publicly owned farmlands. I hope that the community will be able to unite around areas of common ground – expanding organic production, growing more local food for local consumptions, and reducing the environmental impacts of farming practices.

-Will Toor, Boulder County Commissioner

Reply ↓

The Battle in Boulder County Over GMOs is Over for Now, with an Unexpected—and Disappointing—Outcome

What is a GMO?

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