BASF Moves GM Plant Research From Europe To US 288
ananyo writes "The German chemical giant BASF is moving its transgenic plant operations from Europe to the U.S., it says, because of widespread opposition to the technology. The company on 16 January announced that it would move its plant science headquarters from Limburgerhof, Germany to Raleigh, North Carolina and no longer develop plants solely for cultivation in Europe. The division employs 157 people in Limburgerhof, plus another 63 at facilities elsewhere in Europe. BASF said it would relocate 123 of those jobs to the North Carolina facility. In statement, Stefan Marcinowski, a member of BASF's Board of Executive Directors, cited 'a lack of acceptance for this technology in many parts of Europe – from the majority of consumers, farmers and politicians.' The company instead plans to focus on plant biotechnology markets in the Americas and Asia."
Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Insightful)
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dude, if you aren't eating organic, you're already eating GMO.
By GMO, you sure mean Gabbro, Mica, and Olivine - nothing organic in those. ;-)
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Informative)
Humans have been growing GMO for milenia, and even have GM themselves ... if you're an adult and can metabolize milk, you're it.
Someone's trotting out this nonsense again?
There's a world of difference between selective breeding and playing mix-n-match genomes hands-on via gene-splicing.
P.S. It's "millennia".
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> There's a world of difference between selective breeding and playing mix-n-match genomes hands-on via gene-splicing.
In an hundred years, cows will have tentacles instead of horns.
Ah, sorry, wrong thread...
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When I lived on a farm, we grew almonds. There were no milking issues.
So for mister smarty-pants up there, I meant "cows" colloquially for "cattle, prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae", generally meant, to people who haven't had the questionable pleasure of working a cattle farm, as including both male and female.
Not to mention breeds like the Texas Longhorn, both sexes of whom have horns. I want Texas Longtentacle cows!
If you really want to talk gender ambivalence in cattle, try sitting thro
That sounds like a bad idea (Score:3)
Tentacles are, evolutionarily, a gateway to intelligence. They're excellent tool-manipulation appendages, and one presumes they would be "free" and not used for locomotion. Generally speaking, intelligence is a maladaptive trait and natural selection works against it (which is why it's so rare). After all, it consumes a lot of calories but offers pretty much no practical value to an animal that can't communicate or use any kind of tool. But give a cow tentacles (or any other suitable tool using appendag
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Informative)
You do of course realize that cows currently do not have horns, right?
Have you ever been to a farm?
Let me give you a hint: if it has horns, don't milk the long teat.
Cows in the US don't have horns because they can't grow them, but because they get debudded or dehorned. Cows are dehorned [wikipedia.org] on dairy farms when they're calves, so when you see them as adults they are hornless. A farm up the road from me used to have some cows with trimmed horns. This picture [depositphotos.com] shows a cow that hasn't been dehorned.
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If a bacteria dies, its DNA is left laying around. Competent bacteria will assimilate it. This is one way we get multidrug resistant organisms (bact
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Interesting)
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do you really think BASF and Monsanto and the others do "playing mix-n-match genomes hands-on via gene-splicing." ?
Yes, that's exactly what they do. Why do you think they wouldn't?
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, that's exactly what they do. Why do you think they wouldn't?
If you'd read the rest of his comment, it's not that they wouldn't but that they don't, mainly because it's too difficult and therefore costly. Most GM foods have been produced by bathing cells either in radiation or in chemical preparations designed to induce mutation. If the mutation seems favorable, they hang onto it. If it doesn't, they throw it away. The idea that scientists have enough control over DNA to just change bits and pieces according to some grand design gives scientists too much credit. Very seldom is it done that way. Most of the GM modifications might conceivably have occurred in nature. Humans simply select the ones they prefer, rather than letting nature take its course -- which is pretty much how agriculture has always been done.
BTW, I am not saying all GM foods are beneficial in terms of nutrition, ecology, etc. Many are only beneficial in terms of lining some company's pockets. But some people act as though GM foods are made of plastic and cyanide, when really they're still just corn, soybeans, etc.
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The idea that scientists have enough control over DNA to just change bits and pieces according to some grand design gives scientists too much credit. Very seldom is it done that way.
This is done regularly as a research tool. I can't imagine why it would be prohibitively costly or complex to do it for agriculture.
