Source: Beth Skwarecki, GENETIC LITERACY PROJECT, 5/23/18


GMO crops have extra layers of government regulation beyond what “conventionally” bred plants have to deal with. But this year, the USDA decreed that CRISPR’d crops will not count as GMOs if they don’t contain foreign DNA. So, for example, if you take a corn plant and add a gene from another living thing, that could be considered a GMO. But if you just use CRISPR to delete a gene, without adding anything new, the law considers that equivalent to breeding a new corn variety the old-fashioned way.

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