by
Karl Haro von Mogel on 13 October 2010
Back in February, Frank & I went to the MOSES Organic Farming Conference, and while Frank was quick to put up his pictures, and I got one video up, I’ve been a bit lax in getting the rest of the material up and annotated. While discussing genetic engineering over at Grist, Doug Gurian-Sherman from the Union of Concerned Scientist popped in to say a big hello and a response to my comment. One of
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by
Kevin Folta on 19 September 2010
Last night I woke up in a fog, face down on the couch, fully dressed with my work clothes on. It was 3:44 AM and the artifacts around me described the scene. A partially eaten salad, my glasses crooked on my head, a laptop with an exhausted battery and the television running an infomercial led me to the conclusion that I closed my eyes for a minute while eating dinner and drifted off to sleep.
Fumbling with the remote, I clicked through a few middle-of-the-night stations. There’s a vibrating weight to firm womens’ arms. Click. A guy with a tie on a news station says that climate change is a hoax. Click. A woman on the next channel lost fifty pounds in a month eating just cookies. Click. A former playboy playmate says that vaccines are dangerous. Another channel has a person claiming evidence that the terrorist attack on 9-11 was an inside job.
I turn off the television, put on my jammies and head off to bed, my dog Stinkie following behind. The claims of kooks go in one ear, rattle around for a moment and then leave out the other.
We are bombarded with junk science, all the time, every day. I don’t get mad, I consider the source and let it go. They have an agenda, they have to appeal to viewers, and if subscribing to anti-science or abject untruth is their method then so be it. Financial and political gains are there to be had if you can fool enough people.
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by
Anastasia on 25 August 2010
Roundup Ready sugar beets have been back in the news due to the decision by Judge White to revoke approval. As I understand it, the USDA conduced an Environmental Assessment for Roundup Ready sugar beets but did not conduct an Environmental Impact Statement. According to regulation, an EA is sufficient if potential harm is found to be minimal, but an EIS is needed for anything that is less well understood, such as a new trait (and this is hardly a new trait). After reading the EA, I agree with the USDA that the potential environmental harm is minimal, and I think the potential economic harm is minimal as well, due to some very specific characteristics of beet biology, which I’ll explain in this post, followed by a discussion of mitigation strategies that might be used to control gene flow in beets (sorry, folks, this is going to be another long one).
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Malicious pollen? Malicious genes?
In my last post, Co-existence isn’t easy, I discussed some ways that a conventional farmer might accidentally make life difficult for an organic farmer. Some people might not believe it, but gene flow aka “contamination” can happen regardless of organic status. Organic plants could even screw up genetically engineered plants if pollen goes where it isn’t intended.
One example is in plants that are genetically engineered to silence an unwanted protein. Peanuts or wheat could be (and have been – peanuts, wheat – though they are not yet on the market) engineered to eliminate allergenic proteins from those crops. Any genetic contamination from “regular” peanuts or wheat could be very problematic because it would re-introduce those allergenic proteins. Someone prone to hyperbole might even call those genes “malicious” because they would be turning an otherwise safe food into a dangerous food for those who are allergic.
Another example, one that’s happening right now, is Mandarin oranges in California (thanks to Karl for bringing this up). No GMOs necessary – the case here is regular old seedless Mandarin oranges. Farmers growing seedless Mandarins can command a higher price for their produce than if they had seeds. However, any stray citrus pollen carried by bees onto the Mandarin flowers can cause seeds to be created in those tasty little fruits. Farmers who are the “victims” of the “malicious” stray pollen can be adversely affected financially.
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