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Informative)
Please stop with that bullshit just stop. When you use a gene gun and blast dna from a bacterium randomly into the genome of a plant species so as that crop can be doused with Round-UP(tm) [google.com] you are not doing the same thing that farmers have been doing for millennia. sorry to bust your bubble.
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> When you use a gene gun [...]
Really?? I've got to get me one 'a' those.
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I can't wait. My daughter is getting a ferret in February. *Bang* tentacles. Gills. Webbing. Glow in the dark. Strike that last one, it's silly.
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Hmm, actually it does. Not often, but it does happen. And then there is the whole issue of chloroplasts and mitochondria were once bacteria, and well...
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Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Informative)
there is no "Genetic Engineering" yet, only genetic tinkering and selecting
While it is true that people have been altering crops for thousands of years (in fact, some crops, like corn, wheat, broccoli, Brussels sprouts strawberries, and tangerines were pretty much created by humans), and unless you are eating nothing but foraged foods and non-cultivated species everything you eat has had massive genetic alterations made to it via human selection, however it is not true that there are no genetically engineered crops out there right now.
There are, right now (as far as I can remember anyway), a grand total of 15 genetically engineered species with 9 types of traits that have been commercially released worldwide. Genetically engineered corn, soy, canola, cotton, sugar beet, and alfalfa are allowed to be grown in the US (some of these are deregulated in other places like Canada, Argentina, Brazil, and China too). These crops have either resistance to Lepidoptera insects (the Bt traits) or tolerance to an herbicide (the epsps gene for glyphosate or the bar gene for glufosinate), or both, depending on the crop. Also, drought tolerant corn was recently approved in the US, and a soybean called Vistive Gold that has an altered oil content. Those are your major GE crops.
Then there's two minor (relatively) crops, the Rainbow papaya (the first but hopefully not last university produced GE crop to make ti to market) and summer squash, which have genes from virus coat proteins to resist the papaya ringspot virus or cucumber mosaic virus. Another virus resistant crop was recently approved in Brazil, a bean resistant to golden mosaic virus (although it will be two years IIRC before it goes into production). There used two other horticultural crops that were GE, tomatoes and potatoes. The Flavr Savr tomato had delayed ripening traits and NewLeaf potato had the Bt trait, however, while they are still approved for sale, were taken foff the market. There is, however, the Amflora potato being grown in the Netherlands. It has altered starch content and is grown for industrial starch.
The rest are even more minor and aren't actually food crops.. The Applause rose is a GE 'blue' rose (looks more purple to me, but whatever). Once, Iran grew Bt rice, but from what I can tell (and I don't have much info on this one) they stopped growing it. In China they released Bt poplars into the wild to repopulate some deforested areas. The last one is the GloFish, which is sold as a pet.
Also, there's stuff that comes from GE microbes, for example, the rennet used in cheese making often comes from Ge bacteria.
So, that's what is currently (or was at one point) genetically engineered. There are plenty of GE crops in development or awaiting approval though, from Golden Rice to BioCassava to Arctic apples to Enviropig to 2,4-D resistant corn, and there's lots of promising research into other traits like fungus resistance and delayed ripening (food spoilage is a major problem in developing countries), so it isn't just limited to these plants and these traits. Unfortunately, overly strict regulations and general opposition & ignorance prevent the technology from being further utilized.
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> if you think GMO is freak-food you watched too much Ninja Turtles when you should have studied for the Biology/Science class ...
I want to be Leonardo.
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Actually, I'm pretty sure we humans don't have any genetic abilities that give us lactose tolerance at all. It's all because of the bacteria in our guts. Those of us with the right bacteria can digest lactose, those without can't.
Of course, natural selection led us to the present condition where European descendants mostly can digest lactose, but monkeying with our genetics isn't going to affect that.
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Nonsense. Those with lactose tolerance don't turn off lactase production after they are weaned.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactose_intolerance#Lactase_persistence [wikipedia.org].
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Er, no-one claims organic food is about nutritive value. We had this straw man played out in the UK a few years ago, which left the pro-GM people with egg on theor faces. It's mainly about not pumping toxic chemicals into the land, which is bad for obvious reasons.
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That's a concern for vegans, though frankly, there's really no such thing as a vegan--just people who like to pretend they aren't using animal products. That said, there are occasionally (not always) nutritive merits to organic food--not so much when it comes to plants, but specifically with meats. Factory farmed animals/eggs/milk are lower in omega-3 fatty acids because their diets are formulated for cost rather than nutrition--whereas free range animals have a much more balanced diet.
