#1 GM Thread: Protest against wheat testing banned

[Dawn Cannon]

Hungary Destroys All Monsanto GMO Maize Fields
http://planetsave.com/2011/07/21/hun...-maize-fields/

GMO Crop: French citizens destroy trial vineyard
http://foodfreedom.wordpress.com/201...-gmo-vineyard/

Rajasthan Puts GM Crop Trials on Hold: Orders burning of the field trials
http://agrariancrisis.in/2012/03/20/...-field-trials/

Haitian Farmers Commit to Burning Monsanto Hybrid Seeds
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/beverl..._b_578807.html


Protest against wheat testing banned
http://www.itv.com/news/update/2012-...esting-banned/

Protestors planning action over a genetically modified wheat trial in Hertfordshire have been banned from going anywhere near the crop.

St Albans council has won an order from the Home Office to use extra police powers to stop them going on to the land, amid fears the demonstration could result in damage to crops and buildings.

Supporters are due to congregate in Rothamsted Park, next to the institute, at noon.

The plan was to proceed along footpaths to a site where scientists are growing a new strain of experimental wheat.

[Dawn Cannon]

British scientists awarded £6.4m GM crop grant

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/sc...t-7945138.html

British scientists have won a £6.4 million grant to develop GM crops - one of the largest single investments into genetic modification in the UK.

The money, awarded by the Gates Foundation, will be used to cultivate corn, wheat and rice that need little or no fertiliser.

It is hoped the work at the John Innes Centre in Norwich will benefit struggling maize farmers in sub-Saharan Africa who cannot afford to treat their crops.

Plant scientists at the independent unit are trying to engineer cereal crops capable of taking nitrogen from the air - as peas and beans do - rather than needing chemical ammonia spread on fields.

Giles Oldroyd, from the John Innes Centre, told the BBC the project was vital for poorer African farmers and would have a huge impact on global agriculture.

If it's in the name of breeding more niggers in Africa, it's all justified. Isn't it.

[Bev]

Children will go blind or die if the world does not embrace genetically modified crops Owen Paterson claimed today.

The Environment Secretary issued the controversial ultimatum as he claimed Britain could lead the way in producing GM food.

He claims it would lower prices and free up the countryside.

The Environment Secretary, a longstanding advocate of GM technology, claims its adoption in the UK could be as significant as the agricultural revolution.

But ahead of a major speech he claimed the decision to back the controversial technology is a matter of life and death.

He said 'golden rice' which could be grown in the world's poorest countries was first created in 1999 but had not been used to help solve global hunger.

'Now the World Health organisation estimates that up to 500,000 children go irreversibly blind a year, and 250,000 of those actually die.

'Now the problem is mainly in South-East Asia, but over the last 15 years, despite offering the seeds for free to those who would need them, every attempt to deploy this golden rice has been thwarted.

And in that time, seven million children have gone blind or died. I think all those who have thwarted the attempts to bring in this – for free, don’t forget – should really reflect.

'Those are real young people, and today, young people will wake up this morning able to see, and they’ll go to bed blind for life. Some of them will die today.'

In his speech Mr Paterson pointed out that since 1996 there has been a hundred-fold increase in the use of GM crops around the world, with 17million farmers in 28 countries now growing what critics have branded Frankenstein foods. Less than 0.1 per cent of this takes place in the EU.

'Farmers wouldn't grow these crops if they didn't benefit from doing so,' he argued.

'Governments wouldn't license these technologies if they didn't recognise the economic, environmental and public benefits.

'Consumers wouldn't buy these products if they didn't think they were safe and cost-effective. While the rest of the world is ploughing ahead and reaping the benefits of new technologies, Europe risks being left behind. We cannot afford to let that happen.

'The use of GM [technology] could be as transformative as the original agricultural revolution was. The UK should be at the forefront now, as it was then.'

Mr Paterson – who comes from a long line of farmers and tanners and keeps sheep, hens and horses at his country home in North Shropshire – claims that GM farming can help feed people in poorer countries and inject missing vitamins into the diets of children in the UK.



In a speech designed to appeal to traditionalists, he also argued that using GM crops to improve yields will require less space, freeing up more greenfield land.

'If we use cultivated land more efficiently, we could free up space for biodiversity, nature and wilderness,' he said. He also argued that GM crops can help combat the effects of Britain's increasingly erratic climate.


Mr Paterson will argue that using GM crops to improve yields will require less space, freeing up more greenfield land

In recent weeks the Prime Minister, the Government's chief scientific adviser, Sir Mark Walport, and the Science Minister, David Willetts, have all voiced support for GM crops.

Mr Paterson intends to lead a campaign among European ministers to make Brussels lift many of its restrictions on the use of GM technology.

He said: 'I am conscious of those who have concerns and who need reassurance on this matter. I recognise that we – government, industry, the scientific community and others – owe a duty to the British public to reassure them that GM is a safe, proven and beneficial innovation.'

Due to the speech's controversial content, the location where it was to be delivered was kept wraps last night to avoid it being hijacked by protesters.


