Support NeoGAF

[Wilsongt]

GMOs are engineered to resist larger quantities of poison. That means farmers can spray larger quantities of poison. These larger quantities of poison are absorbed by the plans, and then eaten by you. Further, these large quantities of poison enter the watershed and are absorbed by fish, eaten also by you.

What do you think "Roundup Ready" means?

Except not...

You only need a tiny amount of the herbicide to kill any non-resistant plants. You act as if farmers are going out and dumping huge barrels of Basta on plants.

 

[CornBurrito]

GMOs are engineered to resist larger quantities of poison. That means farmers can spray larger quantities of poison. These larger quantities of poison are absorbed by the plans, and then eaten by you. Further, these large quantities of poison enter the watershed and are absorbed by fish, eaten also by you.

What do you think "Roundup Ready" means?

Is every GMO crop Roundup Ready or designed to be resistant to pesticides?

 

[Jenov]

VICE did a documentary on GMOs and talked about Roundup in one of their most recent episodes. Basically they accused Monsato of ignoring pesticide resistance in bugs/weeds in favor of increasing sales of their Roundup brand (which Monsato also owns). Also, that farmers were upset over being required to always replant with newest GMO seeds year by year, and never allowed to reuse the same seeds or they would be sued.

 

[Stet]

VICE did a documentary on GMOs and talked about Roundup in one of their most recent episodes. Basically they accused Monsato of ignoring pesticide resistance in bugs/weeds in favor of increasing sales of their Roundup brand (which Monsato also owns). Also, that farmers were upset over being required to always replant with newest GMO seeds year by year, and never allowed to reuse the same seeds or they would be sued.

I don't know what Monsanto can really do to prevent resistance except provide a variety of treatments in different herbicide groups, which they already do. It's up to the farmers to rotate their herbicide and rotate their crops so resistances don't develop.

 

[Trokil]

GMO does not == Glyphosate. There's a ton of benefits genetically modified crops bring to the table. Chipotle (and of course various governments) are taking them off the table for patently stupid reasons. That's the core issue here.

Not it is not, GMO was never ever about feeding the world, most GMO will not be eaten by people but is used for fuel or to feed cattle. There are enough studies about that in this thread already. It is propaganda to tell anybody GMO will feed the world, because it will not. GMO is just another stupid one way ticket the whole western agriculture industry is heading and it is very sad, that people still think, that GMO is a solution to anything but producing more cheap bad food for the western market and leaving scraps for the third world.

People in the western world are spending less money on food than they have ever and food is getting even cheaper. It's not about quality or anything it is a about cheap products and cheap prices. Everything surround the western agriculture is going totally wrong, farmers make almost no profit, subsidised products are killing markets, big corporations are controlling seeds and patents. For the millennium development goals scientists did the biggest ever evaluation about agriculture and none of their solution was GMO and that it will save us all.

It is almost a religious mantra, that GMO will change anything because it will not, but until all the soil in the western world is destroyed by fertilizer and chemicals nothing will change, because too much money is to be made and too many people fall for corporate propaganda. People are enraged about how cattle or chickens are treated and how farmers get no money, but the want a 50 Cent burger, which is more important or a 30 cent Lasagne, so they don't care, even if kills them. At least it is cheap and a lot of food.

 

[Stet]

Not it is not, GMO was never ever about feeding the world, most GMO will not be eaten by people but is used for fuel or to feed cattle. There are enough studies about that in this thread already. It is propaganda to tell anybody GMO will feed the world, because it will not. GMO is just another stupid one way ticket the whole western agriculture industry is heading and it is very sad, that people still think, that GMO is a solution to anything but producing more cheap bad food for the western market and leaving scraps for the third world.

People in the western world are spending less money on food than they have ever and food is getting even cheaper. It's not about quality or anything it is a about cheap products and cheap prices. Everything surround the western agriculture is going totally wrong, farmers make almost no profit, subsidised products are killing markets, big corporations are controlling seeds and patents. For the millennium development goals scientists did the biggest ever evaluation about agriculture and none of their solution was GMO and that it will save us all.

It is almost a religious mantra, that GMO will change anything because it will not, but until all the soil in the western world is destroyed by fertilizer and chemicals nothing will change, because too much money is to be made and too many people fall for corporate propaganda. People are enraged about how cattle or chickens are treated and how farmers get no money, but the want a 50 Cent burger, which is more important or a 30 cent Lasagne, so they don't care, even if kills them. At least it is cheap and a lot of food.

