GMO crops, Monsanto, and the future of world agriculture.

[mvaliz]

GM crops themselves I don't have a problem with.

Mosanto's business practices, however, I do. Patenting life is dubious enough... but they're forcing out nearby smaller farmers by suing them when their GMO corn pollen blows over their crops and pollenates their corn. That's just fundamentally wrong on so many levels...

[Laize]

GM crops themselves I don't have a problem with.

Mosanto's business practices, however, I do. Patenting life is dubious enough... but they're forcing out nearby smaller farmers by suing them when their GMO corn pollen blows over their crops and pollenates their corn. That's just fundamentally wrong on so many levels...

Again, the problem is that Monsanto isn't using terminator seeds.

In fact, there's a UN ban on terminator seeds.

Monsanto has to protect their interests somehow. Allow them to use terminator seeds.

[Underverse]

This, absolutely this, and only this.

We didn't get into the 21st century on organic agriculture, and all natural bullshit. We got to where we are now by defying nature. If you don't like defying nature then start your own damn garden and let me eat my bowl of GMO Flakes, with fortified milk in peace. Farm land is cheap. Start a subsistence farm if you are so concerned about what is being grown commercially.

On the contrary, we did get here by organic agriculture. That changed only a couple centuries ago. Defying nature...no we never really did any of that, we simply took parts of our own nature that we could exploit and focused on them.

Again, the problem is that Monsanto isn't using terminator seeds.

In fact, there's a UN ban on terminator seeds.

Monsanto has to protect their interests somehow. Allow them to use terminator seeds.

The reason terminator seeds were banned, from what I've read, is that they created a dependence of farmers on companies like monsanto for both seeds and pesticides that are compatible with those seeds. This happens because the farmers can't take seeds from previous crops and reseed their fields, because the seeds are sterile. Creating the dependence with terminator seeds would drive global prices up (because farmers have to rebuy; this could even destroy entire economies built on agriculture because they are fragile as is due to incredibly low profit margins) and put far too much power in the hands of far too few corporations.

[cFortyfive]

The fact is people are calling to stop the production of GMO crops all together.

So these people are standing in your kitchen and are keeping you from eating what you want ? Interesting.

[Joi]

I have some concerns about Monsanto, and also how we produce food, ship, and store food in general.
Directly on the topic, I find the company's practice of suing farmers whose fields became fertilized by neighbouring Monsanto crops, and not allowing farmers who use Monsanto seed to save seeds for use the following year, to be detrimental to farming. The genetic diversity is reduced by using seeds from one source, and natural local condition adaptation can't occur if farmers can't save seeds from their own best performing plants.
A sued farmer doesn't know which of their saved seeds is 'contaminated' and if not allowed to use it have little choice but to try to buy un-contaminated seed elsewhere and start their seed saving over the next year (greater expense to buy seed then save it, and still at risk of Monsanto discovering some cross pollination next year and suing again), or buy from Monsanto. Farmers are losing genetic lines they've been working on for generations.
It also makes life tougher for organic growers. They can't label produce as organic if their crops become contaminated with the modified plants.

In addition to the above, modern farming is contending with issues with top-soil loss (no boundary plantings of grasses and bushes around the fields to help with handling heavy rains so the water is sending topsoil to rivers and out to sea where it then affects marine life), pollination (bees have been declining, and there are a lack of other pollinations due to limited insect and wildlife diversity in areas heavily farmed), climate change, and the family farms not being taken up by their children as the farmers retire. It's a real possibility that more and more of our food will come from a handful of companies instead of family farms and we will have reduced choice in food source & variety.
A small pool of producers also puts us at greater risk for instability in the food supply. If for example all the wheat were to come from one or two companies and they have crop failures, disease contamination, etc.. then what would we do?

Compounding matters, it can be difficult for a suburban or urban dweller to garden (though there are some great projects going on for vertical growing, indoor growing, and city roof use) or keep animals (i.e. chickens). We need more home gardeners, and more local small farms. It helps with diversity, variety and choice in product for the consumer, transport/gas costs, and helps promote local business.

I could go on from here about neat things going on with aquaponics, hydroponics, vertical gardening, and what I've learned about sustainable farming, but then I'd get us even more off topic then the above. So back to a topic. The seed saving issue is of a particular worry. We've saved seeds for centuries, and doing so helps develop varieties of plants that can cope with local growing conditions. If you or a family member gardens and has been saving seeds off your tomato's for years for example, like my grandmother did, then the plants you are growing now are not the same as the ones that you started with when you bought the seed packet. By saving seeds off the plants that survived in your conditions you've essentially selectively bred for plants that survive in your area. If we can no longer do this we create a lot of risk for our food supply and will loose plant varieties.

