Sparky, Bugsy

I see your point on the benefits of biotechnology. However, the 10 or 11 year trials of GM crops is not a long time when it comes to getting the science right.

Some of the "silver bullet" chemicals I referred to earlier were introduced in the 40's or 50's. They have killed many people. It was only in 2001 that a global ban was placed on these destructive pesticides. Many countries continue to use them despite the devastation they are wreaking on human and ecological health.

These chemicals are showing up in the ice caps of the Arctic. They have pervaded every part of the planet and continue to bioaccumulate and wreak destruction.

The regulators need to be far more prudent than they have been in the past. And the science, I believe is not yet sufficiently assuring to adopt a gung ho approach to GM crops.

There needs to be fewer exaggerations about GM crops, fair play and clearer definitions for GM free zones. Already there are institutes, including the Department of Plant Science at the University of Manitoba, expressing concern about the transgene frequency which has occurred with GM crops.

In 2004, The UN Food and Agricultural Organization acknowledged that GM crops can have reduced yields.

All the more reason to proceed with caution.

Technology is not the only answer to solving problems, especially those around producing enough food for continuous population growth.

The selling-off of the Commons- namely, the appropriation and ownership of ecosystem services that have traditionally been available free of charge to all - are now being patented and on-sold, thus reducing accessibility and equity to our quality of life.

For example, Monsanto's efforts to patent the genes of porcine and other entities have claimed ownerhip of the human genomes... yes, apparently yours and mine...... so I am no longer 'the owner' of me? Again, Monsanto and Bayer CropScience have patented their genetic engineering so seeds - once freely available for farmers to re-use year after year AND continue the plant breeding process - now control so many of the world's seed companies.

In this debate, I simply ask people to use their imaginations and extrpolate the scenario over the next 10, 20, 30 years and see how the world's food supplies really operate.

Yes, dominant market share is a brilliant free-market economy model and controlling the majority of the world's food supplies is audaciously brilliant....... as long as you have the income to purchase the goods on offer. Diminution of corn varieties is occurring in Mexico - the home of corn - from contamination of GE crops and, again.... who owns these engineered varieties? It's NOT the Mexicans.

Apply some imagineering to this issue..... be objective and wholistic and see how the world's food suplies could be controlled by very few...... that scares the living daylights out of me and long live my vegie garden.

bush goddess

Bush goddess

You're right about the patenting of genes being bad and in my view it clearly holds back public research. That said I think it is more of a systemic problem that allows genes to be patented rather than the evils of Monsanto. If Monsanto doesn't patent genes it is working on then someone else probably will resulting in Monsanto having to pay patentee for permission to study that gene.

Hopefully lawmakers in the US will change this situation.

And again the debate swings back away from the science......

This is probably a perfect example of what Max what talking about. As soon as anyone starts talking about GM crops and foods..BANG! they start talking about economics and business ethics and patent law and on and on....but not about science. If anyone is going to make decisions about and between different GM technologies, then they had better be literate about them and I would prefer people from all occupations and backgrounds on my ethics committees. Unfortunately, it seems, noone except the scientists ever bothers to discuss the actual science. The last few posts have done exactly what Max was saying. You keep going on about about what Monsanto wants to do, what about what Syngenta, Dow or even Arcadia or Ventria or Athenix? Nope, nobody is interested, Monsanto is the devil.

The future is science based and you had better get with the program and start educating yourself, otherwise other people will be making the decisions for you.

In all fairness I was just using Monsanto as an example, but let's not get into a debate about having a debate.

I've noticed that we really haven't been discussing the science of GM cotton which I would argue is Australia's most successful GM crop.

My understanding is that the Monsanto version of GM cotton has three modifications. Two are natural insecticides from Bacillus thuringiensis which kill insects but is easily broken down by mammals. The third is a resistance gene to the herbicide Roundup which allows farmers to spray the chemical on fields to kill weeds but not the crop itself.

Anyone disagree with my assessment that it's our most successful GM crop?

This discussion of whether or not Australia should plant GM canola is really a bit of a joke. As Sparky notes, GM cotton is already grown with 3 different genes. This, I am told, is more than 90% of the cotton grown in Australia. Not only that, cottonseed enters the food chain both directly and through dairy cows. Unfortunately, Australia has missed the boat on GM canola. The 12 crop of GM canola is in the ground now in Canada. Over that period both area sown and yields of canola have increased in Canada. The opposite is true of Australia. Sometime this year the last canola trait from Canada will be approved for import into Europe. Not that this will matter too much. Canada had record exports of canola seed last year and are set to do the same again this year. Canada is now also exporting considerable quantities of canola oil to Europe. The Australian canola industry has struggled to keep up, in part because it is dominated by atrazine resistant canola. They call that yield resistant canola in Canada. The moritoria have really just been an own goal for Australian canola growers.

As to the science: GM is just another breeding technique, just you can do things like hybrids that you can’t do as well with conventional breeding.