Outlining what he will say, Mr Paterson told BBC Radio 4's Today show this morning that there was no evidence GM foods are harmful.

'The facts show that in other parts of the world GM is being adopted as normal practice. In 2012 there were 17 million farmers in 28 countries growing GM crops on 170 million hectares, that's 12 epr cent of the world's arable land or, very roughly, seven times the surface area of the whole of the UK.

'These crops are now established, they are part of normal life, they are part of normal agricultural production, they are part of people's everyday diets.'

He questioned the reason behind the highly charged debate about the use of GMOs.

'Is it emotion or is it evidence? There have been a whole raft of studies across the EU, there have been about 50 projects over the last 25 years on GM, 400 independent research groups.'

Peter Melchett of the Soil Association warned: 'We need farming that helps poorer African and Asian farmers produce food – not farming that helps [GM producers] Bayer, Syngenta and Monsanto produce profits.'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...ldren-die.html

[Solskeniskyn]

I took it for granted that this was some ridiculous Monsanto-lobbyist when skimming through it, then realizing that it is actually the environment secretary that is spouting this surreal shit(!). Well, ok, seing the connections of the GM-companies and the bought/interchangable FDA in the US, this is perhaps not that suprising, not to mention the level of corruption in India and other third world countries causing farmers to off themselves by the thousands as the Monsanto indebtedness squeezes the lifeblood out of them. I'll say, If GM had been around in Orwell's time, this (new)"speech" would have definitely qualified for the book.

[Solskeniskyn]

Seeds Of Death - Full Movie - YouTube

Seeds Of Death - Full Movie - YouTube

[Bev]

The DM was calling it "Frankenfood" earlier. I like that. It's very descriptive. I'm going to steal the word and claim I invented it.

Minister for Frankenfood: It IS safe and babies will die unless we give it our support, says Environment Secretary

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...food-safe.html

[Bev]

GM foods are banned from restaurants in the Houses of Parliament despite government claims it is ‘probably safer’ than other meals.

Government ministers are demanding that ordinary families should abandon their reluctance to eat genetically modified food, however they are banned from MPs’ plates.

This week the food and farming secretary, Owen Paterson, launched an extraordinary propaganda campaign to encourage the nation to accept GM crops and farming.

He bolstered his campaign with claims that some seven million children in the Far East could have been saved from blindness or death in the last 15 years if only people had opened the door to a new form of GM ‘Golden Rice’.

However, his efforts were unravelling today amid evidence that GM food is banned from the dinner tables of MPs, while his claims for the GM rice proved to be bogus.

The House of Commons Catering service today confirmed that the ban on GM ingredients which dates back to 1998 remains in place as a matter of ‘customer choice’.

It said: ‘In line with its procurement policy, the House of Commons Catering Service avoids, wherever identifiable, the procurement of foods that contain genetically modified organisms.


‘To this end, as part of the tendering process, food suppliers are required to work to a strict GM organisms policy and give assurances that goods supplied be free from genetically modified materials.’

It added: ‘The decision to avoid GMs is seen as largely a matter of customer choice.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...pposition.html

You've got to haven't you? THEY won't eat it, but don't mind us eating it.

[Bev]

David Cameron has indicated he is ‘perfectly happy’ for him and his family to eat genetically modified foods that have been deemed safe by watchdogs.

Sources close to the Prime Minister said he took the same view as Environment Secretary Owen Paterson, who said this week that he had eaten GM foods and would happily feed his children a genetically modified tomato.

As the Government launched a push to end an effective ban on GM products in British supermarkets, Downing Street repeatedly declined to say whether Mr Cameron would eat them or give them to his family.

But yesterday a source close to the Prime Minister told the Mail: ‘Of course he would happily eat GM products that have been through proper procedures.

‘Anyone who has ever eaten a meal in the United States has almost certainly eaten GM, since almost all the soya produced there has been genetically modified for many years.

‘The point is we can’t carry on damning an entire technology as “Frankenstein foods”. Surely the sensible thing is to judge each product on its merits or demerits.’

Mr Paterson prompted a row with critics of GM foods this week when he insisted that they are safer than those produced using conventional farming methods.


He blamed European resistance to the technology for depriving the Third World of products such as ‘golden rice’, which is engineered to contain high levels of vitamin A to help prevent blindness.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...lic-issue.html

Indeed, a recent survey by Which? found that 71 per cent of Britons believe GM food, and meat from animals fed on GM food, should be banned from supermarkets. A further 15 per cent are ‘undecided’. In other words, just over one in ten thinks it’s a good idea.

But in modern government, where big policy decisions are taken behind closed doors, the opinions of ordinary folk play second fiddle to the self-interested demands of big business.

The GM industry’s wealthy — but little-known — trade body, the Agricultural Biotechnology Council [ABC], seems to have decided it had a sporting chance of converting David Cameron and his administration to its cause.

