The March edition of the magazine “Canadian Living” had an article entitled “Understanding GMOs” written by Jill Buchner. The article claims it will separate fact from fiction and help the readers to decide “what’s right for your family”. The article fails miserably in attaining these objectives. It starts off badly by suggesting that GMO’s are hiding in your food and that some people suspect they might cause an increase in allergies and a surge in cancer rates. I follow the GMO literature and have never heard of them causing allergies and I don’t believe there has been an increase in cancer rates, at least not one caused by GMOs.
GM plants were first developed in the early 1980’s. There was an agreement at that time that they would not be commercialized until it was clear that sufficient work had been done to show they were safe. In fact, the first GM crops were not planted until 1996. Since that time, the use of GM crops has expanded dramatically. In 2013, world wide there were 430 million acres of GM crops grown. So far, there have been no reports of problems with these crops, in fact, there have been major benefits with reduced use of pesticides and major environmental benefits. Of the 430 million acres world wide, the USA accounted for 173m, Brazil for 100m, Argentina for 60m, India and Canada each for 27m and China for 10m acres. Even the European Union, that is supposed to be GM free, grew 330,534 acres.
The expansion of GM crops is growing fastest in developing countries. In India, 95% of the cotton crop is now genetically modified to be insect resistant. The major crops grown worldwide are soybeans (79% GM), maize (corn) (32% GM), cotton (79% GM) and oilseed rape (canola) (14%GM). In the USA, sugar beet is 95% GM and, in Hawaii, Papaya is 60% GM. Papaya was developed to overcome the deadly effect of a rust disease that was devastating the crop. GM crops are the most tested crops in the history of agriculture. I was once confidentially shown the application package for a new GM variety. I was astonished. The pile of paper was over two feet high and consisted of detailed analysis of the crop both in the field, the environment, for food safety and nutritional aspects. Most of the reports were from outside agencies not reports generated by the company.
In Canada, GM crops come under the category of plants with novel traits. This means all new crops with distinctly different traits, no matter how these have been developed, whether or not by biotechnology, are investigated thoroughly. This is a much more responsible way of approaching the safety of crop plants than focusing solely on the means by which these new varieties had been developed.
In Canada, the government agencies directly connected with the registration, i.e. approval of GM crops, are the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) and Health Canada. Health Canada evaluates the safety of human foods produced by biotechnology. CFIA evaluates the safety of GM animal foods and also the environmental safety of these crops.
This india sildenafil complex array of emotions often accompanies feelings of doubt and self blame. A lot of financial debt can prevent you from purchase cialis getting harder erections. At order cheap viagra any rate, the following are some recommendations you can use to help manage your impotence and inability of getting an erection for a sufficient amount of time. Moreover, any injury to the spinal cord, bladder, pelvis, prostate, and penis can impact smooth muscles, nerves, arteries, and corpora cavernosa fibrous tissue, leading to erection troubles. sildenafil discount
It is often reported that 70% of food in a supermarket is genetically modified. This is very misleading. If you go into the produce section of your supermarket, and look around you will see no produce that is GM, unless you notice some papaya, which may be. So where does the 70% come from? Prepared foods, often have thickening agents in them, usually corn or soybean meals. Someone, sometime must have figured out that if you count all the products in a supermarket you can get up to 70% that are prepared in some way. Of course, corn and soybean meals are totally safe and will have no impact on one’s health. In the case of canola oil, the oil from GM canola is absolutely identical with non-GM canola. To have it registered, it has to be.
GM crops have been fed to countless millions of cows, pigs and chickens. It would be astonishing if problems with these crops as food had not been discovered. At present, we have a world population of 7 billion people,to feed and the prospect is that by 2050 this will probably reach 10 billion. If we are to feed this huge number of people and not destroy every bit of natural ecosystem in the world, we have to increase the yield per acre dramatically. Already, there are one billion people seriously malnourished. GM foods are an essential component, in not just eliminating this, but also providing for an increased population while preserving natural habitat.
In the Canadian Living article, it was stated that long term studies need to be completed before GM crops can be declared safe. How long is “long term”. This attitude indicates that, unfortunately for the sceptics, nothing serious has so far arisen. In fact, GM crops have had less problems than even their most ardent supporters could have hoped for. There are herbicide resistant weeds but far fewer than was feared. There are Bt resistant insects but nowhere near the number anticipated. GM crops are a remarkable success story.
Monsanto has been the leader in developing GM crops and have persevered with their development through incredible impediments. One can only hope that the companies achievements and those of its executives such as Rob Fraley, the Chief Technical Officer, will one day be recognized with a Nobel Peace Prize.
There will be a second blog dealing with the generation of new crop varieties both traditionally and using biotechnology which is sadly mistaken in the Canadian Living Article.
