OT: The "M" stands for Monsanto

[docdawg]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/06/us/food-industry-enlisted-academics-in-gmo-lobbying-war-emails-show.html

 

[aTotal360]

The GMO conversation intrigues me. Only because of sides that people take. I know a couple people that are fervent atheist and push the science over God argument at every opportunity they can. But on the flip side, they refuse science when it comes to feeding their kid or the world. The GMO argument seems to create audiences that would at no other point agree with one another.

 

[horshack.sixpack]

Coming from a position of relative ignorance, why should I care if my food was grown from genetically modified seeds? Is there a specific known health risk, or is it just a generic "mutant" phobia? It all seems sensationalized from both sides to me.

 

[patdog]

The fact is, we've been genetically modifying our crops for at least the last 6,000 years through selective breeding. If we're going to feed 7 billion people (and growing every day), we're going to have to be more efficient in growing crops.

 

[seshomoru]

Banging head on desk... DCD, care to take this one?

 

[seshomoru]

Lowes had a "Non GMO" seed section this past Spring.

There were seven different types of green beans.

Soooo.... yeah.

 

[patdog]

Are those domesticated green beans? If so, they've been genetically modified through selective breeding. Just like all our other crops have been.

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

Gee where do I begin.

Dr Folta is being crucified over this because he took some travel money from Monsanto. He has since given the money back because people flipped out over it. I've said it before on here and I'll say it again. GMOs have been proven safe over and over and over. It's damn near a scientific consensus.

I don't have time right now because I'm in the middle of doing something but I can show you data and peer reviewed studies that show their safety.

Monsanto gets a lot of hate because of Roundup. What most people don't know is Roundup is probably one of the safest pesticides on the market (much MUCH safer than organic pesticides).

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

This is one of my favorite pics I like to get out when people talk about eating things like God made them.

View attachment 2375

 

[UpTheMiddlex3Punt]

Selectively bred? Yes. Genetically modified? No. If I cross-pollinate between my two biggest producing green beans to get an even bigger producer, then I am introducing no new genetic material to the mix. If I grab a gene from a squid to increase the yield, I am introducing new genetic material.

Not taking sides on this (actually in favor of GM, but not liking the way IP issues are heading), but to equate genetic engineering with cross breeding is disingenuous.

 

[docdawg]

I wasn't so much trying to start a debate on the health attributes of GMO as I was trying to point out that the New York Times is accusing our VP for Research of engaging in unethical practices.

 

[mstateglfr]

The fact is, we've been genetically modifying our crops for at least the last 6,000 years through selective breeding. If we're going to feed 7 billion people (and growing every day), we're going to have to be more efficient in growing crops.

Um...I am in no way defending the non-GMO position and am in no way bashing the GMO position by saying the following, I am simply disagreeing with your comment.

- There should be an obvious difference to everyone when comparing how a wild grass called teosinte in central Mexico was slowly developed into many varieties of maize that were adaptable to varied soil and climates, and introducing bacteria into the seed thru lab performed gene alteration.


Again, I am not saying GMO seed is bad. I work with many ag companies and help improve the ways they get that GMO seed to the land. I eat GMO products.
But saying or even suggesting the GMO creation process is no different than the natural selective breeding processes is laughable.

 

[johnson86-1]

I don't have time right now because I'm in the middle of doing something but I can show you data and peer reviewed studies that show their safety.

There is a difference between being safe from the harms granola, upper middle class moms are worried about if little Eustace eats something that is "unnatural" and being safe from the fat tail risks that some people are concerned exist with more complicated forms of genetic engineering. I don't have a position on the latter, but I do know that while I would trust a "consensus" on the former issue, I would not necessarily trust it on the latter.

 

[horshack.sixpack]

What would make GMO unsafe? I've never seen a practical attribute cited. For example, I assume that most mods are for pest or herbicide resistance or yield increase. Are there cases where some edible crop, once modified, contains some harmful chemical? I just legitimately don't get the potential safety concern, nor have I seen specific logical data to tell me what to be afraid of.