Last June, it duly invited a selection of Tory ministers, high-ranking MPs and top civil servants to attend a round table discussion about GM at the Westminster Conference Centre in central London.

To the ABC’s surprise and delight, several accepted. On paper, the summit, inside a steel and glass building a stone’s throw from the Houses of Parliament, couldn’t have sounded more anodyne.

Headlined Going For Growth and held in an air-conditioned upstairs boardroom, it was billed as an informal talk between politicians and industry experts hoping to find ways of ‘realising the potential of agricultural technologies in the UK’.

Yet behind this mealy-mouthed jargon lay a pressing fact: the so-called round-table discussion was actually a carefully constructed exercise in political lobbying.

Over tea, biscuits and mineral water, the event provided representatives of foreign firms Monsanto, Bayer and Syngenta — the big three of the Frankenstein food industry — with a chance to spend two hours arguing the case for GM to ministers and their aides.

It was a priceless PR opportunity for these multi-national biotechnology companies, which fund the ABC and have a combined market value of around £100 billion.

For years, they have been prevented from selling almost all of their hugely profitable GM seed products within the EU.

A change to that rule would afford them access to a market worth billions each year — provided they could secure political backing.

The Going For Growth event, which took place on Tuesday, June 26, 2012, offered the industry a rare chance to secure that backing. Until now it has been shrouded in mystery.

Despite taking place on public property (the conference centre is run by the Department for Business), it did not receive a single mention in the popular media.


Yet via a Freedom of Information request and through conversations with attendees and their representatives, I have been able to gain an intriguing insight into proceedings.

A total of 22 guests attended, including such lofty power-brokers as science minister David Willetts, one of the most senior Conservatives in the Government, and Lord Taylor — then a minister in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA).

Also there was MP George Freeman — a prominent backbench supporter of GM, who runs an all-party group that supports the industry — and Roger Williams, a Lib Dem who sits on the science and technology select committee.

From Whitehall came four of the most high-ranking civil servants who work in the field of GM, including Mike Rowe, the Government’s head of GM policy and regulation in charge of drawing up laws governing the industry.

Lobbying this influential crew on behalf of the biotech industry were six scientists who work in GM research, along with executives from the big three GM firms, chemicals giant BASF and EuropaBio — an association for biotech companies.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...Ministers.html

[NewsFeed]

EU To Ban Heirloom Seeds and Criminalize Unregistered Gardens

Truthstream Media

TruthstreamMedia.com

January 11th, 2014


If the global domination is allowed to take root, biotech and Big Agra will control the world food supply, at the expense of personal liberty.

Because independence is the greatest of all crimes under the emerging global government, which essentially works to protect the dominance established by the biggest of corporations, who participate, in turn, as de facto members of the ruling oligarchy – and in baby steps through the EU, and emerging North American Union, the Trans-Pacific Partnership , et al.

Related : Trans-Pacific Partnership Breaks Down Sovereignty and GMO Protections via Intellectual Property Rights

The U.S. has already seen its fair share of cases where backyard gardens and rain collectors are raided by SWAT teams, shut down through regulations and otherwise intimidated out of proliferation.

Now, official policies to support this kind of dominance by biotech, pesticide companies and other plays in big agribusiness are being pushed through in Europe, in this case by the European Commission through a truly bunk proposed law .

Arjun Walia, from Collective-Evolution.com , writes:

The European Commission is changing the European Union’s plant legislation, apparently to enhance food safety across the continent. This move has sparked a heavy opposition from many, saying that the measure will threaten seed diversity and favour large agrochemical businesses. This new law creates new powers to classify and regulate all plant life anywhere in Europe.

The “Plant Reproductive Material Law” regulates all plants. It contains restrictions on vegetables and woodland trees, as well as all other plants of any species. It will be illegal to grow, reproduce, or trade any vegetable seed or tree that has not been been tested and approved by the government, more specifically the “EU Plant Variety Agency.” [...] The new law basically puts the government in charge of all plants and seeds in Europe, and prevents home gardeners from growing their own plants from non-regulated seeds. If they did, they would now be considered criminals.

If this takes root as law in Europe and elsewhere, it will contribute towards the total subjugation of the people to the undue powers granted to biotech and Big Agra.

The Real Seed Catalogue has warned about this tyrannical law and the business interests behind it. They say that under this bad law, “ It costs nearly £3000 to test & register just one single variety of seed for sale “:

This law will immediately stop the professional development of vegetable varieties for home gardeners, organic growers and small scale market farmers. Home gardeners have really different needs – for example they grow by hand, not machine, and can’t or don’t want to use such powerful chemical sprays. There’s no way to register the varieties suitable for home use as they don’t meet the strict criteria of the Plant Variety Agency, which is only concerned about approving the sort of seed used by industrial farmers – Ben Gabel, Director of The Real Seed Catalogue

According to the Real Seed Catalogue , the bill was heard by the EU Environment and Agriculture committees, but has been reworked due to significant public outcry. As of Nov. 2013, they reported , “ The feedback we’re getting from all the MEPs is that they are receiving hundreds of emails, and they really know that there is a problem and that gardeners are worried! “

A community petition posted on Avaaz.org titled “We don’t accept this. Let us keep our seeds EU!” is nearing 100,000 signatures and may have worthwhile influence in convincing Europe’s unelected bureaucrats to drop this ridiculous corporate interest law. Click here to view and sign.