[docholiday]

This, absolutely this, and only this.

We didn't get into the 21st century on organic agriculture, and all natural bullshit. We got to where we are now by defying nature. If you don't like defying nature then start your own damn garden and let me eat my bowl of GMO Flakes, with fortified milk in peace. Farm land is cheap. Start a subsistence farm if you are so concerned about what is being grown commercially.

Farm land is anything but cheap

[Kraenen]

Monsanto took out the terminator gene because of public outcry. They listened to their customers and allowed the seeds to be genetically fertile. They still had to make money though.

Personally I thought ti would be better if they left the terminator in.

Still their responsibility, they should stop whining because people don't want a product made that way. And they need to stop suing other people for their own irresponsible behavior.

[Vuljatar]

Monsanto does not allow farmers to use heirloom seeds which contain their technology, and sue successfully anytime they find farmers doing so.

This is my only problem with Monsanto. And it sure as hell is a big one.

The only reason they are allowed to get away with this shit is because they are in bed with the government. The government makes the laws, and they tailor them to serve the corporations with the most political power.

Monsanto is probably the best modern day example of a stereotypical evil corporation, and unlike most it deserves it's reputation through and through. And it's not lack of government oversight that caused this, it's selective government oversight. They use the law as their tool, their weapon against their competitors. And since it's fucking impossible to fight the government, Monsanto wins and reaps the profits every time--profits which find their way to the lawmakers that are, in one capacity or another, on Monsanto's payroll.

Monsanto could never exist as it does today in a truly free market. Without their corrupt "legal" manipulations they wouldn't be able to maintain the stranglehold monopoly they have on the market. Oh wait, isn't the government supposed to "save us from the evil monopolistic corporations"? No, it only stops the monopolies that it doesn't like. This is the perversion of capitalism. This sort of thing is why we have the problems we have--and yet all the naive kiddies refuse to see that all this shit is the fault of the government playing favorites. They demand "more regulation", which to the government means "more manipulation".

Where are the conservatives who always rant about personal responsibility on this issue?

If by "conservatives" you mean the Republican party, they're in the exact same place they've always been about personal responsibility; nowhere fucking near it.

You can't support the war on drugs while supporting personal responsibility. You can't support foreign military interventionism while supporting personal responsibility. You can't be against reproductive rights while supporting personal responsibility. They are for the things they want, and against the things they don't want--just like the Democrats. The Democrats are always ranting about rights, but they only want people to have the rights that they want the people to have. Neither party has ever stood on principle and neither party ever will.

[Kalyyn]

So these people are standing in your kitchen and are keeping you from eating what you want ? Interesting.

They're trying to. So far the law prohibits them from doing that, but they're trying to change the law.

[Laize]

Still their responsibility, they should stop whining because people don't want a product made that way. And they need to stop suing other people for their own irresponsible behavior.

They're not whining. The terminator seeds are illegal by UN convention (Which doesn't necessarily make them illegal in the US, but there would be some political backlash). So the seeds are fertile but Monsanto still needs to control their product. Technically, another farmer growing Monsanto corn without license is pirating their intellectual property.

The only alternative is terminator seeds which, as we've been over, are highly controversial.

---------- Post added 2012-12-03 at 07:30 AM ----------

This is my only problem with Monsanto. And it sure as hell is a big one.

The only reason they are allowed to get away with this shit is because they are in bed with the government. The government makes the laws, and they tailor them to serve the corporations with the most political power.

Monsanto is probably the best modern day example of a stereotypical evil corporation, and unlike most it deserves it's reputation through and through. And it's not lack of government oversight that caused this, it's selective government oversight. They use the law as their tool, their weapon against their competitors. And since it's fucking impossible to fight the government, Monsanto wins and reaps the profits every time--profits which find their way to the lawmakers that are, in one capacity or another, on Monsanto's payroll.

Monsanto could never exist as it does today in a truly free market. Without their corrupt "legal" manipulations they wouldn't be able to maintain the stranglehold monopoly they have on the market. Oh wait, isn't the government supposed to "save us from the evil monopolistic corporations"? No, it only stops the monopolies that it doesn't like. This is the perversion of capitalism. This sort of thing is why we have the problems we have--and yet all the naive kiddies refuse to see that all this shit is the fault of the government playing favorites. They demand "more regulation", which to the government means "more manipulation".