Admittedly, this may be complete ignorance on my part.

 

[seshomoru]

There are life saving implications for sure.

Golden Rice is a rice that has been modified to synthesize beta-carotene (a vitamin A precursur). Millions of kids go blind or die because of Vitamin A deficiency in the developing world. Humanitarian efforts try to get Vitamin A to them through oral supplements or shots, but that is insanely expensive and requires a lot of people to go out and make it work. We could literally let them grown their own cure, but no... there is the same anti-GMO, anti-Monsanto (or insert ag company name) crap all over the world. Activist in the Philippines actually burned plots of it.

ETA: Monsanto actually grants free licenses to subsistence farmers to grow it.

 

[docdawg]

I think that part of the problem that the NYT article is alluding to is that the data and peer reviewed studies can be called into question if the funding for that research was provided by Monsanto. Imagine your doctor prescribing you a new medicine that has been shown effective in treatment but with a higher price tag than past treatments. Then it's discovered that the doctor had been paid handsomely by the manufacturer to go on trips across the country to talk about how much his patients love the new drug. Yes, scientists all need funding, but at what point is a line crossed?

 

[seshomoru]

I think that part of the problem that the NYT article is alluding to is that the data and peer reviewed studies can be called into question if the funding for that research was provided by Monsanto. Imagine your doctor prescribing you a new medicine that has been shown effective in treatment but with a higher price tag than past treatments. Then it's discovered that the doctor had been paid handsomely by the manufacturer to go on trips across the country to talk about how much his patients love the new drug. Yes, scientists all need funding, but at what point is a line crossed?

But it wasn't. He was reimbursed travel for testifying. Companies call in experts in all fields and they are always reimbursed travel. Monsanto didn't even pay him directly. It was a donation to UF to help him set up a GMO education outreach program so they can combat all the looney granola dipshits that attack everybody from university professors to ag companies.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidkr...monsantos-cultivation-of-academic-scientists/

 

[mstateglfr]

What would make GMO unsafe? I've never seen a practical attribute cited. For example, I assume that most mods are for pest or herbicide resistance or yield increase. Are there cases where some edible crop, once modified, contains some harmful chemical? I just legitimately don't get the potential safety concern, nor have I seen specific logical data to tell me what to be afraid of.

Admittedly, this may be complete ignorance on my part.

I am interested and hesitant to hold any definitive position on the issue(s) since the amount of info on both sides is so clearly filled with propaganda. The board's resident farmer's opinions(and they are) really don't have much effect due to previous comments against GMO's alternatives.


My concerns fall into 2 categories- increased herbicide use and the unknown/unmeasured side effects(unintended, I am sure) from use.

- GMOs increase the use of herbicides. The increase in herbicidal use over the last 3 decades is astonishing. How this nation ever fed itself(and its animals) before Roundup is apparently a damn miracle. Simply put, I would like to ingest as few synthetic lab created chemicals as possible thru my life. Call me nuts, but I also want to limit my children's growing bodies to said exposure too. Herbicides are sprayed on plants to kill them. Instead of alternative farming practices to reduce the need for herbicides, more chemicals are just used.
Yes, there would probably be either a drop in production or an increase in prices if herbicides weren't used. I fully recognize that and the total speculation of how that would impact our food safety and economy is just that- speculation. The speculation is simply quite varied.
I want as few synthetic lab produced chemicals in my body and in my environment as possible. That goes for herbicides and pesticides. And as more Roundup is sprayed each year, more plants will develop a resistance. When glyphosate(Roundup) doesn't work- other herbicides are used. The answer is apparently more chemicals.