Additionally, you can personalize the form letter posted on the Real Seed Catalogue and send it to the appropriate members of the European Parliament to let them know the public is watching with disdain.

This kind of tactic was literally used in the occupation of Iraq, by the way, where Bush appointee Paul Bremmer instituted the so-called 100 Orders of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) that in one part forced Iraqi farmers to use only registered seeds , essentially jeopardizing thousands of thousands of years of heirloom seed agriculture, dating back to Mesopotamia.

Instead, it strong armed most farmers into using genetically-modified seeds – even as new corporate friendly agricultural cropped up to grow a brand new corn industry to grow, in turn to grow fodder for its brand new beef cattle industry.

As Global Research aptly explained in their 2005 article, “ Biopiracy and GMOS: The Fate of Iraq’s Agriculture “:

Order 81 deals specifically with Plant Variety Protection (PVP) because it is designed to protect the commercial interests of corporate seed companies. Its aim is to force Iraqi farmers to plant so-called “protected” crop varieties ‘defined as new, distinct uniform and stable’, and most likely genetically modified. This means Iraqi farmers will have one choice; to buy PVP registered seeds. Order 81 opens the way for patenting (ownership) of plant forms, and facilitates the introduction of genetically modified crops or organisms (GMOs) to Iraq. U.S. agricultural biotechnology corporations, such as Monsanto and Syngenta will be the beneficiaries. [4] Iraqi farmers will be forced to buy their seeds from these corporations. GMOs will replace the old tradition of breeding closely related plants, and replace them with organisms composed of DNA from an altogether different species, e.g., bacterium genes into corn. In the long run, there won’t be a big enough gene pool for genetic viability.

Upon purchasing the patented seeds, farmers must sign the company’s technology agreement (Technology User Agreements). This agreement allows the company to control farmers’ practices and conduct property investigation. The farmer becomes the slave of the company. Like U.S. farmers, Iraqi farmers will be “harassed for doing

----- snip -----


read full article at source: http://www.thedailysheeple.com/eu-to...gardens_012014

[Bev]

I was reading about this the other day:

NaturalNews) A new law proposed by the European Commission would make it illegal to "grow, reproduce or trade" any vegetable seeds that have not been "tested, approved and accepted" by a new EU bureaucracy named the "EU Plant Variety Agency."

It's called the Plant Reproductive Material Law, and it attempts to put the government in charge of virtually all plants and seeds. Home gardeners who grow their own plants from non-regulated seeds would be considered criminals under this law.

The draft text of the law, which has already been amended several times due to a huge backlash from gardeners, is viewable here.

"This law will immediately stop the professional development of vegetable varieties for home gardeners, organic growers, and small-scale market farmers," said Ben Gabel, vegetable breeder and director of The Real Seed Catalogue. "Home gardeners have really different needs - for example they grow by hand, not machine, and can't or don't want to use such powerful chemical sprays. There's no way to register the varieties suitable for home use as they don't meet the strict criteria of the Plant Variety Agency, which is only concerned about approving the sort of seed used by industrial farmers."

Virtually all plants, vegetable seeds and gardeners to eventually be registered by government
All governments are, of course, infatuated with the idea of registering everybody and everything. Under Title IV of the proposed EU law:

Title IV Registration of varieties in national and Union registers
The varieties, in order to be made available on the market throughout the Union, shall be included in a national register or in the Union register via direct application procedure to the CVPO.

Gardeners must also pay fees to the EU bureaucracy for the registration of their seeds. From the proposed law text:

The competent authorities and the CPVO should charge fees for the processing of
applications, the formal and technical examinations including audits, variety denomination, and the maintenance of the varieties for each year for the duration of
the registration.

While this law may initially only be targeted at commercial gardeners, it sets a precedent to sooner or later go after home gardeners and require them to abide by the same insane regulations.

Government bureaucracy gone insane
"This is an instance of bureaucracy out of control," says Ben Gabel. "All this new law does is create a whole new raft of EU civil servants being paid to move mountains of papers round all day, while killing off the seed supply to home gardeners and interfering with the right of farmers to grow what they want. It also very worrying that they have given themselves the power to regulate and licence any plant species of any sort at all in the future - not just agricultural plants, but grasses, mosses, flowers, anything at all - without having to bring it back to the Council for a vote."

As a hint of the level of insane bureaucracy that gardeners and vegetable growers will be subject to under this EU law, check out this language from the proposed EU law:

Specific provisions are set out on the registration in the Union variety register and with regard to the possibility for the applicant to launch an appeal against a CPVO decision. Such provisions are not laid down for the registration in the national variety
registers, because they are subject to national administrative procedures. A new obligation for each national variety examination centre to be audited by the CPVO will be introduced with the aim to ensure the quality and harmonisation of the variety registration process in the Union. The examination centre of the professional operators will be audited and approved by the national competent authorities. In case of direct application to the CPVO it will audit and approve the examination centres it uses for variety examination.