You can grow GMO crops without any "chemicals". I can do it in my backyard.

 

[LOCK]

I don't know what Monsanto can really do to prevent resistance except provide a variety of treatments in different herbicide groups, which they already do. It's up to the farmers to rotate their herbicide and rotate their crops so resistances don't develop.

Which is modern agricultural practice already.

This thread is proof that media and second hand website scare tactics have lead to very widespread misinformation about GMOs.

I think we need to ask the questions about the consequences of not pursuing GMO research, what are presentable alternatives for those that are anti GMO. What is the intrinsic value of potential environmental loss from expanding agricultural practices, what is acceptable and potential starvation rates, what are bearable cost and total cost associated with limited food supply?

GMO research is not limited to Monsanto, it's not limited to near future profit and potential. Many scientists are exploring GMO research in preparation of long term consequences. Research takes time, money, and sometimes it is great and advancing while other times it is stagnant and potentially harmful.

I don't think people really think about the big picture, but rather jumps on the bandwagon of the latest news trend. But that's not their fault to a point, it's the way we have been groomed as a society.

 

[gdt]

Glyphosate may well be dangerous, but it's not related to GMOs aside from being the pesticide for many of them. If it's unsafe, we need a replacement ASAP.

 

[cyclonekruse]

VICE did a documentary on GMOs and talked about Roundup in one of their most recent episodes. Basically they accused Monsato of ignoring pesticide resistance in bugs/weeds in favor of increasing sales of their Roundup brand (which Monsato also owns). Also, that farmers were upset over being required to always replant with newest GMO seeds year by year, and never allowed to reuse the same seeds or they would be sued.

Monsanto puts lots of money into R&D for their breeds. If they allowed farmers to retain harvested seed for reuse the following year(s), they would never be able to recoup the costs of their R&D. It would absolutely be the death of their business. So Monsanto requires that anyone who buys seed from them signs a contract agreeing to not keep seed for the following year. If a farmer does retain the harvested seed even though s/he agreed not to, s/he is going to rightly be sued for breach of contract. And Monsanto is notorious for aggressively pursuing such lawsuits.

And while it would certainly benefit farmers to not have to shell out for new seed every year, it's not like the current arrangement is ripping them off. If Monsanto is doing its job correctly, their seed should increase yields to the point where farmers are making more money despite having to pay a recurring cost for seed each year. That's Monsanto's business model. And that's why farmers are still willing to pay them lots of money to use their seed even though they have to sign a contract saying they won't reuse seed. They're getting a healthy return on their investment.

 

[Trokil]

It is incredible that people actually still fall for this, GMO will solve world hunger crap. World hunger is not the problem of not enough food, we already have enough food, we can feed the world.

Hunger exists because:

1. in the Western world we throw away 30-40% of our food

2. highly subsidised products and scraps from the EU, the USA and China are killing markets in Africa and don't allow them to rebuild their own agriculture. Chicken farmers for example can compete with chicken leftovers from the EU sold in Africa, meanwhile fisherman from all over the world are stealing the fish from the african coasts, which is again not eaten by people but by cattle.

3. food in the western world has to be so cheap, that somebody has to pay the prize. You want cheap food like cheap clothing, of course you screw somebody over.

Reality is, you want cheap food, so GMO is your solution, because in the end it is about you and just about you. Please don't insult anybody with this crap about ending world hunger, but if it helps you sleep at night, it is a nice little bedtime story. In reality nobody is interested in ending world hunger, there is for example a whole industry behind shipping unsold crop from the US to africa as donations to help them.

 

[Stet]

It is incredible that people actually still fall for this, GMO will solve world hunger crap. World hunger is not the problem of not enough food, we already have enough food, we can feed the world.

Hunger exists because:

1. in the Western world we throw away 30-40% of our food

2. highly subsidised products and scraps from the EU, the USA and China are killing markets in Africa and don't allow them to rebuild their own agriculture. Chicken farmers for example can compete with chicken leftovers from the EU sold in Africa, meanwhile fisherman from all over the world are stealing the fish from the african coasts, which is again not eaten by people but by cattle.

