Quote:
Originally Posted by Bicycle Bob
I'm all in favour of plant breeding for better yields. Our local economy is based on the work of schoolchildren who competed to select the very best wheat seeds for a tiny test plot. Direct genetic tinkering, however, is well known for reducing soy output by 10%, and high-fructose corn is widely implicated in health problems. The pollen from these varieties is destroying the option to farm organically. There is no more organic canola, for instance.
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1) Since it is well known, could you help me find a source showing reduced soy output? 2) The jury is still out on high fructose corn syrup (versus sugar). There is no consensus in the scientific community, but the majority of the good studies show no adverse affects. 3) As to the organic argument, I'm not sure why this is a problem. The issue is more a product of how we define "organic" than it is with any known problems with GM foods. For example, a GM crop with yellow mosaic virus resistance cross-pollinates (a natural process) with an organic crop. Future generations of the "organic" crop now contain the GM resistance; is it therefore now non-organic? If it isn't, why? Is "organic" thus determined by a plant's genetics? If so, how is this different than using hybridized plant strains in organic crops?