Such language is, of course, Orwellian bureaucraticspeak that means only one thing: All gardeners should prepare to be subjected to total government insanity over seeds, vegetables and home gardens.

htt p://w ww.naturalnews.com/040214_seeds_european_commission_registration.html

I've bolded the only bit you really need to know. Basically what it means for the average person is that only treated seeds will be available to buy and f**k anyone who tries to avoid ingesting unnecessary chemicals.

[Mike in Denver]

This is possibly the most dangerous, to us normal folk, new moves by any government in the world. It's spreading to the US as well, though so far mostly to livestock and front yard gardens.

Here in Denver over the last few years home gardening has taken off. I still am surprised when I start talking to someone for the first time and find out that they are growing a good deal of their own food. Denver has possibly one of the worst growing seasons in the US. We're only at just under 40 deg. north latitude, but we are at more than a mile altitude -- my house is at its base 5415 feet. Still people here are growing food...and raising chickens. A lot of very small dairys (or is it dairies?) have sprung up in Colorado selling excellent, mostly goat milk and other dairy products. Greenhouses are springing up here and there, small, medium, and soon to come, huge.

But, there is an undercurrent here that people only barely talk about that one day the Feds will roll in and shut it all down. They've done it elsewhere.

Mike

[Bev]

Originally Posted by Mike in Denver

This is possibly the most dangerous, to us normal folk, new moves by any government in the world. It's spreading to the US as well, though so far mostly to livestock and front yard gardens.

Here in Denver over the last few years home gardening has taken off. I still am surprised when I start talking to someone for the first time and find out that they are growing a good deal of their own food. Denver has possibly one of the worst growing seasons in the US. We're only at just under 40 deg. north latitude, but we are at more than a mile altitude -- my house is at its base 5415 feet. Still people here are growing food...and raising chickens. A lot of very small dairys (or is it dairies?) have sprung up in Colorado selling excellent, mostly goat milk and other dairy products. Greenhouses are springing up here and there, small, medium, and soon to come, huge.

But, there is an undercurrent here that people only barely talk about that one day the Feds will roll in and shut it all down. They've done it elsewhere.

Mike

I just don't get it. I mean, I can sort of see them (not that I agree with it) - from a health point of view - wanting to stop people from selling produce to others (who knows if the dairy produce is coming from healthy animals?) but really, what damage can be done by buying a bag of tomatoes from one of the local allotment holders or swapping fruit and veg with neighbours?

It's a real shame for those who just want a tomato plant and a half dozen lettuces and of course a shame for everyone who wants to grow their own on a larger scale. I can see seeds being the next "must stockpile" item.

[Dawn Cannon]

Looking back at what they did to Iraq:


For generations, small farmers in Iraq operated in an essentially unregulated, informal seed supply system. Farm-saved seed and the free innovation with and exchange of planting materials among farming communities has long been the basis of agricultural practice. This is now history. The CPA has made it illegal for Iraqi farmers to re-use seeds harvested from new varieties registered under the law. Iraqis may continue to use and save from their traditional seed stocks or what’s left of them after the years of war and drought, but that is the not the agenda for reconstruction embedded in the ruling. The purpose of the law is to facilitate the establishment of a new seed market in Iraq, where transnational corporations can sell their seeds – genetically modified or not, which farmers would have to purchase afresh every single cropping season.

While historically the Iraqi constitution prohibited private ownership of biological resources, the new US-imposed patent law introduces a system of monopoly rights over seeds. Inserted into Iraq's previous patent law is a whole new chapter on Plant Variety Protection (PVP) that provides for the "protection of new varieties of plants." PVP is an intellectual property right (IPR) or a kind of patent for plant varieties which gives an exclusive monopoly right on planting material to a plant breeder who claims to have discovered or developed a new variety. So the "protection" in PVP has nothing to do with conservation, but refers to safeguarding of the commercial interests of private breeders (usually large corporations) claiming to have created the new plants.
http://www.grain.org/article/entries...gainst-farmers

[Bev]

Originally Posted by Dawn Cannon

Looking back at what they did to Iraq:


For generations, small farmers in Iraq operated in an essentially unregulated, informal seed supply system. Farm-saved seed and the free innovation with and exchange of planting materials among farming communities has long been the basis of agricultural practice. This is now history. The CPA has made it illegal for Iraqi farmers to re-use seeds harvested from new varieties registered under the law. Iraqis may continue to use and save from their traditional seed stocks or what’s left of them after the years of war and drought, but that is the not the agenda for reconstruction embedded in the ruling. The purpose of the law is to facilitate the establishment of a new seed market in Iraq, where transnational corporations can sell their seeds – genetically modified or not, which farmers would have to purchase afresh every single cropping season.

