As 2024 comes to a close, we're looking back at the year that was. The revolving door of biotechnology continued to spin, with GMOs entering the marketplace and even a few leaving it (adiós, GMO salmon!). Plus, there were important developments in several international and ongoing stories, and a big announcement from us at the Non-GMO Project.

Let's take a look at the year's biggest stories.

GMOs coming in

• Grow your own GMOs — UK's Norfolk Healthy Produce announced in February that seeds for GMO purple tomatoes were available online to home gardeners. The purple tomato is engineered to contain high levels of anthocyanins, and is the first GMO to be marketed to home growers.
• From a land down under — Also in February, a disease-resistance GMO Cavendish banana was approved for cultivation and consumption in Australia and New Zealand.
• It's a plant! It's a pig! It's Piggy Sooy! — In April, the USDA determined Piggy Sooy, a GMO soy plant that produces pork proteins, was not subject to regulation, paving the way for the transporting and planting of seeds. You can find more info about Piggy Sooy and the molecular farming techniques that made it possible in our New GMO Alert.

GMOs going out

• Golden Rice's winding path — In April, the Philippines' Court of Appeals reversed previous approvals for GMO Golden Rice and Bt Eggplant over safety concerns.
• Cultivated meat's ups and downs — After USDA approval of two cultivated meat products from GOOD Meat and Upside Foods last year, the outlook seemed rosy for the fledgeling industry. However, Upside Foods has since initiated two separate rounds of layoffs, and in May, Florida outlawed the manufacture and distribution of "lab-grown" meat in an effort to protect traditional meat producers. 
• AquAdvantage goes belly up — In December, AquaBounty announced it was closing its last genetically engineered AquAdvantage salmon production facilities and culling the remaining fish. As the first GMO animal for direct human consumption, AquAdvantage salmon was a controversial product which dozens of major retailers and restaurants pledged not to carry. 
• Down with lax GMO rules — On December 3, a federal court struck down rules that eliminated most government oversight of genetically engineered crops, trees and grasses. The overturned rules were implemented in 2020, and essentially allowed the novel industry to self-regulate. The victory was announced by Center for Food Safety, whose lawsuit against the USDA said the rule violated numerous environmental laws and contradicted the agency's previous statements about the need for oversight of GMOs. 

EU changes course on new GMOs

Back in 2018, the European Court of Justice decided new GMOs made through new genomic techniques (also known as NGTs) would be regulated using the same framework as older, transgenic GMOs. Last year, the European Commission proposed deregulating NGTs, arguing that the changes made through new genomic techniques could also be achieved naturally or through traditional breeding methods. 

The proposal has been criticized for several reasons. Deregulating new GMOs would compromise organic and non-GMO supply chains and compromise a shopper's right to know how their food was made. Aligning new GMOs with conventional breeding and natural processes flies in the face of the Cartagena Protocol's definition of living modified organisms (the EU is a signatory to the treaty). Also, deregulated new GMOs would be eligible for exclusive patents that are off-limits to traditionally-bred or naturally-occurring plants — setting the stage for a corporate takeover of seed breeding in Europe. 

A plenary vote in February found compromise by adopting different categories for NGT crops. Category 1 NGTs would be limited to 20 or fewer modifications from the parent plant and would be considered equivalent to conventionally bred plants; Category 2 NGTs with more than 20 modifications would be regulated as GMOs. However, the proposal is currently in legislative limbo following a failure to find agreement at February's vote. 

Maize, Monsanto and Mexico

This story first caught our eye in 2020, when Mexico's then-president Andrés Manuel López Obrador issued a decree to ban GMO corn imports and prohibit the herbicide glyphosate. Unsurprisingly, US trade representatives and corn lobbyists vehemently opposed the decree. The US is Mexico's largest trading partner, and 94% of US-grown corn is GMO. 

Mexico ultimately softened its stance from a ban to a restriction — allowing GMO corn imports for animal feed or industrial uses but prohibiting it from products for human consumption — and submitted a 264-page document to support the move.

While the US reaction to the potential restriction of GMO corn has been intense and unrelenting, there have been some victories: In June, Monsanto-Bayer (formerly Monsanto, the agrochemical company that developed some of the first GMO crops engineered for tolerance to the herbicide glyphosate) dropped the lawsuit it had filed over the decree. However, in late December, a dispute resolution panel settled the issue in favor of the US.

Mexico's stance as a global leader in food sovereignty expands beyond the GMO corn restriction. In April, Mexico approved historic legislation securing the right to adequate, sustainable, nutritious, safe and culturally appropriate foods. And in October, incoming President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo's inauguration speech included a pledge to uphold food sovereignty and self-sufficiency, to “feed those who feed us." As a climate scientist and the protege of outgoing President López Obrador, President Sheinbaum intends to uphold the GMO corn restriction and glyphosate ban brought in by her predecessor. 

Introducing the Food Integrity Collective

In April, the Non-GMO Project announced the launch of the Food Integrity Collective, an initiative aimed at revolutionizing the retail food system. The Collective's approach encompasses eight essential 'petals' – from minimal processing and non-GMO practices to regenerative sourcing, healthy human communities and animal wellbeing, and includes an initial cohort of partner brands committed to this work. You can find out more about the Food Integrity Collective on the website, here.