If by "conservatives" you mean the Republican party, they're in the exact same place they've always been about personal responsibility; nowhere fucking near it.

You can't support the war on drugs while supporting personal responsibility. You can't support foreign military interventionism while supporting personal responsibility. You can't be against reproductive rights while supporting personal responsibility. They are for the things they want, and against the things they don't want--just like the Democrats. The Democrats are always ranting about rights, but they only want people to have the rights that they want the people to have. Neither party has ever stood on principle and neither party ever will.

I don't understand. Why is it such a big deal that Monsanto doesn't allow farmer to use heirloom seeds?

Monsanto made the seeds. They deserve profit from their creation. They could just as easily put a terminator in the seeds (sterilizing the plants). Would that be more acceptable to you?

[Vuljatar]

I don't understand. Why is it such a big deal that Monsanto doesn't allow farmer to use heirloom seeds?

Monsanto made the seeds. They deserve profit from their creation. They could just as easily put a terminator in the seeds (sterilizing the plants). Would that be more acceptable to you?

It absolutely would be. But they won't do that, because then they won't have the ability to sue/steal from anyone who happens to get an errant Monsanto seed blown into their field.

It's no accident that their seeds function the way they do, and it's certainly not because of the U.N. It's because this way makes them a lot more money and makes it much easier for them to destroy the competition.

[Laize]

It absolutely would be. But they won't do that, because then they won't have the ability to sue/steal from anyone who happens to get an errant Monsanto seed blown into their field.

It's no accident that their seeds function the way they do, and it's certainly not because of the U.N. It's because this way makes them a lot more money and makes it much easier for them to destroy the competition.

It absolutely is because of the UN and general public opposition to terminator seeds.

Initially developed as a concept by the United States Department of Agriculture and multinational seed companies, Terminator seeds have not been commercialized anywhere in the world due to opposition from farmers, indigenous peoples, NGOs, and some governments. In 2000, the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity recommended a de facto moratorium on field-testing and commercial sale of terminator seeds; the moratorium was re-affirmed in 2006. India and Brazil have passed national laws to prohibit the technology

[obdigore]

GM crops themselves I don't have a problem with.

Mosanto's business practices, however, I do. Patenting life is dubious enough... but they're forcing out nearby smaller farmers by suing them when their GMO corn pollen blows over their crops and pollenates their corn. That's just fundamentally wrong on so many levels...

This absolutely.

Hydroponics, GMO crops, and large skyscrapers that take less land footprint but are able to be build up and have quite a bit more crops are the future. Not the near future, probably, but the future, unless we (humans) start imposing population controls or we build colonies and start an exodus to other planets/ships/asteroids/whatever.

[Foosha]

Contrary to popular belief, just because the "seed" lands on your property, you can't be sued. The farmers got sued because they knowingly used/seized Monsanto's "product". It's kinda like a copyright law, when you write a paper, you have to be like "Yo, this dude said it, and I'm just conveying the message because it fits together and shit in my paper...SCHOOL ROCKS!"

Oh, and this whole mess is brought to you by the Federal Government. They want ethanol, and a majority, hell pretty damn close to 100% of the gmo's, and a lot of the non gmo's gets brought in for ethanol production. If they would stop subsidizing corn, and say subsidize algae or that weird grass for ethanol, this would all go away. Maybe HFCS would go away and I can have my natural sugar cherry coke and vanilla coke back.

[Butler to Baby Sloths]

GMO crops are either completely banned or, at the very least, extremely tightly regulated over here in Europe.

[Laize]

GMO crops are either completely banned or, at the very least, extremely tightly regulated over here in Europe.

That's ridiculous. The EU is usually so progressive but they reject GMO food for no good reason.

[Kalyyn]

That's ridiculous. The EU is usually so progressive but they reject GMO food for no good reason.

It's because the people making the laws against modified foods are rich enough that they don't need them. Fortunately, Europe does not have a wide-spread food shortage, so the effects are small. To see how this bullshit can really get out of hand, let's look at Africa. This applies to a handful of nations, but we're going to focus on Zambia.