While historically the Iraqi constitution prohibited private ownership of biological resources, the new US-imposed patent law introduces a system of monopoly rights over seeds. Inserted into Iraq's previous patent law is a whole new chapter on Plant Variety Protection (PVP) that provides for the "protection of new varieties of plants." PVP is an intellectual property right (IPR) or a kind of patent for plant varieties which gives an exclusive monopoly right on planting material to a plant breeder who claims to have discovered or developed a new variety. So the "protection" in PVP has nothing to do with conservation, but refers to safeguarding of the commercial interests of private breeders (usually large corporations) claiming to have created the new plants.
http://www.grain.org/article/entries...gainst-farmers

I wasn't aware of any of that - thanks for posting it. It seems similar to the law they're trying to enforce in Europe and the US.

Come 2020, the British diet is going to be deep fried cockroaches with a side order of GM monopoly potatoes and washed down with a nice cold glass of filtered toilet water. It's not all bad - there will be cloned or petri dish or whatever it was beef product for special occasions.

[Bev]

A genetically modified crop boosted with a dietary supplement could be grown for the first time in Britain as early as this year following a request by scientists to conduct a controversial field trial at a heavily-protected research site in Hertfordshire.


The government-funded researchers have applied this week for formal permission to grow the first GM plants that are designed to produce high yields of the same omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil, which are linked with a healthy diet.

They could receive the go-ahead within three months and the first GM seeds could be sown this spring on the same high-security plot of land within the large estate owned by Rothamsted Research in Harpenden, where GM wheat trials took place successfully over the previous two years without being destroyed by activists.

If the fish-oil field trials are successful, the technology could be used to produce food that is enriched with the omega-3 fatty acids linked with alleged health benefits such as a lower risk of cardiovascular disease – although the scientific support for these claims is mixed.

The GM crop fortified with the genes for making fish oil is among the first of a new generation of genetically engineering food plants designed to boost vital dietary supplements – so-called “nutraceuticals”. Anti-GM activists in the Philippines last year destroyed field trials of GM “golden rice”, which is fortified with genes for precursors to vitamin A.

Wary of public opposition to the trial, the Rothamsted researchers emphasised that they are more interested in showing it is possible to produce commercial quantities of omega-3 fatty acids to supply the fish-meal market for farmed fish which currently accounts for 80 per cent of the omega-3 fish oils harvested from wild-caught marine organisms.

Rothamsted Research applied on Monday for a licence to conduct the field trial from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. The scientists could be given the go-ahead within 90 days, following a public consultation and an inquiry by the government’s scientific committee overseeing the release of GM organisms into the environment.

GM crops could help to solve the problem of over-fishing

The open-air field trial behind a high wire fence and 24hr CCTV will involve the planting of a flax-like plant called Camelina sativa engineered with synthetic omega-3 genes that trigger the production of the “fish oil” in the seeds of the harvested crop.

Although omega-3 is often described as fish oil, it is in fact made by microscopic marine algae that are eaten or absorbed by fish. Among the many health claims made about omega-3, the strongest relate to its supposed benefits in reducing the risk of heart disease – although some medical authorities have questioned the evidence.

“Despite claims that fish oil supplements can help prevent numerous conditions including cancer, dementia, arthritis and heart problems, there is little hard evidence for them,” says the advice on the NHS website.

However, the scientists from Rothamsted Research said today that the main aim of the research is to produce GM crops that could be made into food for farmed fish, which cannot grow healthily without a diet rich in omega-3 fatty acids, currently derived from wild-caught marine organisms.

Farmed fish grown in cages are unable to absorb sufficient omega-3 in their diets so they have to be fed on smaller fish, such as sandeels, caught in the wild. The scientists said the practice is unsustainable and it would be better for the environment to produce fish feed enhanced with omega-3 derived from GM farm crops.

“I honestly believe there is an opportunity for our plant-derived fish oil to be a sustainable source of terrestrial fish oils for the fish-farming industry,” said Professor Jonathan Napier, the project’s lead scientist at Rothamsted.

“In general, ultimately down the line, you could also imagine using plant-derived oils as another source of fish oils for human consumption… Fish oils are known to be important for human health and nutrition and they have a proven role in reducing cardiovascular disease. However, global fish stocks are in decline,” Professor Napier said.

At the same time, the human population is growing and demand for fish oil will continue to increase, he said. “It is difficult to imagine how everyone on the planet can have equal access to these important fatty acids,” he added.

Helen Wallace, director of GeneWatch UK said that omega-3 fish oils have recently been implicated in raising the risk of prostate cancer, and it is not clear whether GM-derived fish oils will be safe for human or animal consumption.

“GM crops with altered oil content raise new safety issues for consumers. It is hard to predict the effects on health because many nutrients will be changed and some could be harmful for some people,” Dr Wallace said.

