GMOs causing autism?! We report, you decide!

[kramerfan86]

^And yet large cases of contaminated/dangerous (non-GM) food are not that common. There were the main ones in west/northern Europe, involving the pig-based foods of some companies (and cow-based), and those were presented to have been caused by entirely un-regulated feeding of those animals by horrible and not at all allowed food.

So then you shouldnt have a problem with regulated GMOs because if controlled cases of dangerous GM food would be incredibly incredibly rare.

 

[Kyriakos]

^Yes, but the key phrase is 'in theory'. If they can be well-regulated (ie they involve few and well-named modifications, and studies are shown for all of those) then we would have a better view of what those foods can do or cannot.

 

[kramerfan86]

Then you are reasonable, my main problem is with those who have a visceral hate of the very concept. Wanting the whole thing to be better controlled is highly reasonable.

i will say terminator genes should be across the board illegal, genetically sterility being put into a food crop in a dangerous dangerous game that shouldnt be played.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

Defending Goliath against David in the form of defending corporate frivolous lawsuits against struggling family farmers puts you on the GAR list.

It is like like saying "They must have done something." And, meanwhile, 250,000 farmers in India commit suicide because mega-agribusiness destroys their livelihood

And that frickin' research that Monsanto demands to be compensated for? They already got their frickin' compensation. It's called The cost of doing business.

That's not Marx, that's John Kenneth flippin' Galbraith.

But, bourgeoisie suck and it's all finance capital's doing, anyway.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

And, meanwhile, 250,000 farmers in India commit suicide because mega-agribusiness destroys their livelihood

I, uh, looked into that actually. It's a bit more complicated.

The issue of farmer suicides first gained media attention in 1995 as the southern state of Maharashtra began reporting a significant rise in farmers killing themselves.

Other states across the country began noticing an increase in farmer suicides as well.

But it wasn’t until seven years later — in 2002 — that the U.S.-based agribusiness Monsanto began selling genetically modified cotton seeds, known as Bt cotton, to Indian farmers.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

All right, then. Those farmer deaths were not in vain.

GAR list it is.

In 1995, Monsanto introduced its Bt technology in India through a joint-venture with the Indian company Mahyco. In 1997-98, Monsanto started open field trials of its GMO Bt cotton illegally and announced that it would be selling the seeds commercially the following year. India has rules for regulating GMOs since 1989, under the Environment Protection Act. It is mandatory to get approval from the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee under the ministry of environment for GMO trials. The Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology sued Monsanto in the Supreme Court of India and Monsanto could not start the commercial sales of its Bt cotton seeds until 2002.

And, after the damning report of India’s parliamentary committee on Bt crops in August 2012, the panel of technical experts appointed by the Supreme Court recommended a 10-year moratorium on field trials of all GM food and termination of all ongoing trials of transgenic crops.
But it had changed Indian agriculture already.

Monsanto’s seed monopolies, the destruction of alternatives, the collection of superprofits in the form of royalties, and the increasing vulnerability of monocultures has created a context for debt, suicides and agrarian distress which is driving the farmers’ suicide epidemic in India. This systemic control has been intensified with Bt cotton. That is why most suicides are in the cotton belt.

Word.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

GAR list it is.

An internal advisory by the agricultural ministry of India in January 2012 had this to say to the cotton-growing states in India — “Cotton farmers are in a deep crisis since shifting to Bt cotton. The spate of farmer suicides in 2011-12 has been particularly severe among Bt cotton farmers.”

The National Post graph cuts off at 2010, even though it was written in 2013. That's interesting.

 

[El_Machinae]

Reducing biodiversity

I think the major concern is that pollen containing bt (a type of pesticide, for our audience) would blow off of the fields and get consumed by herbivores downwind, so you end up 'poisoning' a larger swath than just the field.

As you say, monoculture is a separate issue, and a fairly serious one.

I can't believe I was actually asked what is the benefit of not having to pay for something every year when it can be grown from previous stock.

Do those patents expire? At some point, shouldn't the technology be open source.

All right, then. Those farmer deaths were not in vain.

GAR list it is.
Word.

I really like listening to her talks. I might not agree with her 100%, or I might know stuff she doesn't (no one is perfect), but she's illuminating.

 

[Farm Boy]

I think the major concern is that pollen containing bt (a type of pesticide, for our audience) would blow off of the fields and get consumed by herbivores downwind, so you end up 'poisoning' a larger swath than just the field.