- What are the long term effects from mixing genes from totally unrelated species? Will it have no negative impact? Will it produce new allergens? Will it nutritionally rob the soil at a faster rate? Will there be nutritional deficiencies?
I am not suggesting GMO seeds not be used because there is a hypothetical danger. I am simply saying I am concerned because there is a huge unknown. We know what happens with natural selection and natural seed hybridization as there are thousands of years of history to tell us the story. We don't know what the long term impact is from introducing bacteria to corn for the purpose of killing caterpillars will be. China killed all their sparrows 50+ years ago because sparrows were seen as a pest, and their crops were decimated because no sparrows were around to eat the bugs that destroyed the crops. Apply that here. Is what we are killing essential, or just convenient in the short term?

 

[Dawgology]

This, to me, is much like the anti-vac movement

It's like people just look for something these days. It's a trend and it will die out and eventually the soccer moms will have a new battle cry to keep them busy while little Timmy is at school. Ultimately, it's a beautiful bit of marketing.

http://www.geneticliteracyproject.o...foods-among-most-analyzed-subject-in-science/

The fight has been over for a while but there is a lot of money in pushing the GMO debate. You can sell books on it, raise money for "research" that never gets published, and charge triple for a granola bar that it nutritionally worse for you than the cheaper GMO granola bar.

It's all a cycle. People are stupid. Marginally-informed, stupid people are dangerous.

 

[Digging dog]

GMO bashers just need to learn to like "Wormy" food. And less of it.

 

[Bane.sixpack]

Great post!

Imagine if all these useful idiots filled up their empty days doing anything of substance!!

 

[horshack.sixpack]

So, potential impact on wildlife combined with concerns about treatment chemicals that may be on the food. Chemicals that couldn't even be used without the crop being GMO. I'd say that there is some merit in being concerned if chemical residue is really present in what we are consuming. Whether that concern becomes alarm, or outweighs the benefits of GMO are still up in the air.

Thanks for the candid response.

 

[johnson86-1]

What would make GMO unsafe?

Short answer, watch jurassic park.

Slightly longer answer, unknowns. Easy ones to identify would be creating a modification so successful that market forces pushed the vast majority of farmers of a particular crop to plant the modified plant, and when we find out it is susceptible to whatever because of the modification, it's too late (I assume they more or less protect against this by lengthy testing under a variety of conditions/stresses before deploying). A more farfetched but harder to guard against risk would be a successful modification that somehow gets incorporated into natural stock and so it's not just market forces, in general they can't keep the "natural" stuff alive and there is no more of the natural stuff available outside of the emergency seed banks or whatever they call it. Another unlikely risk would be that the crop is fine for humans, but somehow is deadly to a vital part of the food chain in a particular area.

It's basically another version of the climate change debate. We are making changes to the environment and we don't really know what risks might be out there, so it makes us nervous. There's probably some level of caution/protective measures that we should take to protect against the unknown but potentially catastrophic risk, but those precautions/prortective measures can more or less be measured in "number of poor asians and africans killed". So how many poor people are you willing to condemn to protect against these unknown and un-measurable risks? There possibly is a "correct" "number of poor Asians and Africans to be killed", but that "correct" number is almost certainly a hell of a lot lower than the one that would be chosen by the average soccer mom shopping at wholefoods or the politicians that cater to them. Unfortunately, as we learned with DDT, the poor Asians and Africans generally don't get much say in the debate.

 

[mstateglfr]

A more farfetched but harder to guard against risk would be a successful modification that somehow gets incorporated into natural stock and so it's not just market forces, in general they can't keep the "natural" stuff alive and there is no more of the natural stuff available outside of the emergency seed banks or whatever they call it.

This really isn't farfetched, at least not the first part, since its happening now. GMO is incorporated into non-GMO fields every year due to pollen drift.

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

There's still plenty of non GMO seed in the world. It's not disappearing.

 

[Tin Cup Cowboy]

GMOs increase the use of herbicides. The increase in herbicidal use over the last 3 decades is astonishing.