Of course we could
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:4, Interesting)
That is mostly a result of not going for the cheapest supplier though. The organic farmers aren't convincing with the lowest prices, so they have to convince with quality. And they get paid enough that they can afford to do this.
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Informative)
USDA & FDA labeling requirements [usda-fda.com] state: "...consumers buying organic products, whether produced in the United States or imported, can be assured that the foods are produced without antibiotics, hormones, pesticides, irradiation or bioengineering.
So, yes, you can bet on "organic" being non-GMO.
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I'd bet you aren't allergic to the corn in Doritos popcorn etc because it's genetically modified, rather that you are allergic to those things BECAUSE THEY AREN'T FOOD. They are so heavily processed that you may be allergic to any number of chemicals that those food-like substances are subject to during their processing.
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There is no GMO popcorn.
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And freak food that is genetically modified in an unbridled fashion ! what more can one ask .........
With an attitude like that, you sound like the stem-cell opponents. Seems like an even trade - let the Europeans have the stem cell research and the Americans can have the crop research.
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All I want is the stuff to be marked as genalt food so I can make an informed choice about buying it or not. It will also allow the vendor of such food to face the publics wrath should something bad happen.
I'd also want genalt foodstuffs to require an environmental impact statement before they could be released in the wild and for impacts outside of the growing area to be considered damage against anothers property and treated like any other property damage.
Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Insightful)
What, exactly, do you think people will eat on our journey out to colonize the galaxy??
Transgenic plants. No complaint from me, it will be needed. Also, closed in a spaceship it cannot do much harm.
I just am a bit more hesitant about releasing GM plants into all the biosphere we have.
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I just am a bit more hesitant about releasing GM plants into all the biosphere we have.
Hey! Think about it from the point of the scientist! It's no longer "I drive down to the lab and work for eleven hours a day..." soon, it can be "*Maniacal Laughter* The entire WORLD IS MY LABORATORY, bow before me peasant!".
I mean, what next, the gene splicing scientists get the power to revoke the designation of a planet to a dwarf planet? Wait, what? Sorry, that's for another thread.
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Re:Great !! 123 more jobs, (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't need genetically-modified plants in a spaceship, where presumably you can use hydroponics to grow everything. The whole point of GMO, at least these days, is to make plants that are resistant to herbicides and pesticides, since trying to grow crops in a natural environment means you'll have to deal with weeds and insects that reduce the crop yield. That way, you can douse your farmland with all that shit, and the plants will still grow, without any insects or weeds reducing yields. Then, you can sell pesticide-laden plants as food to consumers.
In a spaceship, there's no natural environment; no weeds, no unwanted insects. You just bring the plants you want to grow, and grow them hydroponically for best yield. With no pests to deal with, you can use regular plants.
Thanks Limburgerhof!!! (Score:4, Insightful)
The BASF facility in RTP has never been terribly large and/or important when compared to their neighbors.
These jobs will be a nice addition to the area and help elevate Biotech even further.
Thanks Limburgerhof!!!
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I wonder who calls dibs on Limburgerhof. BASF even had an annual farmer's market at Limburgerhof. Pity, I'll miss them.
If you think any of the 200 employees who
Anti-Science Europeans Chase Business to America (Score:5, Funny)
You have to admit, you weren't expecting to read that headline.
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Re:Anti-Science Europeans Chase Business to Americ (Score:5, Insightful)
And they are against GM food, because it's patent creep - doodle around in a little corner of the genome and patent the whole plant afterwards, thus gaining power over all people doing business with similar plants and destroying traditonal seed circulation.
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One problem with that notion. Europeans oppose publicly funded research that would not have that problem too. Ever heard of the potatoes [slashdot.org] at the University of Ghent, the government funded grape rootstocks [redgreenandblue.org] in France, or the government funded wheat & potatoes [gmo-safety.eu] and apples [gmo-safety.eu] in Germany? Destroyed. Meanwhile, I've never heard of them having any problem with patented non-GE plants. Maybe the patents factor into it, but you really can't take the patent or corporate angle here. The main issue is the science.
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Sorry that's bullshit. The patent you get is on the improvement to the plant, not the plant itself.