It's a damned naturally occurring bacteria. And this is how smart organic farming is. In order to spite large agribusiness, you can't buy an unnatural voodoo GMO seed that has the gene from that bacteria mixed in to control a narrow swath of pests. But, since BT(Bacillus thuringiensis) is natural itself, if you are growing organic you then spray that crap everywhere over the same crop to control the same pests. Yep, that's another field pass(or more). Burning diesel for mother earth since the plant can't be allowed to do the horsepower for you, and the yokels just snap it up with chants of "MONSANTO MONSANTO MONSANTO." This one simply must be saferer and betterer! And tons of "organic" processes work like this. It's revolting El!

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Last time I checked, Bacillus thurigiensis wasn't similar to plant pollen in terms of gene transfer, and dozens of other parameters.

 

[Zelig]

I favor food labeling, period. If an item regarding food is relevant to a portion of the public (as in THEY hold it to be relevant), then they souldn't be denied that information.

What if (for example), a portion of the public wants "only farmed/owned/produced by white farmers" labels on their food?

Clearly, there are some factual labels that aren't reasonable.

The problem is that you are have a dry year and you know that there isn't enough of the season to make an effort to plant and thus you just dig up your seeds and re-use them for next season, but with terminator seeds, you simply just can't do that, so you have to plant your seeds and hope for the best, when you know it isn't likely.

Yeah Farm Boy, listen to classical_hero tell you about your problems as a farmer.

 

[Loppan Torkel]

I want food from Swedish farmers. It's more expensive, but the animals are treated much better here than in the rest of the world. So, yeah..

 

[Zelig]

I want food from Swedish farmers. It's more expensive, but the animals are treated much better here than in the rest of the world. So, yeah..

Yes, I'm sure those poor Finnish cows are just brutalized compared to the luxurious lives of Swedish cows.

Really, if you're going to modify diet based on animal treatment, you shouldn't be eating meat.

 

[Farm Boy]

SS, corn pollen reliably pollinates other corn up to somewhat more than 60 inches. It unreliably pollinates farther, and will be drowned out by closer plants at any significant distance. If you want soy or cotton, you can look those up. It's out there. So our concern is that herbivores eating plants downwind are going to get pollinated by Bt corn, internalizing and incorporating that specific gene out of all the genes in corn, whereas they aren't eating an naturally occurring or downwind-sprayed Bt bacterium and also internalizing and incorporating that specific gene out of all the genes in that bacteria?

Or are we on Monsanto's patent lawsuits? Hey, we've had the faus news show's take on it, how about the take straight from the devil's mouth? http://www.monsanto.com/newsviews/pages/saved-seed-farmer-lawsuits.aspx Take it for what it's worth. It does make a good case for why terminator genes are an eloquent solution to the DRM problems present in heldover/crosspollinated seed. Fears of dead-end food crops are overblown, if you are propagating a seed with terminator genes it still needs generations that propagate themselves indefinitely so seed can be grown for sale to farmers as seed crop, then sold infertile to end-use markets. You still need, and we have, the infrastructure in place to produce the entirety of the viable seed crop needed for planting every year. There's an elaborate system of labor-sharing and contracting in place for the production of seed crops. It's pretty interesting, you should look into it.

Yeah Farm Boy, listen to classical_hero tell you about your problems as a farmer.

There are so many things critically in error in that statement I don't really even know how to phrase or order the responses really.

First, that's not how terminator crops work. They work by the plant being sold as seed crop being exceptional in production for one generational cycle, but yielding infertile or unprofitably unfertile seeds so that they're useful for processing and consumption, but unprofitable for planting. The terminator seeds don't have some sort of chronological clock attached to them waiting to go off. It activates when the plant enters maturity and yields its (hopefully)bountiful and sterile crop.

Second, you aren't going to dig up your seeds. You plant tens of thousands of seeds per acre. There is no good mechanical way to remove them. You'd have to dig and separate your entire seed rows from dirt, pebbles, debris. You aren't going to take a trowel out there. Even if you could do it mechanically, and somehow so efficiently that you wouldn't either be doing unprofitable(compared to the cost of the seed) damage through unnecessary compaction and tillage(yea, you can do both at the same time, and compaction then needs additional tillage to undo, which is a big erosion hazard) or unprofitable use of fuel, you would need a really niche and specific piece of equipment to do this.

