Health ministry still touts Canadian General Standards Board, even after its closure was announced in Budget 2025

Thursday – March 26, 2026. Today, consumer and environmental groups are raising the alarm about the government’s pending April 1st closure of the Canadian General Standards Board (CGSB) and its failure to publish a planned new standard for labelling genetically engineered foods.

“The closing of this standards body leaves everyone vulnerable to misleading and flawed food labelling,” said Lucy Sharratt of the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network (CBAN), a member of the committee reviewing the voluntary standard for labelling genetically engineered foods. “Closing the agency without publishing the new labelling standard only benefits big food and biotechnology companies that are opposed to transparency and strong consumer protections.”

Closing the agency kills progress on a revised standard for “Voluntary Labelling and Advertising of Foods That Are and Are Not Products of Genetic Engineering.” The new standard would have stopped companies from labelling gene-edited foods as non-genetically engineered.

“Biotechnology companies will benefit from the government abandoning this new labelling standard,” said Sharratt. “The biotechnology industry wasn’t pleased with the revised standard because they wanted to label gene-edited foods as non-genetically engineered.”

This labelling standard instructs companies on how to voluntarily label genetically engineered (GE) foods as well as foods that are non-genetically engineered. A motion passed in a standards review committee meeting on October 20, 2025, removed an edit that would have changed the definition of genetic engineering (GE) to exclude the controversial new techniques of gene editing. The finalized minutes of that meeting have not been provided to the committee members.

“It’s particularly egregious that Health Canada made a public statement about the standard and review process which the government appears to have abandoned,” said Thibault Rehn of the Quebec network Vigilance OGM (GMO Watch), who was also on the committee.

When Health Canada announced its approval of a gene-edited pig on January 23, 2026, it referred to the “public review” of this standard. In a January 26, 2026 response to a petition demanding mandatory labelling, the Government of Canada also referred to the standard and its review when saying, “our government recognizes that information about genetic engineering is important.”

The revised standard was scheduled to be published in May 2026. However, instead of expediting the process to conclude a month early, government work on the standard review has halted. For example, there was a public comment period on the revised standard that ended on January 23, 2026 but no report on these comments has been published.

CBAN and Vigilance OGM are asking the Minister of Health to urgently publish the revised standard and to announce a federal policy for mandatory labelling of all genetically engineered foods, including foods from gene-edited plants and animals such as the recently approved gene-edited pig.

Mandatory labelling is supported by 83% of Canadians according to a recent poll. Furthermore, an October 2025 poll found that 91% believe consumers have the right to know if gene editing is used and 90% say this information should be disclosed on food labels. 66% of Canadians believe gene editing is a form of genetic engineering and 71% say it would be misleading to market gene-edited foods as “not genetically engineered.”

The CGSB says it will announce the transition of all its standards to another, probably non-governmental, agency but has not provided any information about the status of this labelling standard that is in its latter stages of revision.

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