Re:Anti-Science Europeans Chase Business to Americ (Score:5, Insightful)
It's funny - the IP/Patent Creep angle is actually the most compelling and possibly only legitimate argument against GM food. If this is the real reason behind the protesting, then it's doing the right thing (fighting GM food) for the right reason (Patent Creep / IP / Corporate greed controlling food)
However, I bet there really are a lot of "frankenfood" protestors there too.. folks who are doing the right thing (fighting GM food) for the wrong reason. I worry about that crowd because it's like handing the corporate apologists a giant strawman.
Re:Anti-Science Europeans Chase Business to Americ (Score:5, Interesting)
And that fear is an irrational fear of the science behind it. Many of the crops have been in use for several decades and proven not only safe but in the case of corn, highly effective at reducing pesticide use yet they are still banned in Europe. Not because there is any evidence showing that they are bad, but because the public at large fears them. In fact there has been lots of studies showing a complete lack of harm and not a single study showing harm yet they are still banned.
They were erring on the safe side in the first 5 years this stuff was used, 20 years down the road they aren't on the safe side anymore, they are on irrational side. And yes it is most certainly anti-science (anti crop science), it's just a different variety than the kind in the US.
Re:Anti-Science Europeans Chase Business to Americ (Score:5, Insightful)
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I'm not sure anymore how much of that is real, and how much is stereotype due to the tech gadgets and anime which come out of Japan. During the nuclear crisis, watching NHK coverage was a treat. I had expected the Japanese to be well ahead of the U.S. in fancy computer graphics in their news broadcasts. In
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In many parts of Africa, it isn't so much fear of the crops themselves (although I'm sure there is some of that too, especially among wealthy Africans) as it is fear of losing their export market to Europe. Some African countries really need that market, so because Europe rejects GE crops, then in order to prevent their ability to export to Europe secure, those countries ban GE crops as well. This basically means that because Europeans are scientifically illiterate the people who need agricultural science
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Screw that. /. don't like them.
The reason people don't want GMO'S is because they are pushed by Monsanto, a company that wouldn't be scared to eat babies and sell grand-parents for profit.
Microsoft is all rainbows and unicorns in comparison to them, and a lot of people on
Re:Anti-Science Europeans Chase Business to Americ (Score:4)
Safety of consumption is just one of the safety concerns. A much bigger problem is crosspollination, and escaping to the wild, messing up the ecosystem. By these standards even safely consumable GMO plants aren't safe.
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There's lots of independent testing [biofortified.org] confirming the safety of genetic engineering. Anyone who says otherwise either doesn't know much about the area, or is lying. Considering that Gurian-Sherman works for the Union of Concerned Scientists as an 'expert' in this field and wrote the report Failure to Yield [ucsusa.org], which claimed that GE crops yielded less than non-GE crops, while conveniently ignoring the fact that 1) those GE crops were not designed to be intrinsically higher yielding but to have other benefits, 2)
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There's lots of independent testing [biofortified.org] confirming the safety of genetic engineering. Anyone who says otherwise either doesn't know much about the area, or is lying.
The problem is that issues we don't know to test for (either because they are as yet undiscovered or there was no reason to believe they would happen) can have serious consequences. "Confirming the safety" is rightly treated as suspect by the public as it generally means merely "We found no known reason to believe it is unsafe". The BSE crisis in the UK is the classic example -- the change to British law that allowed the temperature rendered feed was sterilised at to be lowered was deemed to be safe by th
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Just as those who doubt humans are causing global warming, because its a conspiracy of socialist to screw them over somehow*.
Just as those who doubt evolution, because its just a theory and not a fact like gravity.
* ( never really understood that one, so its tought to parody).
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But I would rather err on the safe side.
Totally agree !
I'm european, and I suffer from an incurable illness: celiac disease http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coeliac_disease [wikipedia.org]
I'm not a vegetarian, and I don't eat organic food.
When I eat gluten, and most particularly wheat, I become very tired, I get a giant dermatosis and my articulations hurt in less than one hour.
In fact, my intestinal villi are destroyed when exposed to gliadin, and this leads to cancer after several years.
It took me more than 10 years to discover why I was constantly ill, since my d
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Milk's issue for Celiac disease sufferers is generally due to the lack of cilia. If you're gluten-free long enough to regenerate them, you should be fine with milk again. It's not because there's little gluten proteins in your GM milk. And in what world is genetically modified corn harmful to people with Celiac disease?
Maybe you don't have supermarkets in Europe, but there are tons of them here in the US. They always have a gluten-free section in the natural foods area, and many of our other products have d
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Wheat has been "improved" by selection, so GM food is probably even more dangerous.
