Labels on bags of snack food indicate their ingredients don't contain any GMOs. Voters in Washington state decide Nov. 5 if they want to make such labels the law. Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images

It's not easy eating green.



Even the most informed omnivore must navigate a labyrinth of half-truths and dubious marketing claims to find foods that are, to use a loaded term, "natural."



And for Americans who want to know whether their food contains genetically modified organisms -- crops that have had their genetic sequencing artificially restructured, usually known as GMOs -- the path is much less clear. The scientific consensus has consistently ruled GMO crops as safe for human consumption, but some countries have banned their use citing a lack of independent research.

On Nov. 5, Washington state will decide the outcome of "The People's Right to Know Genetically Engineered Food Act," or I-522, a bill focused not on the safety of GMOs, but on transparency in the food system. Last fall, voters in California narrowly rejected a similar initiative, Proposition 37, that would have mandated all genetically modified and engineered foods (the latter known as GEs) be labeled accordingly.

Shoppers heard for years that their food purchase helped them to "vote with their forks." But Prop 37 and I-522 represent a new frontier, author Michael Pollan wrote in 2012, that allows people to vote "with votes, not just forks." In Washington, television ads from both sides debuted last week, and voters from Seattle to Spokane are watching a battle shaped by the lessons of California's foray into food policy activism.

The Prop 37 campaign exposed a startling disconnect: the marketing messages of some of the country's most familiar "all-natural" packaged goods contradicted the political spending of their corporate parents. For consumer rights activists, the loss in California was a major setback. Had the law passed in the country's most populous state, industry-watchers expected similar policies would become normalized nationwide.

To the corporations and agribusinesses that spent $46 million to help defeat what they considered onerous government regulation, the Golden State's dance with GMO labeling was a brush with disaster. Opponents — including bio-tech and food manufacturing giants such as Dow AgroSciences and PepsiCo Inc. — outspent supporters five-to-one. The Monsanto Company chipped in more than $8 million, nearly as much as the total raised by the pro-labeling campaign. Despite such lopsided outsider spending (22 percent of "No" contributions were made by organizations based in Washington, D.C.), the initiative lost by less than 3 percent.

Corporate political donations are nothing new, but it was the brands under these companies that provided the real surprise.