Following successful segregation trials, GM cannola has been approved for WA.

http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/wa-approves-gm-canola-20100125-mu6i.html
http://fw.farmonline.com.au/news/state/agribusiness-and-general/general/progm-groups-welcome-wa-decision/1735790.aspx

Tasmanian and South Australian farmers, however, are still being penalised by the greens who hold sway over the Labor states.

With the successful cultivation in three states, the agricultural ministers in the respective states are running out of justification for continuing their moratoriums.

Yes, but this does not mean that those states who have ignored the wishes of non-GM farmers or concerns of consumers are necessarily correct.

Have you considered that they may be wrong? If it is proven thus, we may be glad that some states held out unless of course cross pollination does not make any discussion on that moot.

SM
Almost right try a 't' in front of the 'r'.Your blind faith in conservative dogma would be sweetly naive if the probable consequences of it here didn't have such moral and national significance.

Let's be clear I doubt that the technology is dangerous in simple terms ...it is unlikely to poison any more than current practices.

It's the corporations I don't trust the life science corps are in reality simply the re-branded chemical ones.

In either guise they aren't exactly the most honourable institutions.
First they raid poor country for the plant stock's DNA fiddle with it, patent it and sell it back to same farmers with onerous licensing arrangements.

All the time knowing that under these terms and their financial political power they will dominate(control)the market. They force farmers to use their brand of chemicals. they have unrestricted access to farmers fields...ya that can better target the farmer and of course control next years extra profit.

They get it on the seed, on the chemicals and grain at the end, yup, vertical marketing and eliminating competition at the same time in three markets. Oh yes, did I mention their tie up with processor and cross ownership in retail.

If a country doesn't like the terms, the corps get the USA government to pressure the uncooperative one. ie if they can't sell their seed in a country on their terms, they claim restraint of trade then off to the WTO (US influenced). If you can't compete in an open competitive market. Force it to change so you can control it. That's vertical marketing (monopolizing, manipulating more honestly)

Even in their own country they eliminate competition controlling 60% of seed outlets.

Fair trade, good for competition, good for local species, great for cash cropping and external market manipulation, the poor, the country the environment not likely.

Now it's Australia's turn just what we need more pressure on the farmers and the land to grow monoculture for overseas markets while we become less independent every day.
Dawn of reason? dawn of treason via the farmer more likely.

The Greens now look so stupid when it comes to gw that they have to find some other cause to protest about.

Runner, you are very tragic.

It has scaped your attention that the Greens have always opposed GM crops, and pollution of all sorts on the clear grounds that we don't know what they'll do when let out.

I personally don't have a problem with genetic engineering, but it is trivial to do a better job than Monsanto was happy to settle for. Unlike many types of crop enhancement, we know glyphosate resistance can tranfer to weed species by several means. That is rather self-defeating.

As for global warming:
Do you deny that burning lots of coal releases Carbon dioxide?
Do you deny that adding extra Carbon dioxide to normal air increases capture of solar radiation?

if you accept these first principles, the problem is then: where does the extra "heat" go?

Does it get removed by convection to the upper atmosphere? (wind and climate are rather related)

Does it get conducted to a heatsink which raises in temperature? (ocean temperatures and climate are related)

Your flatulent interjections merely make you look dumb.

Do get that education I once mentioned.

Rusty.

*It's the corporations I don't trust the life science corps are in reality simply the re-branded chemical ones.*

Ah Examinator, like them or not, yours is hardly an unbiased opinion!

It cannot be denied, that those who risk their money, should gain
some reward, if their risks pay off. For they also stand to lose
100s of millions, if they get it wrong.

I'll give you a classic example of where farmers can only blame
themselves, if companies make a quid from them.

Frost is a huge problem for WA farmers, each year we have tears,
when frosts wipe out huge acreages of crops at flowering.

Some agronomists put together a team, which found genes that could
tolerate frost and could be spliced into wheat, using genetic
engineering. They asked farmers to join in on the ground floor,
10 grand each, to get the ball rolling.

Suffice to say, the venture failed, as not enough farmers would
take the risk. All very sad and these days Govts won't invest
in agriculture either.

Now if one of those "evil" corps comes along, ploughs 20 million
into the venture, and makes a go of it, it is only fair enough that
they should charge those who benefit, and who refused to put their
money on the table in the first place.

Unless of course you think that its better that the work was never
done in the first place, in which case we just shrug our shoulders
and accept hundred million dollar losses, due to frosts, as we have
in the past. That is hardly progress.