That's not a particularly scientific or even rational-sounding argument, I'm sorry to say. If you have an autoimmune disease that's triggered by wheat, then GM wheat is wheat and you shouldn't eat it. The GM part is not your issue.
It's blatant trade protectionism: (Score:3)
You don't unjderstand, Rix. There's an excellent reason for Europe to believe they are unsafe. It was promoted that way for some time.
Given the fact that US agriculture can undercut the cost of production in France and Belgium etc, The politicians there were quite happy to use protectionist trade policies to protect local farms etc. Sadly for them, that's limited by the WTO and international agreements. (The US is guilty of it too, so it's hardly unique to them.)
But, if you can make it a food safety issue,
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You can't prove that something is safe. So you are setting up an impossible to satisfy barrier.
If this sort of logic were applied at the time of the discovery of fire we would still be living in dark unheated caves and eating our food raw.
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That is incorrect. GM plants in the wild would only be adversely selected if the "wrong" characteristic impacted their ability to procreate, and then typically after many generations. In the meantime, the plants may out-compete indigenous species or introduce
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If it is able to out-compete indigenous species, then there is by definition nothing wrong with it.
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If so, then your definition of "right" and "wrong" is limited to evolutionary pressure. It ignores the possible reasons why people may have concerns, such as an interest in local habitat conservation. It neatly ignores the context of the conversation:
Nobody else i
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In regards to your signature:
There are somewhere between 12 and 27 million slaves right now.
China, an ostensibly Communist country, has over a billion inhabitants.
The Nazis and American independence, those are valid points... except for the increasingly fascist rules the US keeps passing and forcing on other countries at the behest of corporations.
BASF still exists? (Score:3)
Wow!
BASF still exists? To me BASF is this [youtube.com], and I haven't heard them since. :)
/greger
Re:BASF still exists? (Score:5, Informative)
Wow!
BASF still exists? To me BASF is this [youtube.com], and I haven't heard them since. :)
BASF [wikipedia.org] is the largest chemical company in the world - more than twice the size of DuPont. 2010 revenues were almost 64 billion €.
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Don't forget Dow Chemical at #2, nearly twice as large as DuPont in terms of revenue.
Wow!
BASF still exists? To me BASF is this [youtube.com], and I haven't heard them since. :)
BASF [wikipedia.org] is the largest chemical company in the world - more than twice the size of DuPont. 2010 revenues were almost 64 billion €.
Re:BASF still exists? (Score:5, Informative)
So (Score:2)
If GMO food labeling would be happening in the US, some priorities on affected companies would change there as well.
Re:So (Score:5, Informative)
If the UPC starts with 9, it's organic.
If it starts with 8, it's GM.
If there's another number, it's conventionally farmed.
For once, lazy programming helps slashdotters.
Re:So (Score:5, Interesting)
In 1992, the FDA declared that biotech foods were the same as conventional foods – because the biotech companies said so. The number 8 was then instituted since the produce industry thought consumers would prefer genetically modified food moreso than conventionally grown food. It did not take long for them to find out differently. Although the number 8 designation can still be found, it is rare. The biotech industry is also fighting any sort of labeling for their inventions – now that they know consumers really do not want them. As it stands now, Hawaiian papaya is about the only food you will find that has the number 8 in front of it.
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If the UPC starts with 9, it's organic.
I believe you're talking about the codes on the little stickers that come on your produce in U.S. supermarkets, not the UPC code. The UPC code is the barcode that comes on boxes and cans, and its first digits describe the food's country of origin.
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Allow non-GMO modified producers to label their products as such.
They are allowed. Walk down the organic section of your local supermarket and you'll see tons of stuff with 'non-GMO' on the label.
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This is forward thinking (Score:5, Funny)
I remember BASF (Score:2)
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And 5 1/4 floppies.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/7-BASF-5-25-FLOPPY-DISKS-/140338067360 [ebay.com]
Manufacturing been migrating South (Score:2, Offtopic)
They're Right-to-Work (without benefits) states and they've been enticing European companies for a while now. Why pay a union guy $20/hr with benefits when you can pay a Southerner $10/hr who will also vote to make sure you keep his pay and benefits low?
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These are not $20/hr union jobs. These are high paid science and technology jobs.
I assume they are going into Raleigh because it is part of the Research Triangle.
