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General Mills Announces Original Cheerios Have Gone GMO-Free

No go on GMOs for GM.
No go on GMOs for GM. Photo: General Mills

Last night, food manufacturer General Mills pointed out what at first seemed like a major change to Cheerios: There’s now a label indicating the cereal is “not made with genetically modified ingredients,” a move that is apparently neither about product safety nor pressure from consumers, and, in fact, says the company, isn’t even a big deal. “This change is not much of a change at all,” VP for Global Communications Tom Forsythe wrote in a blog post. Genetically modified oats are not really commercially available, so there’s that, and it turns out that the biggest changes to the recipe are in cornstarch and sugar, which are now sourced from non-GM crops. “We did it because we think consumers may embrace it,” Forsythe writes. Meanwhile, Honey Nut and other varieties of the cereal are not getting the new labels — what is Buzz the Bee hiding? [General Mills via Reuters, Related]

General Mills Announces Original Cheerios Have Gone GMO-Free