“If these plants are grown to feed to fish, the oil content of the fish will also require testing. And there will be questions about the use of land that could be used for food. People will also want these products to be labelled and consumers may not want to buy them,” she said.
What are omega-3 fatty acids

Omega-3 fatty acids are made up of a complicated soup of large, organic molecules that are variously described as being good for human health. Oily fish are particularly rich in certain types of omega-3 fatty acids linked with a healthy diet, notably EPA and DHA fatty acids.

It is a misnomer to call them “fish” oils given that fish cannot manufacture these substances – they are in fact made by microscopic marine algae that are eaten or absorbed by the fish. This is why farmed fish need omega-3 fatty acids to be added to their diet.

The Rothamsted Research scientists have copied and synthesised the genes from the algae that are involved in the manufacture of EPA and DHA fatty acids. They have stitched these gene copies into a plant called Camelina sativa, known as “false flax”, which is widely grown in parts of Europe and North America for its seed oil.

The scientists hope to develop an alternative source of omega-3 fatty acids that can be fed to farmed fish – about 80 per cent of the world’s supply of ocean-derived fish oil is fed to farmed fish. They believe that growing GM crops on arable land will be more sustainable and better for the environment than trawling the sea for small fish in order to feed them to bigger fish.

htt p://ww w.independent.co.uk/news/science/first-nutrientenriched-gm-crops-could-be-grown-in-the-uk-within-months-9081305.html

Don't blame the EU for this, Call-Me:

Euro MPs have voted to give EU member states more flexibility to restrict or ban genetically modified crops on environmental or health grounds.

The draft legislation, still to be discussed by EU governments, would enable countries to go beyond the EU-wide mechanism for regulating GM crops.

ht tp://ww w.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14045365

The only conclusion one can come to is that Call-Me wants to eat it himself:

The House of Commons is continuing to bar genetically modified food from its restaurants and cafés, despite a drive by ministers for the technology to be more widely accepted.

ht tp://w ww.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/10135908/GM-foods-kept-off-the-menu-at-Westminster.html

So is it safe or not? Someone must eat it, so what do the makers say?

Monsanto, the biggest promoter of genetically modified food, was hoist with its own petar when it was disclosed that it has a staff canteen in which GM produce is banned.

h ttp://w ww.independent.co.uk/environment/gm-food-banned-in-monsanto-canteen-737948.html

[Bev]

Found this site - it has all sorts of debunk articles for anyone arguing against GM. Purple tomatoes that can cure cancer - debunked. Weeds that change colour if near landmines - debunked and so on.

http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php/sav...with-a-gm-weed

Food crisis fears prompt UN to call for a move away from intensive farming and GMOs to greater sustainability.

UNCTAD's Trade and Environment Review 2013:
Wake up before it is too late: Make agriculture truly sustainable now for food security in a changing climate


1.Wake Up and Smell the Soil! Groundbreaking UN Report on the Paradigm Shift Needed to Feed the Future
2.Food crisis fears prompt UN wake-up call to world leaders

(merging with the heirloom seeds thread because I think these two might be long lost distant relatives and so will be happier together.)

[Bev]

A genetically modified crop boosted with a dietary supplement could be grown for the first time in Britain as early as this year following a request by scientists to conduct a controversial field trial at a heavily-protected research site in Hertfordshire.

The government-funded researchers have applied this week for formal permission to grow the first GM plants that are designed to produce high yields of the same omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil, which are linked with a healthy diet.

They could receive the go-ahead within three months and the first GM seeds could be sown this spring on the same high-security plot of land within the large estate owned by Rothamsted Research in Harpenden, where GM wheat trials took place successfully over the previous two years without being destroyed by activists.

If the fish-oil field trials are successful, the technology could be used to produce food that is enriched with the omega-3 fatty acids linked with alleged health benefits such as a lower risk of cardiovascular disease – although the scientific support for these claims is mixed.

The GM crop fortified with the genes for making fish oil is among the first of a new generation of genetically engineering food plants designed to boost vital dietary supplements – so-called “nutraceuticals”. Anti-GM activists in the Philippines last year destroyed field trials of GM “golden rice”, which is fortified with genes for precursors to vitamin A.

Wary of public opposition to the trial, the Rothamsted researchers emphasised that they are more interested in showing it is possible to produce commercial quantities of omega-3 fatty acids to supply the fish-meal market for farmed fish which currently accounts for 80 per cent of the omega-3 fish oils harvested from wild-caught marine organisms.

Rothamsted Research applied on Monday for a licence to conduct the field trial from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. The scientists could be given the go-ahead within 90 days, following a public consultation and an inquiry by the government’s scientific committee overseeing the release of GM organisms into the environment.

GM crops could help to solve the problem of over-fishing

The open-air field trial behind a high wire fence and 24hr CCTV will involve the planting of a flax-like plant called Camelina sativa engineered with synthetic omega-3 genes that trigger the production of the “fish oil” in the seeds of the harvested crop.

Although omega-3 is often described as fish oil, it is in fact made by microscopic marine algae that are eaten or absorbed by fish. Among the many health claims made about omega-3, the strongest relate to its supposed benefits in reducing the risk of heart disease – although some medical authorities have questioned the evidence.