US doesn't mandate disclosure (Score:5, Informative)
In Europe the market gets to decide if they want GMO food. That happens because they have labeling and menu laws that require the disclosure. It's capitalism at work. BASF is free to grow all the GMO it wants. But they have to sell GMO to the consumers. Here in the US you can pretty much put what you want into foods without nearly as much disclosure.
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In Europe the government does the deciding, not the market. It is the exact opposite of a free market because government regulators are attempting to protect the heavily subsidized European farmers from competing with imported GMOs. The WTO ruled against Europe in 2006 for these policies. The European Court of Justice reaffirmed that ruling in September of 2011.
To this day most GMO food imports are banned in Europe.
Where's my frankenfood? (Score:3, Interesting)
I keep waiting for all this "frankenfood" the Luddites promise I'll see, but all we get are more resiliant, disease and pest resistant crops that have the potential to feed the starving, etc etc.
Where are my grapples (grapes the size of apples)? Where is my chocolate flavored bananas that grow in a temperate environment? Where is the wheat I can bake into a pizza crust that has all my RDA vitamins along with a weight-loss ingreiant?
And god dangit, where are my real booberries?
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I saw some grapples in Safeway today!
http://www.grapplefruits.com/ [grapplefruits.com]
Wow, 123 Jobs!!! (Score:4, Insightful)
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Yea, right, like anyone in America has a strong enough command of Biology anymore to actually work there.
I'll take anything I can get at this point. (Score:2, Troll)
Just about any business that wants to relocate the US is welcome. And really, we're well suited to this one. GMO doesn't scare us and whatever some people think it's the future.
So I'm very happy the US is increasing market share in an industry with huge growth potential and effectively infinite life span because this is a business that will never go away.
Meanwhile, stem-cell research migrated to Europe (Score:3)
We have to stop this shopping around for the country with the loosest morals!
It starts here, but before you know it, they'll be migrating good jobs to countries with appalling labour and environmental practices because those low morals make manufacturing cheaper! Up to 40,000 factories in the US could be lost this way!
Oh, wait, my briefing paper says "1982" not "2012". Damn. What? It already happened?
Never mind...
The Food Supply (Score:5, Insightful)
GMO is not about making plants that produce more, or are resistant to cold or heat or drought.
It is the control of the food supply, that is what it is about.
Ask any Biologist, and they will tell you, genetically creating strains of identical plant lines to maximize a trait is a truly dangerous thing to do. Whenever you take and engineer biological entities such as plants, that are gentically identical and create entire artificial eco systems that have low diversity, or in the case of GMO, _NO_ diversity, all sorts of catastrophic destruction can happen to the population.
Whether it be a GERM, a BUG or BAD WEATHER, having a food supply that is genetically diverse and NOT engineered is the safest and will produce the most food, consistently over a wide variety of environmental conditions.
GMO has got to be the worst possible idea of all time. It won't produce food for anyone except the rich, and it will not produce food that has the ecological diversity requirements to provide a safe consistent yield.
It isn't by accident you know, they will not put GMO labels on food. They know it is not safe, and they do not want you to know about it.
GMO also is causing massive extinction rates in our grain crops from gene contamination. If this isn't stopped, there won't be any grain species left that are safe to eat.
-Hack
Re:The Food Supply (Score:5, Informative)
GMO is not about making plants that produce more, or are resistant to cold or heat or drought.
Presently they are about resistance to insects, better weed management practices, and virus resistance, and they work.
It is the control of the food supply, that is what it is about.
You have no idea what genetic engineering is, do you? It is a technique. It doesn't want to do anything. Sure, you could say that a company wants to get larger market share, but that would be like saying that cooking is all about control because McDonald's does it.
Ask any Biologist, and they will tell you, genetically creating strains of identical plant lines to maximize a trait is a truly dangerous thing to do.
Funny, because that's exactly what many biologists working in plant science are trying to do with particular traits. That's what we've been doing for years with conventional breeding, or did you think all those plump grains and fat fruits were natural? This is not intrinsically different than altering traits via GE. And as a matter of fact, I have asked biologists about this very subject. University professors in genetics, biochemistry, plant biology, and agriculture. Guess how many of them opposed genetic engineering? None.
Whenever you take and engineer biological entities such as plants, that are gentically identical and create entire artificial eco systems that have low diversity, or in the case of GMO, _NO_ diversity, all sorts of catastrophic destruction can happen to the population.
