I think my main objection to GMO right now is that it's as much or more about control as it is about either increased production or safety. Private companies are patenting existing living things with minor modifications. They are actively preventing seeding plants from being able to reproduce. Call me skeptical, but I doubt that having the food supply under private control is going to solve the world's hunger problems.
I'm also entirely unconvinced by the argument that cross-breeding and genetic engineering are the same and thus pose the same level of safety risk. If that were true, we wouldn't need genetic engineering, we could stick to grafting.
As by product the child of a family owned-farm for a co-op I have a bit more nuanced view and GMOs are a tool.
* Any time you’re farming you’re screwing up the local ecology by putting shit where it doesn't normally grow or if it does, specifically tailoring it.
* Organic food still uses chemicals for pesticides and fertilizers. The difference they aren’t made chemically, and still have negative effects on local ecology. Example: Cow shit is bad for water tables just like fertilizer, and less effective.
* There’s still no evidence about a nutrition gap between organic and non organic.
* If you’re going to produce food, the ideal is to use the least amount of land and the least amount of chemicals for minimal impact.
* I don’t agree with many mass-ag techniques like high yield varieties in water strapped areas but we can make drought resistant crops that are more mindful of fresh water resources with GMOs and be more responsible.
* I do not like the idea of patenting organics or crops unable to reproduce. It's not conducive to small farming by pricing smaller producers out, which promotes mass ag. Localization of food production helps minimize impacts.
* The best reason to support organic is that many of the farms have better work conditions, more female owned, more social responsibility, but that’s exactly the same reason why you want to buy local.
* We need to cultivate a signifier to the idea of minimal impact farming over the idea of organic vs GMO. A classic example of a minimal impact farming technique is shade grown coffee, which means allowing more biodiversity in flora and fauna. Large trees protect the coffee berries, and allow native species to still grown which in turn provides nature habitat for local avian populations which in turn helps maintain local ecology and naturally help curb pests. There's not a single metric, nor a right technique for every crop.
This is awesome, thank you! I have to admit I wasn't even thinking about GMO in relation to organic. But I can share that my wife and I totally feel like "Organic" is mostly a bullshit marketing label being used to justify increased prices, and we don't buy that organic certified foods are safer.
I wouldn't say I'm anti GMO in general, like you I just don't love all the ways this tool is being used.
What do you think the chances are that the Jurassic Park movies have had the largest impact on the public perception of GMO foods? :P
Yes, food supply is largely under private control in the sense that I buy food from private companies, but I was making a different point than that. I should have elaborated. Patent protection of GMO products is eliminating competition, and making it illegal to grow similar foods. Furthermore, use of their product over time might eliminate non-GMO varieties. This kind of control can lead to private companies monopolizing the food supply, and being the only legal source of some foods. These companies are actively seeing that future.
Regarding the government, I'm not sure I follow - why should I fear the government, and how is the food supply going to end up under government control? Currently, it's largely private companies that are patenting GMO products, is it not? It is definitely private companies, and not the government, that are developing and selling GMO seeds that produce non-seeding plants. The government is not currently attempting to monopolize markets of GMO products, or food in general.
> So, your concerns would be alleviated entirely by a compulsory licensing scheme?
I doubt it, but this question also sounds like a way for me to trap myself, so I'm going to avoid it. ;)
My primary concern here in this thread was I felt like Soylent's article was misleadingly one-sided, and conspicuously left out possibly the most important issue wrt GMO food, an issue that might directly contradict the stated claims of going after world hunger. Limited production capacity is not the primary reason world hunger exists, so increased production capacity shouldn't be expected to fix it, right?
> are you aware that 100% completely non-GMO plants are subject to an IP regimen called plant breeder's rights...
Maybe I painted the wrong picture. I'm totally in favor of reasonable business protections for investments in research. But, you'd agree the patent system is at least somewhat broken and is currently being at least somewhat abused? I do think private entities are testing and pushing the boundaries of what is acceptable with GMO - and if that were my business, that might be what I'd be doing to. There's a long and wonderful history of private enterprise trying to maximize it's own gains, I've even read that maximizing gains is it's primary function. Which is precisely why I'll hesitate before shooting down any and all critics of GMO techniques. They might benefit me as a consumer, but that's not their primary purpose at the moment.
On the whole, I think it's great if big-agra is developing more robust higher yield crops that everybody benefits from. If it ends up being cheaper for everyone, and they don't start rent-seeking, then two thumbs up. Time will tell. I don't expect modifying seeding plants so they can no longer reproduce to solve world hunger in any way, shape, or form. But as long as they don't hose the future food supply or the population's health, then yeah, it is their prerogative to protect their IP.
