GM crops/food?

monument

Just after watching a ‘debate’ on Prime Time about GM foods…

There were some fuzzy claims about the use of GM foods somehow feeding the third world, and other fuzzy claims about eradicating crop diseases, while fuzzy bits about needing to use very strong pesticides which end up (real fuzzy bit from the other side…) killing wildlife and everything but the crop.

[possible exaggerations there, so please don’t accredit the claims to anyone on the program]

Honestly, I’m siding on the anti-GM side, at the moment I’m in the mind that there hasn’t being enough research done. I’m not impressed with corporate-type of bullish “it’s the only way” type talk.

However, I haven’t read a whole lot on GM foods, any further reading and/or views?...

Also with something like a crop that can cross-pollinate and spread GM to another farmer’s field can EU free market rules really apply where governments want to introduce GM-free zones? And isn’t the US’s request to the EU to remove GM labelling from foods just silly?

Chalk

from what i understand the use of gm crops has saved billions of lives since the 70s
now its just some propoganda from environmentalists about the loss of insect populations and the destruction of plants.

i wanted to make a really detailed post on this on humanities before but deicded against it.
basically my opinion is that if your family and entire country was starving would you turn down a solution that has worked in the past, to save an insect.

whatever your position on veganism / aniaml welfare i dont think you can class an insect or plants survival above that of a human until its your own family at stake.
the legislation being passed here, on the basis of natural wildlife, imo is sound, but gives fuel to the fire of the people that would completely outlaw it, even in countries where gm crops could prevent the starvation of millions .

just because we have enough food and can make decisions on what way to grow it doesnt mean everyone can.

Sparks

From what I understand, GM crops are resistant to pesticides, but the pests develop tolerances as well so you have to spend more on spraying and increase the amount of chemical spray used (which ends up in the water table eventually); the seed has to be rebought every year from the company that makes it; and it cross-pollinates over a wide area contaminating large amounts of non-GM crops, and exposing farmers to lawsuits for theft of intellectual property.

Seems that while the idea's sound, the implementation sucks. It's like Cullen's eVoting all over again...

bonkey

Chalk wrote:

just because we have enough food and can make decisions on what way to grow it doesnt mean everyone can.

That I'm aware of, the EU hasn't stopped anyone from feeding themselves with GM food to prevent starvation, nor from growing it to the same end. Can you provide an example where this is not so?

jc

GuanYin

I'm inclinded to discount alot of the negative reports on GM crops as most of them haven't been verified by independent researchers.

Dr. Eoin Mullins in Teagasc is probably one of the foremost GM experts in Ireland and I saw him give a talk late last year on GM crops.

The results in his presentation (Which was part of an ethics debate and his presentation was more fact based than ethics based) were quite interesting and teh facts are as follows:

Hawaiian Papaya: GM resistance to Ring Spot Virus
60% acreage is GM papaya.
Saved the industry worth 45million/pa

Chinese Cotton: GM resistant to Bollworm
Reduced pesticide spray rate from 21 to 9.
2001 reduction is pesticide usage is 78,000 tonbes
Pesticide related posioning reduced from 29% of workers to 9%.
Average of 405mil/ha benefit.


The main issue with herbicide tolerence is down to farm management strategies bonkey, so I wouldn't count that as an issue for GM crops alone.

If anyones wants informed info on GM crops, I suggest you look at www.gmoinfo.ie

Sparks

psi wrote:

I'm inclinded to discount alot of the negative reports on GM crops as most of them haven't been verified by independent researchers.

The claim of independence is one often made by pro-GM reports y'know, and it's hotly disputed...

GuanYin

Sparks wrote:

The claim of independence is one often made by pro-GM reports y'know, and it's hotly disputed...

Well I'd see indepentants as ones putting forward the pro's and cons and then balancing the argument.

I'm not directly involved in any research and was quite open to be swayed in the ethics debate on areas of GM (although not on stem cells, which was the other area) and I found the arguments put forward by Pro-GM to be a much stronger case.

That said, the website is a good resource.

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

Sparks

The claim of independence psi, doesn't relate to putting forward the facts or the pros and cons, except in the most extreme of cases (for example, I'd consider the facts put forward by monsato as not being independent because of their vested interest and I'd want them verified by a third party). The independence is called into question when the "balancing the argument" part takes place.

Thing is, most of the rational objections to GMOs aren't to do with the actual genetic modification process itself - after all, evolution relies on a non-directed genetic modification process through mutation as well as through the directed process of selection - but to do with the implementation of the process, the testing regimen involved and so on. Given the problems induced by cross-pollination, GM experimentation has the potential to introduce risks to the entire food chain. If a genetic modification proves to have long-term health risks, and we find that the GMO in question has cross-pollinated with a large amount of the crop in the time it took the long-term problem to be identified, we are in effect, screwed.

