In any produce section at any grocery store, it's obvious that organic foods are taking off.  Organic produce usually have their own little section with a big "Organics" sign on top so people know exactly where to go if they're looking for Organic foods.. great system.  But say your budget won't allow you to buy organic all the time, what section of the produce department do you go to to avoid Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO)?  If you don't know how to spot them, GMOs blend right into the greenery and are picked up by people who if they had an easy tool to avoid them, would make the effort.

Thankfully, a tool exists to do just this, you just have to know where to look.  There is a universal produce code system, that stemmed from the globalisation of the produce industry and the need to have a standard labelling system, that allows quick and easy differentiation between Organics, GMOs and conventional produce. 

It's very simple.  Every produce code is 4 digits long.  For example the code for bananas is 4011.  If a food is organic they will add an 9 as the first digit of a produce code and if a food is a GMO they will add a 8 as the first digit of the code.  So, to complete the banana example, if a sticker reads 94011, the banana is organic, if it reads 84011, the banana is Genetically Modified.

So easy you can't afford not to be a responsible consumer here!

For more on GMOs and "what's so bad about them anyway", read on.

GMO crops come from Genetically Modified seeds that have been 'bred' to be more hearty or be resistant to a specific type of herbicide. 

A major corporation called Monsanto is responsible for the production of many different agricultural and gardening products but the most infamous of all is Round-up.  Round-up is a herbicide that indiscriminately kills everything except for seeds that Monsanto also manufactures (and owns the rights for reproduction to) called 'Round-up Ready' seeds.  What's so bad about this? At first sniff it sounds pretty good to be able to grow a crop of corn or canola without having to worry about weeding... Yes until you understand that the Genetically Modified strain is dominant and when it breeds with natural strains of the same plant it turns the offspringing into a GMO. 

Corporations like Monsanto are responsible for wide-spread soil-erosion and destruction of biodiversity all over the world.  If you buy a GMO food at your local grocery store, chances are you're indirectly supporting Monsanto and other companies like them... You're saying "YES! This is what I want in my world!" every time you buy a GMO food whether or not you are aware of the implications.