Chipotle: First Major Fast Food Chain to Stop Serving Genetically Modified Food
DENVER, April 27 (UPI) — The Mexican-style fast food chain Chipotle will no longer serve food that has been genetically modified starting on Monday.
The move makes Chipotle the first major fast food chain in the United States to end the practice, according to the New York Times.
“This is another step toward the visions we have of changing the way people think about and eat fast food,” Steve Ells, founder and co-chief executive of Chipotle, said in a statement. “Just because food is served fast doesn’t mean it has to be made with cheap raw ingredients, highly processed with preservatives and fillers and stabilizers and artificial colors and flavors.”
The company was already labeling menu items that contained genetically modified organisms (GMOs) as early as 2013, but it will no longer include such food at all.
A GMO is any organism, including a fruit or a vegetable, thats genome has been altered in a lab to produce certain characteristics. GMO apples, for example, are often more red in color than wild apples. Many anti-GMO activists believe there could be negative consequences to altering food in such a way. The Food and Drug Administration claims GMOs are safe for consumption.