Sparks

daveirl wrote:

This post has been deleted.

True. What's needed is something similar to what the IPCC is for global warming and climate studies.

HomesickAlien

think i heard somewhere (cant remember) that pollen from GM crops got spread around in north america to the extent that up to two thirds of all crops over there have been contaminated and contain some GM foods. so pretty soon this debate could become a moot point.

btw, i agree with psi, nowhere near enough research has been done yet to determine if its a good or bad thing.

GuanYin

Sparks wrote:

The claim of independence psi, doesn't relate to putting forward the facts or the pros and cons, except in the most extreme of cases (for example, I'd consider the facts put forward by monsato as not being independent because of their vested interest and I'd want them verified by a third party). The independence is called into question when the "balancing the argument" part takes place.

Teagasc were charged with reviewing the situation and putting forward their proposals. They were cautiously favourable. I'd deem their assessment to be quite independent, seeing as they had nothingto gain and that most farmers in Ireland don't earn/produce enough to afford/profit from GM crops.

There still needs to be more research for research sake in the area, and thats primarily what I mean.

Thing is, most of the rational objections to GMOs aren't to do with the actual genetic modification process itself - after all, evolution relies on a non-directed genetic modification process through mutation as well as through the directed process of selection - but to do with the implementation of the process, the testing regimen involved and so on. Given the problems induced by cross-pollination, GM experimentation has the potential to introduce risks to the entire food chain. If a genetic modification proves to have long-term health risks, and we find that the GMO in question has cross-pollinated with a large amount of the crop in the time it took the long-term problem to be identified, we are in effect, screwed.

Again, the evidence in this scenario is speculative worst case scenario stuff and wouldn't be out of place in a Dan Brown book.

The problem is, the stuff that most people pick up on is the worst case scenario, which is what the Anti-GM people want.

There are thousands of similar risks associated with foodstuffs and drugs that are less controversial and on the market.

The same ilk as the hardcore anti-GM people, champion herbal traditional remedies and suppliments that have no FDA approval and pose serious health risks.

Its all about motivation. I'm not particularly motivated either way. I tend towards a mostly vegetarian organic food diet myself (though I'll eat a steak if you give me one), mainly because I think they taste nicer, and I pay inflated prices for them. That wouldn't stop me tending towards GM-crops from all the valid scientific data and scenarios that I have seen on the issue to date.

Sparks

psi wrote:

Again, the evidence in this scenario is speculative worst case scenario stuff and wouldn't be out of place in a Dan Brown book.

Don't forget that the same thing was said (and still is being said in some quarters) about global warming. Meanwhile, scientific consensus says that we can expect a disasterous rise in sea levels by between 2050 and 2100, which is well within our lifetimes.

The problem is, the stuff that most people pick up on is the worst case scenario, which is what the Anti-GM people want.

Again, this is true, but does not necessarily negate the argument for catastrophic results.

The same ilk as the hardcore anti-GM people, champion herbal traditional remedies and suppliments that have no FDA approval and pose serious health risks.

I don't think Richard Dawkins would appreciate that. He's not anti-GM either, but has reservations about the implementation of the idea. And he's a well-known public decryer of "alternative" medicine.

Again, the rational problem here is not with the GM idea, but how it's being implemented, in the same way that many experts thought the idea of eVoting was a good one, but the implementation Cullen favoured was unacceptable.

Sparks

An interesting post today from a science blog about a study done on the toxicity of popular herbicides:

In a paper titled "The Impact of Insecticides and Herbicides on the Biodiversity and Productivity of Aquatic Communities," published in the journal Ecological Applications, Relyea examined how a pond's entire community--25 species, including crustaceans, insects, snails, and tadpoles--responded to the addition of the manufacturers' recommended doses of two insecticides--Sevin® (carbaryl) and malathion--and two herbicides--Roundup® (glyphosate) and 2,4-D.

Relyea found that Roundup® caused a 70 percent decline in amphibian biodiversity and an 86 percent decline in the total mass of tadpoles. Leopard frog tadpoles and gray tree frog tadpoles were completely eliminated and wood frog tadpoles and toad tadpoles were nearly eliminated. One species of frog, spring peepers, was unaffected.

