State media tries to persuade Chinese public GMO food is safe

China’s state media is working overtime to persuade the public that genetically modified food is safe, apparently softening up the population for a policy switch to allow the sale of such food to ensure its 1.35 billion people have enough to eat.

In the past 30 years, China’s urban population has jumped to about 700 million from under 200 million, driving up demand for meat and staples such as rice that scientists say only genetically modified organisms can satisfy.

Imported GMO soybeans are already used as feed for animals, but winning acceptance for the more widespread use of GMO may be a hard sell in a country frequently in the grip of food scares – just this year, over baby milk powder and chemicals in chickens, for instance.

GMO food faces opposition even at the top levels of Chinese bureaucracy, with a senior national security official likening it to opium.

But state media is taking up the fight: on Monday, the Communist Party’s mouthpiece, the People’s Daily, rejected rumours that eating GMO food could alter human DNA, and official news agency Xinhua ran an investigation last week debunking tales that consumption of GMO corn had reduced sperm counts.