3. food in the western world has to be so cheap, that somebody has to pay the prize. You want cheap food like cheap clothing, of course you screw somebody over.

Reality is, you want cheap food, so GMO is your solution, because in the end it is about you and just about you. Please don't insult anybody with this crap about ending world hunger, but if it helps you sleep at night, it is a nice little bedtime story. In reality nobody is interested in ending world hunger, there is for example a whole industry behind shipping unsold crop from the US to africa as donations to help them.

Throughout this entire thread all you've done is insult people who think differently from you, but you've provided absolutely no credible sources for any of your claims and have been disproven several times on many of your own questionable facts.

African agriculture is suffering because they don't have money to buy equipment to help them farm. Food security isn't about whether or not farmers in a developing country can sell their food, it's about whether or not they can eat. There are organizations trying to help them, including a group of several African countries called the African Union, and I would tell you to do some research to educate yourself instead of calling us gullible for giving you facts, but I guarantee you would not.

 

[Trokil]

Ok, let's do this.

Food waste in western countries:

http://endhunger.org/food-waste/

USDA: (Released in February 2014) “In the United States, 31 percent—or 133 billion pounds—of the 430 billion pounds of the available food supply at the retail and consumer levels in 2010 went uneaten. The estimated value of this food loss was $161.6 billion using retail prices. For the first time, ERS estimated the calories associated with food loss: 141 trillion in 2010, or 1,249 calories per capita per day.”

http://www.worldfooddayusa.org/food_waste_the_facts

In the USA, organic waste is the second highest component of landfills, which are the largest source of methane emissions
In the USA, 30-40% of the food supply is wasted, equaling more than 20 pounds of food per person per month

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_waste

As of 2013, half of all food is wasted worldwide, according to the British Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IME).[1] Loss and wastage occurs at all stages of the food supply chain or value chain. In low-income countries, most loss occurs during production, while in developed countries much food – about 100 kilograms (220 lb) per person per year – is wasted at the consumption stage.

According to research we are producing ebough food world wide to feed the planet already.

http://www.fao.org/docrep/x0262e/x0262e05.htm

After 30 years of rapid growth in agricultural production, the world can produce enough food to provide every person with more than 2 700 Calories per day a level which is normally sufficient to ensure that all have access to adequate food, provided distribution is not too unequal.

Want to know how the US or the EU is destroying the african markets. Everything I am writing is very well known, but of course people don't like to talk about it.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6256274

Bags of U.S. cornmeal are stacked in a U.N. World Food Program warehouse in Blantyre, Malawi. The United States ships millions of tons of food aid to Africa each year. While the food is desperately needed in many parts of the continent, some activists and economists say the inflow of huge amounts of surplus Western-grown grain stifles agricultural development in Africa.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?sid=aqcEofUwPqtU&pid=newsarchive

Article from 2008

http://fpif.org/destroying_african_agriculture/

At the time of decolonization in the 1960s, Africa was not just self-sufficient in food but was actually a net food exporter, its exports averaging 1.3 million tons a year between 1966-70. Today, the continent imports 25% of its food, with almost every country being a net food importer. Hunger and famine have become recurrent phenomena, with the last three years alone seeing food emergencies break out in the Horn of Africa, the Sahel, Southern Africa, and Central Africa.

Or 2002

http://www.iatp.org/files/Dumping_on_the_Poor_The_Common_Agricultural_Po.htm

And do you know the funny thing, GMO will not change anything, because to have a reliable income people need working markets to sell their products. But the US, the EU and China are using Africa as a dumping ground for their products.

http://www.consultancyafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1111:a-continent-vs-a-country-china-putting-strain-on-africas-clothing-and-textile-industries-&catid=82:african-industry-a-business&Itemid=266

Africa neither does need GMOs nor so called investements in infrastructure. What Africa would need is not getting fucked by the western countries or China, but because our system is based on stealing from the poor so we can be rich, there is not that much pressure to change anything.

And it is the same thing with GMOs and Glyphosate. There are a lot of problems, risks and dangers but it is all getting ignored, because technology will solve everything. It is the nuclear age all over again.

What would save the planet would be fair prizes for the food or the products you buy. But of course, if you had to pay the amount it is actually worth, you could not afford a new I-phone every year or similar things. In reality GMO is a cute little bedtime story for all the people who don't want to know the reality, that our wealth is produced by cheating on billions of people. Speculating with food, resources and stealing. Of course nobody calls it stealing, but if you can rent the fishing rights of a whole country for a few million dollars, just because you talk to the right person, it is pretty much that.