"The most shocking insight coming out of this was that Roundup®, something designed to kill plants, was extremely lethal to amphibians," said Relyea, who conducted the research at Pitt's Pymatuning Laboratory of Ecology. "We added Roundup®, and the next day we looked in the tanks and there were dead tadpoles all over the bottom."

Relyea initially conducted the experiment to see whether the Roundup® would have an indirect effect on the frogs by killing their food source, the algae. However, he found that Roundup®, although an herbicide, actually increased the amount of algae in the pond because it killed most of the frogs.

Roundup®, for those who don't know, is made by Monsato and if you're producing food using their GM crops, the idea is to spray three or four times as often with the stuff (crops like their GM soybeans are engineered for immunity to it). Now if it has that much effect on amphibians, the question of how much of an environmental impact it will bring has to be examined; and remember that because of gene flow, if you plan GM crops, there's the risk that the weeds will also gain immunity from the herbicide and then you have to either increase the dose which may poison even more organisms; or you have to find a new herbicide which the GM crops may not have resistance to (thus negating a prime GM advantage) and which you may not have as much time to test because of commercial pressures.

Again, it's not the basic idea that's at fault here, it's the implementation...

Round up is probably to my knowledge the most commonly used agricultural weed killer.
It's widely used by most farmers irrespective of gm ( Gm usage would be it's tiniest usage I'd imagine ) for to control weeds before they sow crops.
It's also used to burn off an old grass field before its reseeded with a new fresher grass variety.
It's been extremely commonly and widely used for as long as I can remember.
It's also retailed in garden shops and used quite commonly for that purpose too.

Sparks

But not at the levels that it will be used at with GM crops, earthman.

edit: and if it's been around that long and is that popular and it's taken until now to turn up that it's that lethal to a pretty large segment of the wildlife population... well, doesn't that support the requirement for more long-term testing?

Well just to give you an inside piece of information,practically every grass field you see around you in the countryside has been doused in roundup at some point and certainly every tillage field might usually be done once a year.
I can't think of the rate per acre used but its strong enough obviously to kill any plant.
Interestingly though, you could drink roundup and people have done it to commit suicide and all it does is give you a very bad hang over, theres been some local anecdotal evedence of that, and some very disappointed attempted suicides with sore heads!
Cattle can also eat the dead roundup soaked grass without any ill effects, this I can confirm.

By the way, there is a warning on the lable not to use it near watercourses/streams and to avoid that kind of soakage, which would tie in with that research saying how harmfull it it to fish etc.

Sparks

I can't think of the rate per acre used but its strong enough obviously to kill any plant.

But the whole point of the GM crops developed so far is to make them even more resistant to Roundup so you can increase the amount of it that's sprayed to kill off the weeds even faster. This means that more of it is used. And anecdotal evidence that one species can drink the stuff neat and survive is useless - remember, one species of frog survived without ill effect in the study as well, but other species were killed off by it.
And the thing is that if it doesn't poison us, but does poison a link in our food chain that we don't yet appreciate, we're still in trouble.

I'm only giving you information Sparks,I'm not advocating anything really.
If the truth be known,my jury is out on GM,I'm inclined not to favour it though.

My point in relation to rate per acre is simply that, the amount of use of roundup on GM is miniscule compared to the amount thats used in ordinary everyday farming or gardening.
Theres an issue with GM weeds that I'd heard of that are resisting roundup which doesnt bode well.

Sparks

My point in relation to rate per acre is simply that, the amount of use of roundup on GM is miniscule compared to the amount thats used in ordinary everyday farming or gardening.

In Ireland, yes, but that's because there's no GM growing going on here at present. If it was split 50-50 between GM and non-GM farming, the GM farming would use three to five times as much roundup because GM crops are supposed to be sprayed three to five times as often as regular crops (you couldn't spray regular crops that often because it'd kill them off along with the weeds).

Ergo, GM crops lead to more herbicide being used. And yes, gene flow means that if there's a related plant nearby that is considered a weed, it has a good chance of cross-pollenating and inheriting the resistance to roundup and then you're up the creek.

Sparks

Sparks wrote:

Ergo, GM crops lead to more herbicide being used.

Roundup maybe but existing non GM crops are actually sprayed several times during their growing season with a coctail of chemicals all of which are not recommended for use close to streams for their effect on aquatic life.

And yes, gene flow means that if there's a related plant nearby that is considered a weed, it has a good chance of cross-pollenating and inheriting the resistance to roundup and then you're up the creek.

Thats already happened where GM is more widespread in the states,I saw a newsnight special on it iirc.
Another thing I don't like about GM is that the research going into it is such that only one company will be mainly providing the chemicals for it, and you know what that means in terms of pricing.