China May Restrict Genetically Engineered Rice 183
An anonymous reader writes "China's State Council has released a proposal for a grain law that establishes legislation restricting research, field trials, production, sale, import and export of genetically engineered grain seeds, the first initiative in the world that deals with GE food legislation at state law level. Monsanto had tried and failed to commercialize GE wheat in Canada. Now they were hoping China would become the first guinea pig, opening the gate to genetic experiments with staple crops."
Re:Hillarious Bias (Score:4, Interesting)
Very true. In fact, if not for the genetic manipulation of wheat, the people of the world would have actually faced the catastrophic starvation that was a concern in the early-mid 1900's.
For what it's worth, Norman Buraug, the Nobel Peace Prize winning scientist who fathered the Green Revolution, said a year before he died (2003) that GE crops would become the accepted norm in much the same way that genetically engineered antibiotics have been.
Re:Hillarious Bias (Score:5, Interesting)
The reason the Chinese are rejecting Monsanto's offer has nothing to do with Capitalism. If they wanted it, they'd take it. That's the funny thing about being a soverign nation these days.
Oh No. The reason the Chinese are Rejecting Monsanto's offering is because there are no studies prooving the GM Corn is safe. In fact, if you look around, there are very few studies whatsoever at all. Once the FDA approved it, everyone assumed it was safe.
Here's the one study you're going to find, and it basically says the findings are inconclusive.
http://www.biolsci.org/v05p0706.htm
Does it bother you 65% of the corn in the USA is Genetically Modified, with no studies on human health? Look, farmers make food, and farmers sell food, and they also breed their plants and cattle to make better plants and cattle. That's one process; the other process includes blasting genes into a genome until they stick and hoping what they knocked out if it wasn't important
I'm not saying natural selection is better at getting results. I'm saying patenting a corn crop, allowing it to reproduce (what are bee's good for?), introducing it into the US, Sueing every farmer that doesn't pay the monsanto tax, while bribing the FDA to allow it and sueing anyone who even considers questioning the product or publishing a study, is a bad idea. It's a very bad idea. And I don't even NEED to argue the health perspective; If 1, little tiny Insect figures out how to bypass the protien they injected into that crop, you've got a famine. You don't think, on a long enough timeline, that won't happen??? Are you stupid? I don't even need nature for that one. I get some Locusts, I feed them some percentage of GMO corn, some percentage of regular food. Some die, some live; the ones that live reproduce, I up the ratio until all they eat is corn, and I release them. TADA, I'm an angry farmer and just killed that product line and a few thousand people from the saftey of my shed in a few years.
Hrm, Gee, I wish there was some kind of Historical Precident to compare this too....oh yeah. rBGH!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bovine_somatotropin
Did the FDA protect the market? No. Did the States protect the market? No, they didn't want the FDA to come after them.
Who protected the market? The Sellers of the product. Enough Customers developed SERIOUS health problems; I myself developed diahrea with blood after drinking their milk for more than a few days straight and stopped drinking milk entirely for nearly 6 years. Customers decided they weren't going to buy rbgh/rbst trashed milk, and enough health problems arose and enough people stopped buying milk or switched to buying organic milk that the sellers responded.
What's happening now? What food are studies being done on?
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/high-fructose-corn-syrup/AN01588
"Some believe that your body reacts differently to high-fructose corn syrup"
I will bet you my entire livelyhood that the next thing that will happen here is people will realize, perhaps slower than they did with milk, that products with Corn Syrup in them are bad. And they will stop drinking them. And where might that FIRST show up at?
Probably in Soda, since they're the #1 consumer of corn syrup.
5 years ago; I go into the aisle of a super market, I'd be hard pressed to find Sugar in my soda.
Now?
Lots of "Wayback Mountain Dew" and "1960's Classic Cola" and lots of "fancy" soda's with SUGAR in them.
Yeah....
You're why people don't believe statistics (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Hillarious Bias (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Probably Not the Best Test Market (Score:5, Interesting)
Psst, rice already is grown in a monoculture. Two and three cropping seasons per year.
The possibility already exists for this to happen.
Greenish revolution (Score:2, Interesting)
Much of what made the Green Revolution [wikipedia.org] so successful wouldn't be acceptable to the organic farming True Believers - pesticides, synthetic fertilizers, cultivation practices, etc. But billions of lives have been saved by using them. Genetically Modified crops are the next extension of that revolution. Like it or not, people need to eat.
The "fail" in Canada was with Roundup Ready wheat. But it's now "a matter of when, not if" GE wheat becomes commercially grown. [growersfor...nology.org]
Re:Hillarious Bias (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Greenpeace. (Score:4, Interesting)
seeds accidentally fall on your farm by natural dispersion...they feel they can sue you for the leaked material.
Okay, can you give me a citation for this? In Percy Schmeiser's case, the court ruled (correctly) that he purposefully experimented for and then grew Monsanto seeds. I've never come across a case where a farmer was sued for accidental contamination, yet this argument comes up repeatedly every time Monsanto is mentioned.
Re:Greenish revolution (Score:4, Interesting)
Can't we just stop with this Myth once and for all? The world is capable to produce more food that humans can ever eat, the problem is that most of the people can't afford to buy food.
Please go to the poorest countries in the world, and tell them that GE food can solve all their problem and feed their children. The people don't have money to get normal wheat or rice, how please in the world can they afford to buy expensive GE wheat, or rice, from one supplier, Monsato.
It's all a matter of money and who have the money to buy stuff. In Germany we throw away food in a volume of 20 Billion Euros each year. That is one year turnover of Aldi in Germany (one of the biggest groceries stores). Alone with the thrown away food we could feed all the starving people in the world twice.
Or in England we throw away 4,1 million ton food each year [sueddeutsche.de]. So please stop with this myth that we need better technology to feed the world population. No we don't need better technology, we need a better redistribution of wealth. We need to make sure that all people in the world can afford to buy food. We can ship bananas or pineapples around the world to Germany, but we can't ship bread, wheat or rice to the starving countries? Because the starving people don't have money to buy our food so we throw it away.
* http://www.taste-the-waste.de/ [taste-the-waste.de]