Starving Nation Turns Down Bioengineered Corn 868
The Washington Post has a story about Zimbabwe turning down shipments of genetically engineered corn, even though the country is experiencing a severe drought and starvation. Zimbabwe is afraid some of the corn will end up planted instead of eaten -- and growing patented corn is a no-no, of course! If the corn is planted even once, it may contaminate all future crops grown in those fields or any fields nearby, leading to huge lawsuits - and then the fields are contaminated, exacerbating the food shortage. So, starve or be bankrupted, and Zimbabwe appears to be choosing, "starve". Tons of ethical issues here, which have hardly been touched upon in the U.S. press.
Birth Control (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Haven't they heard? (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Slashdot misses the point (Score:2, Funny)
Re:doubtful (Score:2, Funny)
I was talking about Europe.
Re:Birth Control (Score:2, Funny)
But license the pills,and you get a better system for controlling births. With the exception of a giant review process before the granting of the pill, the pill should only cost $1 a pop.
This would be the most amazing thing ever created. Easy, simple, built-in birth control. What you can do is just pass out the pills once every 50 years in third-worlds that can't afford to buy them and go through the UN review process.
There's a lot to iron out here, but its certainly an idea.
Re:Also not fertile... (Score:5, Funny)
A bunch of corn will germinate that cannot reproduce, which it will pass on to its children, and so on, until the world is completely filled with infertile corn.
Oh wait.
Hardly touched upon in the US press? (Score:3, Funny)
Is this too easy? (Score:2, Funny)
Maybe I'm missing something here, but:
If the concern is that this corn is going to get grown instead of eaten, why not just grind it before distributing it? I've never tried growing flour, but I don't imagine it'd work :)