That doesn't even make sense. Yes, lack of biodiversity is bad. Genetic engineering however is a way of improving a plant, not a system of agriculture. What you are saying is like saying that modifying cars with spinning rims means that there will only be one car on the market. Furthermore, even with GE crops, they breed the trait into numerous different lines of the crop.
Whether it be a GERM, a BUG or BAD WEATHER, having a food supply that is genetically diverse and NOT engineered is the safest and will produce the most food, consistently over a wide variety of environmental conditions.
Biodiversity is what you grow. genetic engineering is a way to improve it. That's a false dichotomy that makes absolutely no sense and could just as easily be applied to conventional breeding.
GMO has got to be the worst possible idea of all time.
Tell that to the papaya farmers in Hawaii who would no longer be papaya farmers without the GE Rainbow papaya. Tell that to the farmers in India who stole Bt cotton seeds from test fields. Tell that to the farmers all across America, Canada, Brazil, and Argentina who willingly choose to buy GE seed every year.
It isn't by accident you know, they will not put GMO labels on food. They know it is not safe, and they do not want you to know about it.
They?
GMO also is causing massive extinction rates in our grain crops from gene contamination. If this isn't stopped, there won't be any grain species left that are safe to eat.
Really? Care to explain in detail how a single new transgene could possibly do that? Because it sounds like you just made that up.
It sounds like you know nothing about biology or agriculture, but you've got conspiracies down.
Goobye! (Score:3)
Good riddance, glad to see this moving out of the EU. For you guys on the other side of the Atlantic... hope you realize what is coming. We don't accept it here in Europe and you shouldn't either.
Re: (Score:3)
Sue, Crush. They are so interchangable in the US.
On that note, seeing as plants cross polinate out in the wold, I wonder who gets to sue the poor farmer [wikipedia.org] whose normal crops are pollinated by both Monsanto's and BASF's genetically modified strands.
Re: (Score:2)
The link you provided was to a description of a farmer getting sued for intentionally selecting the modified crops and replanting them to take advantage of the patented improvements.
It wasn't 'his normal crops' at all.
Re: (Score:2)
The link you provided was to a description of a farmer getting sued for intentionally selecting the modified crops and replanting them to take advantage of the patented improvements.
It wasn't 'his normal crops' at all.
He was saving seeds produced by *his* plants. Monsanto couldn't control their crop and things cross-pollinated? Tough shit for Monsanto. It was his crop that was contaminated by theirs. He has every right to continue using the seeds. As for 'patented improvements', that's a load of horseshit too. They didn't invent anything. That's like design patents, a whole truckload of horseshit.
Re: (Score:3)
Marie Curie discovered the radium (1898) and died of its poisoning (1934), unknown at the time.
Time will tell.
Re: (Score:2)
Also, remember that before the risks were understood, "radium toothpaste", "radium health drinks" and "radium skin cream" were sold and their benefits advertised.
Re:That's RIGHT MOVE ! (Score:5, Interesting)
The thing is no one knows for sure the effects of GM on human bodies, animal bodies, plant bodies and Evolution in general, over a long period of time.
That, by definition, is true for anything. There is always the possibility of an unknown unknown. However, that notion cannot be falsified and as such is a poor point. A better question would be if any of the genes inserted into GE crops pose known any risk. Right now, the few that are (EPSPS protein, various cry proteins, bar enzyme, CMV/PRV coat protein) do not. The moment anyone has evidence supporting the notion that there is any harm from these, or any other inserted protein (since that must be taken on a case by case basis), or the process itself (though strangely not any other plant improvement method) then maybe that notion will have merit.
Also, I notice you're not applying the same logic to any given conventionally bred trait. You could ask the same question about the Cry1Ab gene as you could the sd-1 gene, and it would make about as much sense. The comparison I like to use is lets say you decided to apply that thinking to the smallpox vaccine. Hey, it might have some long term potential but as of yet unsubscribed side effect that could hurt a lot of people, so should it have been used. Yes, because you have to consider KNOWN facts, not what-ifs that may or may not (probably the latter) actually exist.
Re: (Score:2)
Maybe they should move to the Moon [ironsky.net] instead, where their compatriots are already hard at work.
Re:Positive sign (Score:4, Funny)
OK.
1. Failure to use turn signal.
2. Speeding.
3. Driving while intoxicated.
That's three.