Yes, a lot of people a so enraged when John Oliver talks about it, but you will buy the new I-phone anyway even knowing what is all behind it, how Foxconn treats their workers in China. It is so much easier to hope that some scientists in a GMO lab will solve world hunger for you. Of course they will not, there is no profit in ending world hunger.

All the tech solutions also Bill Gates is rooting for are just a cute little distractions. Reality is if you really want, that everybody on the planet can have a happy life, it is not technology that will save us, but we would all have to give away stuff we are so used to. But as the 1% in the US would not give anything to the 99%, the western countries of course will not give anything away as well. And as long people are able to ignore reality and hope somebody else, like a scientist will solve world hunger for them, nothing will ever change. And people are so ready to believe anything just to calm down that little nagging thought in their head about the consequences, if it was not safe. Studies showed it is safe, so off to McDonalds they are selling 3 Burgers for 4 Dollars.

 

[Stet]

Ok, let's do this.

Food waste in western countries:

http://endhunger.org/food-waste/



http://www.worldfooddayusa.org/food_waste_the_facts



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_waste



According to research we are producing ebough food world wide to feed the planet already.

http://www.fao.org/docrep/x0262e/x0262e05.htm



Want to know how the US or the EU is destroying the african markets. Everything I am writing is very well known, but of course people don't like to talk about it.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6256274



http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?sid=aqcEofUwPqtU&pid=newsarchive

Article from 2008

http://fpif.org/destroying_african_agriculture/



Or 2002

http://www.iatp.org/files/Dumping_on_the_Poor_The_Common_Agricultural_Po.htm

And do you know the funny thing, GMO will not change anything, because to have a reliable income people need working markets to sell their products. But the US, the EU and China are using Africa as a dumping ground for their products.

http://www.consultancyafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1111:a-continent-vs-a-country-china-putting-strain-on-africas-clothing-and-textile-industries-&catid=82:african-industry-a-business&Itemid=266

Africa neither does need GMOs nor so called investements in infrastructure. What Africa would need is not getting fucked by the western countries or China, but because our system is based on stealing from the poor so we can be rich, there is not that much pressure to change anything.

And it is the same thing with GMOs and Glyphosate. There are a lot of problems, risks and dangers but it is all getting ignored, because technology will solve everything. It is the nuclear age all over again.

What would save the planet would be fair prizes for the food or the products you buy. But of course, if you had to pay the amount it is actually worth, you could not afford a new I-phone every year or similar things. In reality GMO is a cute little bedtime story for all the people who don't want to know the reality, that our wealth is produced by cheating on billions of people. Speculating with food, resources and stealing. Of course nobody calls it stealing, but if you can rent the fishing rights of a whole country for a few million dollars, just because you talk to the right person, it is pretty much that.

Yes, a lot of people a so enraged when John Oliver talks about it, but you will buy the new I-phone anyway even knowing what is all behind it, how Foxconn treats their workers in China. It is so much easier to hope that some scientists in a GMO lab will solve world hunger for you. Of course they will not, there is no profit in ending world hunger.

All the tech solutions also Bill Gates is rooting for are just a cute little distractions. Reality is if you really want, that everybody on the planet can have a happy life, it is not technology that will save us, but we would all have to give away stuff we are so used to. But as the 1% in the US would not give anything to the 99%, the western countries of course will not give anything away as well. And as long people are able to ignore reality and hope somebody else, like a scientist will solve world hunger for them, nothing will ever change. And people are so ready to believe anything just to calm down that little nagging thought in their head about the consequences, if it was not safe. Studies showed it is safe, so off to McDonalds they are selling 3 Burgers for 4 Dollars.

No, no, no. You can't provide proof points to the simplest and most obvious of statements like "people waste food" and apply them to your entire rambling argument about 3 burgers for 4 dollars. You also can't take food security theory that says we can feed the world today with what we produce as long as we distribute it everywhere and apply it to another theory that says that by distributing food to Africa we're reducing food security.

The problem with your economic ideas is that they're based on contentious facts and when you link articles--not studies, mind you, but articles--you're not reading the whole thing and instead looking for a search term that might prove your point.