In Zambia, most of the population is in various states of starving to death. The United States has offered Zambia free food to keep an entire country from dying slowly and horribly. Zambia has refused this offer. Their reasoning? The genetically modified crops could mix in to the environment and become dominant over non-modified crops. This sounds like a valid concern, until you remember that the entire fucking country is starving.

So how can the leaders of Zambia be so blind? Simple. They aren't the ones starving. They're wealthy politicians who will never know what it's like to live in famine. They can afford to let people die for their agenda.

[Omega10]

If GMO food were so ... healthy, or at least not toxic... why did Monsanto spend so much money in the CA referendum? They are so embarrassed by their product that they refuse to put the GMO label on the stuff they sell? Oops, take the question mark away, companies emphatically DO work hard to hide the fact that their food products have GMO crops in them.

People have the right to destroy their health by eating GMO foods, I have no problem with that. I DO have a problem with not knowing exactly which foods do or do not have GMO crap in them. So basically I... well my wife and I... are switching to almost all organic just to protect ourselves from the problems caused by GMO food.

As insects get more and more resistant to the GMO crops, the amount of poison in the GMO crops has to be basically increased (else the insects just don't die). This increases costs and makes it more deadly for human consumption. The original idea behind GMO crops is that the poison part of GMO would be toxic enough to kill insects, and benign enough to be safe for human consumption. But insects messed everything up by becoming resistant so fast.

People who eat excess GMO crops just to make a point will pay the price due to the extra health issues they will have to live with. But the fact that they are working, as in CA, to cause this kind of pain to everyone else is just plain sick. And Monsanto's business practices are just plain disgusting.

[Deleted]

If GMO food were so ... healthy, or at least not toxic... why did Monsanto spend so much money in the CA referendum? They are so embarrassed by their product that they refuse to put the GMO label on the stuff they sell? Oops, take the question mark away, companies emphatically DO work hard to hide the fact that their food products have GMO crops in them.

People have the right to destroy their health by eating GMO foods, I have no problem with that. I DO have a problem with not knowing exactly which foods do or do not have GMO crap in them. So basically I... well my wife and I... are switching to almost all organic just to protect ourselves from the problems caused by GMO food.

As insects get more and more resistant to the GMO crops, the amount of poison in the GMO crops has to be basically increased (else the insects just don't die). This increases costs and makes it more deadly for human consumption. The original idea behind GMO crops is that the poison part of GMO would be toxic enough to kill insects, and benign enough to be safe for human consumption. But insects messed everything up by becoming resistant so fast.

People who eat excess GMO crops just to make a point will pay the price due to the extra health issues they will have to live with. But the fact that they are working, as in CA, to cause this kind of pain to everyone else is just plain sick. And Monsanto's business practices are just plain disgusting.

Monsanto doesn't want GM food to be labelled as such because a lot of people don't like GM foods, and they don't want those people not to buy their food. I don't think that's particularly ethical of them (people are entitled to know what's in their food) but that doesn't mean that the GM food is unhealthy.

And it isn't. What's done with GM crops these days simply doesn't have any method of creating a health hazard, because they don't change anything that fundamentally impacts what you eat and how it's digested. Using too many pesticides can be bad, yes, but that's bad farming practice, and not because the crops genetically modified. Meanwhile, GM crops have great potential to increase crop yields across the world. It's current use doesn't amount to too much yet, but that's what research is for. Unfortunately, even the research is under attack by misguided anti-GM activists.

Monsanto, on the other hand, isn't nice. That's not particularly surprising; they're a corporation that's in it to make profit for their shareholders. That doesn't make them particularly evil either, though, at least, not compared to other big companies. It does mean they should be watched to make sure they don't do things that are illegal, much like any other big institution.

[Xarkan]

In Zambia, most of the population is in various states of starving to death. The United States has offered Zambia free food to keep an entire country from dying slowly and horribly. Zambia has refused this offer. Their reasoning? The genetically modified crops could mix in to the environment and become dominant over non-modified crops. This sounds like a valid concern, until you remember that the entire fucking country is starving.

I am not opposed to gm foods in principle, it is mostly media hysteria anyhow. However

Your path is the one leading to oh so many of our problems. If you only look at the current hurdle and take the path to overcome it blindly and with no concern for a long term future you will face constant hurdles. In this case there is a need for foods but here is also a need for a future of food production to prevent a return of starvation issues. If they accept gm foods and the un for some crazy (likely media hyped) reason bans gm foods and their crops are contaminated they are majorly f. up