I'm not an expert on this by any means, but I do work in the food industry as a primary supplier, just a different area. I thought that somewhere along the way I've heard GMO actually decreases the amount of herbicide used per acre. Also doesn't Glyphosphate totally break down when wet and in the soil?

Also couldn't the increase in herbicide use simply be from more acreage world wide?

 

[johnson86-1]

GMO bashers just need to learn to like "Wormy" food. And less of it.

My impression is that most GMO bashers are relatively affluent, so really they just need to be able to ignore the results of whatever success they have at deterring GMO food from being planted or going to market. I suspect they'll manage that with flying colors.

 

[mstateglfr]

I'm not an expert on this by any means, but I do work in the food industry as a primary supplier, just a different area. I thought that somewhere along the way I've heard GMO actually decreases the amount of herbicide used per acre. Also doesn't Glyphosphate totally break down when wet and in the soil?

Also couldn't the increase in herbicide use simply be from more acreage world wide?

From what I have learned, and I fully admit I do not hold a science degree, the claim that less is used isn't possible to measure. A couple of comments on the possibility though...

1- herbicides have different levels of biological activity. So the amount of active ingredient per acre will differ, and thus cant be equally measured. Is 1 pound of one herbicide A better than 2 pounds of herbicide B if both A and B have the same amount of biologically active ingredient? Well herbicide A covered the field with half as much liquid, so that's two times better than herbicide B, right? But they used the same amount of biologically active ingredient, so then there is no net benefit.
To actually answer if less herbicide is used now versus 30 years ago(or more), one would have to be able to measure the total active ingredient weight of all combined herbicides then compared to now.

2- I worded my comment poorly. I should have specified and stated that the increased use of glyphosate over the last 3 decades is astonishing.







Forgot to mention earlier that glyphosate use has had a literal butterfly effect. 20 years ago the Monarch population in North America was a 1BILLION. It is now estimated to be 60million. That's over a 90% decline in two decades. Glyphosate kills milkweed, which used to be all over the Midwest in prairies and is typically found growing on the perimeter of corn and soy fields. Well, it USED to by found growing on the perimeter.
Guess what the Monarch's favorite plant is? The one plant that it will lay its eggs in? Guess what plant is the only plant a Monarch caterpillar will eat? Yup- milkweed.
In the Midwest, the variety called 'common milkweed' is much hardier than other varieties and it managed to survive the destruction of prairies being turned into farmland. Only 1% of the amount of common milkweed that was present at the turn of the century is still around. So 99% of what was around 15 years ago is gone.
Oh, and glyphosate use increased 20fold from 1995 until now.

To sum up- glyphosate use increases by 20fold in 2 decades. This corresponds with the introduction of glyphosate resistant seed to the marketplace. Glyphosate kills milkweed and there is now only 1% of what was around at the turn of the century. In the time since glyphosate resistant seed has been on the market, Monarch butterflies have decreased by over 90% due to their nesting and food source being eliminated.

Now I understand correlation does not imply causation. And yet...

 

[signdawg]

Here are two really good articles on GMO's and Organic Farming.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/henrymiller/2015/07/29/why-organic-agriculture-is-a-colossal-hoax/

http://www.slate.com/articles/healt...st_them_is_full_of_fraud_lies_and_errors.html

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

Thanks signdawg. I was about to post the slate article. It's the most comprehensive GMO story article I've seen.

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

You're missing a huge point in this. Roundup use has increased because it has replaced many other herbicides and roundup is also much less toxic than the older herbicides. In years before roundup ready crops you sprayed at least four or five times in a season with multiple herbicides but with roundup crops you typically spray maybe 2 or 3 times of just roundup. In the past 20 years we have dramatically decreased erosion because of no-till farming practices. GMO corn and soybeans are an integral part of the practice. GMOs also decreases our carbon footprint by reducing trips across fields and doing less tillage.

And yes there is weed resistance to roundup but that's to be expected and what most people don't know is that weed resistance is not a new phenomenon. It happened in the 70s and 80s with other herbicides. It's just nature finding a way.

