October 30, 2025. Halifax. A new national public opinion poll finds that Canadians want to be informed when products or ingredients on grocery store shelves are genetically modified.

The survey finds that 83% of Canadians want mandatory labelling of genetically modified (GM) foods. The survey was conducted by Leger Marketing for the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network (CBAN) and the Quebec network Vigilance OGM (GMO Watch).(1)

“This poll confirms that Canadians overwhelmingly want to know where genetically modified foods are in grocery stores,” said Lucy Sharratt of CBAN. “Canadians want transparency and choice on genetically modified foods.”

Gene editing techniques, such as CRISPR, are new ways to genetically modify plants and animals to express new traits, by deleting DNA segments or otherwise changing a DNA sequence. Health Canada will not be conducting safety assessments for many of these coming gene-edited foods. This also means that these new GM products will not be identified in Health Canada’s public list of approved “novel foods,” even though they can be sold for human consumption.(2)

“The federal government should urgently establish mandatory labelling before unregulated gene-edited fruits and vegetables start showing up unidentified in our grocery produce sections,” said Sharratt.

Today’s poll confirms other recent results with similar findings of consumer concern.(3)

Genetically modified foods developed by gene editing could soon appear in stores without labels, leaving consumers uninformed. Research by CBAN determined that there are three genetically modified (GM) fruits and vegetables currently sold in Canada (GM sweet corn, papaya, squash and pineapple) in addition to processed food ingredients from GM corn, canola, soy and sugarbeet.(4)

Gene editing could soon mean the sale of many new genetically modified organisms (GMOs) to unwary consumers, including more GM whole fruits and vegetables. CBAN warns that gene-edited mustard greens for salad mixes and gene-edited whole strawberries could be the first of these new, unregulated GMOs to enter the Canadian market.

There is a Parliamentary e-petition calling for mandatory labelling, launched by the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network with Kids Right to Know, and authorized by Yves Perron, Member of Parliament for Berthier—Maskinongé and the Bloc Quebecois agriculture critic.(5)

For more information: Lucy Sharratt, Coordinator, Canadian Biotechnology Action Network, 902 209 4906, coordinator@cban.ca, www.cban.ca/labelling

NOTES:

1. See www.cban.ca/labellingpoll2025 
2. CBAN, Press Release: Federal government abandons safety assessments and transparency for new gene-edited foods, May 18, 2022. https://cban.ca/federal-government-abandons-safety-assessments-and-transparency-for-new-gene-edited-foods/ 

3. Canadian Health Food Association, Press Release: Canadians Call for Transparency on Gene Editing in Food, October 8, 2025. https://chfa.ca/news-post/canadians-call-for-transparency-on-gene-editing-in-food/ 

4. CBAN, Gene-Edited Fruits and Vegetables: The Threat of New GMOs in Canada, October, 2025. www.cban.ca/GMFoods2025
5. See e-petition 6768: https://www.ourcommons.ca/petitions/en/Petition/Details?Petition=e-6768