> I doubt it, but this question also sounds like a way for me to trap myself, so I'm going to avoid it. ;)
Your professed concerns are over control. A compulsory licensing scheme strips away the ability for a rightsholder to choose who to license to or what price to license at. As a result, it would be impossible for the situation you fear - " private companies monopolizing the food supply" - to come to pass.
It seems like a neat solution to your worries. I'm asking if an actual policy that actually been used for other forms of actual IP would help.
It's a trap in the sense that offering a hammer to someone who needs to drive a nail is a trap.
> Limited production capacity is not the primary reason world hunger exists, so increased production capacity shouldn't be expected to fix it, right?
In total aggregate, production capacity is not the primary reason. Similarly, the world does not lack for water in total aggregate. Does that mean there is no such thing as a drought?
You're of course completely, totally, 100% right. It's not primarily a production problem. It's primarily a logistics problem. It just happens to be a logistics problem that can be addressed by addressing the production problem.
The funny thing about terminator genes is that they've never actually been used. No sane commercial farmer keeps their seeds anyway - it's much more reliable and profitable to just buy more.
1) Improving yields is exactly what you don't want to do if you want to bolster local agriculture. We've learned this lesson multiple times over the past 50 years, from Africa to Asia. If you want to address famines, you're either going to do so by fixing the logistics problem OR you need to inflate prices through trade barriers to induce large-scale, economically viable domestic farming. Improving yields only shifts more agriculture to nations like the U.S., Europe, Brazil, and China, because by reducing labor requirements and shifting to technology and logistics those nations have a comparative advantage over every other country.
2) There are plenty of insane farmers. Just sayin'. And that's not a bad thing, per se. See #1. The core problem is that too much centralization can lead to unstable outcomes; it pays to subsidize some amount of economic diversity.
GMO took off awhile ago and is half way to the heliopause.
I don't know what the regulatory environment is for GMOs, but I'm pretty sure that if you're worried about government regulation of the ag industry then freaking out about GMOs (a label without any substance outside of politics and philosophy) is probably not the way to go.
While most of us (software engineers) can agree that the patent system sucks, I don't see the logic in opposing GMOs because of patents. Does Stallman tell people that all software is bad and should be avoided because not all software is copyleft? No, he doesn't, because on top of being illogical it's just plain counterproductive and pointless.
"As a society, we struggle to satisfy the global demand for food."
My vegan friends claim that this is only true because we waste so much food/water to feed livestock for meat.
Even if thats not true, humans waste a lot of food. Hell, my local supermarket throws out enough food each day to feed me for a month. (Ok ok not really true because it wouldn't last a month, but quantity-wise...)
And there is the whole 'bio-fuel' movement where basically people grow 'bio-fuel' in places where there was food growing earlier cause they get subsidies for doing so. How to account for such 'lost' food sources?
Biofuel is crazy. It produced massive ecological and economical damage, ruining supply chains for generations ahead. Who and why ever thought it was a good idea?
Your vegan friend has a good point. Production of animal-based foods typically use 2-10 times more feed (and consequently more land etc) than what would be needed to feed humans directly.
The article cites the often-cited FAO claim [1] that 70% more food production is needed by year 2050. But researchers are now also increasingly agreeing that dietary choices should be considered -- FAO's "70% increase" claim builds on their projections of future human diets.
For a recent example of this alternative view, see Tilman and Clark (2014) [2]. In summary: Current western diets are harmful for the planet and for human health, so let's also consider changing our diets.
>> As a society, we struggle to satisfy the global demand for food.
> My vegan friends claim that this is only true because we waste so much food/water to feed livestock for meat.
It's not true at all. There's plenty of food in the world, there's plenty of hungry people in the world, unfortunately, they don't tend to be in the same places, and food is perishable, and people don't work for free. It's a transportation and economic problem, not a food shortage problem. It'll probably be solved by better ways to produce locally because shipping food to the starving people isn't going to suddenly start working.
The article does make a few good points, but I also think it uses a couple of unforgivable rhetorical devices. Most obvious are the out-of-context mentions of various "huge numbers", e.g. as follows:
"By reducing the need to till farmland, GR soy and corn have prevented 41 billion pounds of carbon dioxide from being released in the atmosphere between 1996 and 2013."
This amount of CO2 savings sounds great without comparison, but it amounts to about 0.003% of the total GHG emissions in the same period. (Assuming emissions of ~40 Gt CO2e/year 1993-2013 [1].)
It's true that the "Prickles" have caused problems. However, a tremendous amount of good has come of science and technology. Skepticism is necessary to counteract humanity's collective hubris. Morality and philosophy have their uses for this as well. However, it's high time that we asked for some epistemic rigor from the "Gooey" side. Otherwise, our society is going to drown in unarguable nonsense.
I'm also entirely unconvinced by the argument that cross-breeding and genetic engineering are the same and thus pose the same level of safety risk. If that were true, we wouldn't need genetic engineering, we could stick to grafting.