This house believes that GM crops are safe and GMOs should not be labeled

I will begin by congratulating my opponent on a wonderful debate and thanking him for making this debate so fascinating and insightful. Contention 1: HealthThe Pro has failed to respond to my argument about allergic reactions in rounds 4 and 5 and therefore has conceded the argument. Silence is compliance. The pro also cites an article in Nature Biotechnology to respond to my criticism on the lack of independent testing for health and safety purposes. This article, however, has nothing to do with this topic. The article in question cites the Rio Declaration, a UN agreement concerning the environmental impacts of economic development strategies. The "precautionary principle" discussed in the Rio Declaration concerned environmental impacts of economic development, not health and safety regulations. As this does not actually address the topic at hand, it is simply irrelevant and should be disregarded in this contention on health. The precautionary rule being discussed here is that the FDA should require that products be tested for health and safety before they are released onto the market. Currently, this is not the case for dietary supplements, pesticides or GMOs when they are released by companies and developers. The pro does claim that GMOs are required to meet the same safety requirements as traditionally bred plants, and while this is true, traditionally bred crops use natural means and the manipulation of natural forces, while GMOs are developed in a laboratory setting using a scientific process (described by the Pro in round 1) and are considered by the US Government to be a manufactured good, eligible to be patented. The FDA notes on its website that GMOs are only tested by the developer (ie Companies like Monsanto and Syngenta) and not independently or by the agency, saying"During the FDA consultation process, the food developer conducts a safety assessment. "It should be plainly obvious that the food developers have a profound interest in having their product approved, and these developers are notorious for manipulating assessments in their favour. If these safety assessments were submitted for peer review, they would most certainly be rejected because of the conflict of interest. This same process is also used for products including food dyes and other food additives, as well as medications, and very often dangerous side effects are discovered years after the fact after independent evaluations are ordered by judges. The Pro cannot claim that GMOs are absolutely safe when no independent testing is even required for GMOs to be released onto the market and the firms which manufacture GMOs make it impossible for Scientists to test their products. . http://www.fda.gov...http://www.unesco.org...Contention 2: EnvironmentThe Pro accuses me of failing to respond to the arguments and instead relying on ad hominems. There are several issues with this, but I will first address the issue of my own failure to respond to the Nature magazine article. While I did fail to respond to its claims in the previous round, I do feel it should mention now that not only does the article actually contradict the claims of Andrew Kniss, it actually supports my contention that use of GMOs increases pesticide resistance. In the article it states:Since the late 1990s, US farmers had widely adopted GM cotton engineered to tolerate the herbicide glyphosate, which is marketed as Roundup by Monsanto in St Louis, Missouri. The herbicide–crop combination worked spectacularly well — until it didn’t. In 2004, herbicide-resistant amaranth was found in one county in Georgia; by 2011, it had spread to 76. .. GM crops, by encouraging liberal use of glyphosate, were spurring the evolution of herbicide resistance in many weeds. Twenty-four glyphosate-resistant weed species have been identified since Roundup-tolerant crops were introduced in 1996. The article goes on to state the as of now, the damage has not been too disastrous, as quoted by the pro, but also notes that the study this was quoted from was an "industry-funded study" and ended with overall scepticism towards the claims of minimal environmental damage. As to the allegations that my argument relied solely on Ad Hominems. The pro attempts to have this claim support itself, but in reality, the arguments I made were not in any way fallacious, as it is relevant as to what interest the source has in defending GMOs. By highlighting conflicts of interest, I am not using abusive ad hominems or ad hominems which lack any real relevance to the debate and to the credibility of the argument at hand. As to the claim that SourceWatch is "not neutral and does not present a balanced point of view", the Pro contends that articles on GMOs, Monsanto and unspecified "others" contained "lies, fallacies and anti-science positions". There are two major issues with this allegation by the Pro. First, the pro in no way justifies his claims, providing a warrantless statement that is supposed to be taken at face value. This is the definition of an unsubstantiated claim. Secondly, the use of SourceWatch was to show the lack of credibility of the Genetic Literacy Project, not to make any scientific claims. The Pro also attempts to defend the GLP by pointing to its funding sources, however, this argument is not an actual response, as I did not attack the GLP's sources of Funding, but rather its bias and the fact that it is a Pro-GMO group, rather than an education organisation and is a sister organization to two corporate front groups. Additionally, there are issues with the funding sources themselves, as many of the foundations listed on the GLPs website include pro-Free Market think tanks, opposed to regulation, and charities which have been used as front groups for corporate interests in the past. On the issue of monoculture, it must be noted that Monoculture was only mentioned in passing as one of the factors causing pesticide resistance, and was not really a full argument, but rather one of three sub-issues and sub-causes. Furthermore, the two sources he uses to attack this passing remark are, in fact, contradictory. While the first article claims that no link exists at all, the second quote claims that the economics of GMOs have reduced crop rotation and that by educating people on the issues and changing the economic dynamic of GM technology, we can increase crop rotation. Neither of these articles, however, disprove the claims that have been made and fail to address gene contamination and any of the other issues that have been discussed. The Pro has also never responded to the other issues that I have previously mentioned all throughout this debate, instead focusing on the pesticide-resistant weeds and ignoring issues including the overall harm to biodiversity and the microevolution in insects which is begining to threaten other plant species. He has also ignored the fact that more sustainable alternatives are available to GM technology. Silence is compliance and thus, the Pro has conceded on all of these points. Contention 3: CriticalSelf-regulation has been historically a failure for the simple fact that corporations, which are driven solely by profits, will not voluntarily implement a policy which will hinder this goal of maximum profits. The issue at hand is that these corporations have a conflict of interest and it is not in their interest to regulate themselves. It has been a failure throughout history and it is the key reason why most industries are regulated. The Pro claims that the Non-GMO project, Kosher and Halal Certifications and Fair Trade certifications serve as successful examples of self-regulation, however, none of these are examples of self-regulation. Kosher and Halal certifications are given out by non-profit religious foundations independent of the food industry. The Non-GMO project was started by food retailers as a way of certifying products by food manufacturers and is an independent 501(c)3. Fair Trade certification meanwhile must come from FLOCERT, and NGO associated with a Fair Trade promotion group. None of these are in any way examples of self-regulation, as all are administered by third parties. The Pro also claims that Country of Origin Labeling as an analogy is a strawman, and claims that a better example is labeling DNA, however what the Pro fails to acknowledge is that nearly every food product contains DNA, as nearly every food we eat is derived from a plant or animal. Not every food contains GMOs, and thus this analogy is simply ridicolous. While GMO labels would not tell the consumer absolutley everything they need to know, the purpose is to give them a choice as to whether or not they want to support the methods being used. The reason I have given to why GMOs should be labled is very simply that if we want to value the freedom of information and the right to chose, we should label GMOs so consumers can decide what agricultural practices they support. It is not about the unproven risks to human health, it is about the right for consumers to know what is in their food. As to the Pro's second to last paragraph, it must be noted this argument was dropped after the second round by the Pro and therefore should not be allowed to be reargued in the final statement. . http://www.koshercertification.org.uk...;http://www.ifanca.org...;http://www.flocert.net...http://www.nongmoproject.org...For all of these reasons, I can only see a vote for the Con at the end of this debate. The pro has failed to burden of proof and has relied of faulty evidence to substaniate his claims and has not shown any legitimate reason why the resolution should be affirmed.