Third, even if you could do this, or you could somehow trowel up your entire crop, you aren't going to do it and it wouldn't help anyways. Assuming there was any significant level of moisture at all in the soil at any point after it's been put in, the plant is going to start its life cycle. It's too late to store it at this point, if you pull it out the seeds are going to rot and die. I don't know how to put this more simply: once you put an input in for the year, be it seed, be it fertilizer, be it weed removal, be it tillage, be it anything, that input is spent. You don't get a do-over. If conditions are bad enough you expect loss you can cut your losses by not putting any more inputs in, but you aren't going to be taking them out.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

So our concern is that herbivores eating plants downwind are going to get pollinated by Bt corn, internalizing and incorporating that specific gene out of all the genes in corn, whereas they aren't eating an naturally occurring or downwind-sprayed Bt bacterium and also internalizing and incorporating that specific gene out of all the genes in that bacteria?

The latter is much less likely, due to simple biological facts as the differences in eukaryotic and prokaryotic genetics (methylation, etc. etc.). All I'm addressing here is you taking direct Bt treatment and essentially treating it the same as plants with Bt genes.

Take it for what it's worth.

A bunch of PR fluff that doesn't seem to mention cross-pollination anywhere?

 

[Farm Boy]

The latter is much less likely, due to simple biological facts as the differences in eukaryotic and prokaryotic genetics (methylation, etc. etc.). All I'm addressing here is you taking direct Bt treatment and essentially treating it the same as plants with Bt genes.

Bacteria with Bt genes as opposed to plants with Bt genes. The Bt treatment in organics is a biological pest control agent.

Let me get this straight. The concern is indeed that herbivores consuming Bt genetic plants or plant pollen and those herbivores subsequently taking in and incorporating into themselves Bt plant genetic code is of significantly greater concern than those same herbivores consuming naturally occurring or manually applied Bt bacterium and then incorporating into themselves that Bt bacterial code? Code which is toxic to a narrow band of insects.

A bunch of PR fluff that doesn't seem to mention cross-pollination anywhere?

Probably because Monsanto, evil as it is, doesn't actually have much interest suing people who wind up with dribs and drabs of pollen that they don't actually want. That makes even Monsanto look worse than Monsanto is. They do have an interest in suing people that are violating deliberately their use contracts. Which happens. Maybe they've hit some people accidentally, that's sure as crap possible and likely with a corporation that size. Which is mostly why they want terminator genes in their one-season seed products.

But yes, I mentioned the PR fluff is of the worth what PR fluff is. How about Huffington Post? It's got some interesting details in there. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/10/monsanto-wins-lawsuit_n_3417081.html

But this is an aside. Monsanto would be in and take this position with or without GMO presence. That's an intellectual property issue, not a uniquely GMO one. And yes, we do have to make sure the patent system works better than it does in say, software, which is a joke.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Let me get this straight. The concern is indeed that herbivores consuming Bt genetic plants or plant pollen and those herbivores subsequently taking in and incorporating into themselves Bt plant genetic code is of significantly greater concern than those same herbivores consuming naturally occurring or manually applied Bt bacterium and then incorporating into themselves that Bt bacterial code? Code which is toxic to a narrow band of insects.

If ingestion to transfer genes is possible, yes. I'm more interested about plant-to-plant transmission though, and the potential ecological ramifications if any.

Code which is toxic to a narrow band of insects.

but the court said the website statement was sufficient and would be binding.

I sure as hell hope these are true.

 

[Farm Boy]

If ingestion to transfer genes is possible, yes. I'm more interested about plant-to-plant transmission though, and the potential ecological ramifications if any.

Plant to plant transmission is possible. Within species, to some extent, it's going to be unavoidable. It can be mitigated with decent success though. Look up refuge requirements for Bt corn and more significantly Bt cotton. Management and regulation of the insecticide is already a work in progress to expand the lifespan of that method of control before the inevitable problem of pest resistance forces a new generation of controls. Outside of species transmission of genes does seem less likely given how the reproduction works, no?

As for the potential ecological ramifications it's going to have to be taken just like other more conventional treatments are. Case by case. I'm dead serious when I urge everyone to support robust funding of the Land Grant Universities' agricultural programs.

I sure as hell hope these are true.

For the first, that's why the trait is so desirable and adopted in over 90% of crops that have that seed available.

For the second, me too.

 

[dutchfire]

I can't believe I was actually asked what is the benefit of not having to pay for something every year when it can be grown from previous stock.

Why would people ever buy a subscription to Spotify and pay every year when they can just buy the music on disc once?

 

[Kyriakos]

Why would people ever buy a subscription to Spotify and pay every year when they can just buy the music on disc once?

You wouldn't download a GM crop. Or shoot a policeman.