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

I am interested and hesitant to hold any definitive position on the issue(s) since the amount of info on both sides is so clearly filled with propaganda. The board's resident farmer's opinions(and they are) really don't have much effect due to previous comments against GMO's alternatives.

im not against the alternatives I'm just trying to explain what the reality of agriculture is versus what is perceived.

 

[operch]

Where did all the honey bees go?

 

[mstateglfr]

Its amazing what we have learned in 150 years. In the 1870s, it was believed by farmers and scientists that rain followed the plow. Now?...we want to avoid tilling.
Itd be a hell of a trip to find out what we know in 150 years from now about our current farming practices.


I fully agree that glyphosate has increased exponentially due to it being chosen instead of previously used herbicides. Now about overall herbicidal use for produce growing...

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

Apparently into more beehives.

http://www.agprofessional.com/news/bee-population-rising-around-world

 

[docdawg]

Again, I'm not taking a side on the health effects of GMOs. I am merely pointing out that the article is accusing our VP of Research of unethical practices. I'm not even really worried about Folta, but let's go down that route if you want. In the Forbes response, Folta is quoted as saying, "The program was funded by honoraria (sic) that could have gone to me personaly (sic), but instead went into the outreach program." Okay, but if you read the emails, he requested the funds be put into an unrestricted funds category. That way he avoided having to pay taxes on the honorarium. So was the money ever paid directly to him? No. Most research schools don't tie money directly to the professor because they want to hold onto the money in case the professor takes a job somewhere else. In any case, it's just $25,000. The big money went to another professor in his department. Folta is now chair of that department. I'm sure he's proud of that chair, even though it's not his. We'll probably never know exactly how the $25,000 was actually spent. But consider the other things that were paid for by Monsanto and asked of Folta: a reimbursed trip to Hawaii to testify in favor of Monsanto-backed policies; a few other testimonial trips; perhaps some funds for graduate students; and recommendations of potential graduate students who'd like to work for the company. These all have a value placed on them and the end result is very much that Folta had a relationship with Monsanto, something he vehemently denied but now recognizes that others may have perceived differently. These informal relationships exist in many health and science fields. Does your physician get personally paid by drug companies? No. Are they given travel reimbursements, free samples, and other items by these companies? Sure. Just do a search on Propublica for Mississippi doctors. The "reimbursements" can range from $8 to $180K. https://projects.propublica.org/docdollars/query?utf8=✓&query=&state=MS&commit=Search

Now let's transition to our situation. $880K in direct payment. Did this money pay only for the investigator's time? Likely not. It was probably distributed to pay for equipment, graduate assistantships, university overhead (that's a whole other game, in itself), and a lot of other line items. All I'm saying is that it's worth a look, especially given that this is a 6-figure administrator representing our school internationally and being implicated by the leading newspaper in our country. Who's going to investigate this: our university research ethics officer? That officer is a direct subordinate to the person in question. My point is that we need a full investigation instead of a "No Comment" statement from the accused, and a statement from our public affairs officer saying the accused is a "highly ethical researcher." Is that where it stops?

I know I've written too much, and I'm sorry for the length, but this will be my last post. Just consider a plausible hypothetical situation. A graduate student who has her assistantship funded through money tied to Monsanto because her major professor is partially funded by Monsanto decides to investigate the effectiveness of different herbicides. Initially the research points to Roundup being the best herbicide. But after some time, it is found that an alternative herbicide has a very competitive effectiveness (why would we not expect to one day have a better product than Monsanto can provide). The graduate student concludes that the different formulation should be investigated further, thus creating another research agenda. That's great if the dissertation is published. But who would have to sign off on that dissertation: the major professor who's been funded by Monsanto and has been testifying on their behalf? Mismanagement of large funds is not the only way a researcher can behave unethically. I'm sure there are several other hypotheticals. Again, sorry for the length, but I don't want people to miss the forest for the trees.