“Despite claims that fish oil supplements can help prevent numerous conditions including cancer, dementia, arthritis and heart problems, there is little hard evidence for them,” says the advice on the NHS website.

However, the scientists from Rothamsted Research said today that the main aim of the research is to produce GM crops that could be made into food for farmed fish, which cannot grow healthily without a diet rich in omega-3 fatty acids, currently derived from wild-caught marine organisms.

Farmed fish grown in cages are unable to absorb sufficient omega-3 in their diets so they have to be fed on smaller fish, such as sandeels, caught in the wild. The scientists said the practice is unsustainable and it would be better for the environment to produce fish feed enhanced with omega-3 derived from GM farm crops.

“I honestly believe there is an opportunity for our plant-derived fish oil to be a sustainable source of terrestrial fish oils for the fish-farming industry,” said Professor Jonathan Napier, the project’s lead scientist at Rothamsted.

“In general, ultimately down the line, you could also imagine using plant-derived oils as another source of fish oils for human consumption… Fish oils are known to be important for human health and nutrition and they have a proven role in reducing cardiovascular disease. However, global fish stocks are in decline,” Professor Napier said.

At the same time, the human population is growing and demand for fish oil will continue to increase, he said. “It is difficult to imagine how everyone on the planet can have equal access to these important fatty acids,” he added.

Helen Wallace, director of GeneWatch UK said that omega-3 fish oils have recently been implicated in raising the risk of prostate cancer, and it is not clear whether GM-derived fish oils will be safe for human or animal consumption.

“GM crops with altered oil content raise new safety issues for consumers. It is hard to predict the effects on health because many nutrients will be changed and some could be harmful for some people,” Dr Wallace said.

“If these plants are grown to feed to fish, the oil content of the fish will also require testing. And there will be questions about the use of land that could be used for food. People will also want these products to be labelled and consumers may not want to buy them,” she said.
What are omega-3 fatty acids

Omega-3 fatty acids are made up of a complicated soup of large, organic molecules that are variously described as being good for human health. Oily fish are particularly rich in certain types of omega-3 fatty acids linked with a healthy diet, notably EPA and DHA fatty acids.

It is a misnomer to call them “fish” oils given that fish cannot manufacture these substances – they are in fact made by microscopic marine algae that are eaten or absorbed by the fish. This is why farmed fish need omega-3 fatty acids to be added to their diet.

The Rothamsted Research scientists have copied and synthesised the genes from the algae that are involved in the manufacture of EPA and DHA fatty acids. They have stitched these gene copies into a plant called Camelina sativa, known as “false flax”, which is widely grown in parts of Europe and North America for its seed oil.

The scientists hope to develop an alternative source of omega-3 fatty acids that can be fed to farmed fish – about 80 per cent of the world’s supply of ocean-derived fish oil is fed to farmed fish. They believe that growing GM crops on arable land will be more sustainable and better for the environment than trawling the sea for small fish in order to feed them to bigger fish.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/sc...s-9081305.html

So it's about messing with fish - the one food source that they can't currently control, influence or mess with via antibiotics or pesticides or whatnot.

Problem with over-fishing? Or a problem with too much demand for food?

[Bev]

EU bureaucrats want new powers that would allow their inspectors to remove any plants on the Brussels hit list.

Garden favourites such as the Virginia creeper and Hottentot fig are likely to be top of the list along with several types of rhododendron.

The aim is to eliminate invasive non-native species that threaten to cause problems in the countryside.

However, the Royal Horticultural Society last night expressed its concern at the secrecy behind the decision-making and warned that whole species, including garden hybrids, could end up being banned.

Under the new rules, authorities will have the power to come into people’s homes and destroy plants, including popular shrubs such as cotoneasters, which could well be on the banned list.

The measure, which prevents the import, transportation or ownership of a banned plant, will be voted on by the European Parliament next month.

In spite of a year-long consult*ation, it is still unclear just how many species will be subject to the ban or what criteria are being used to compile the list.

The RHS’s chief scientist Dr John David said: “Our concern lies around the definition of species they are using. It’s so inclusive that totally innocuous plants could become subject to the regulation.

“At present, Defra [Environment Department] has strict guidelines for its list of restricted plants. You are not allowed to plant any of those plants in the wild and it works well.

The draft of the laws, issued nine months ago, originally had a limit of 50 species to be banned but that limit has gone and it could potentially be a lot more. We have no idea and that’s the most worrying part.

“You are looking at potential bans on something which, say, is causing a problem in the heat of southern Spain but would not be a problem in the slightest in northern Scotland.

“Rhododendron luteum is quite widespread in Britain’s gardens. It has yellow flowers and is sweetly scented. It is escaping into the environment and it is limited on [Defra’s] schedule nine but we are not aware of it doing any harm in the wild.

Plants listed as restrictive could be removed from British gardens [REX]

“Britain has many species growing in the wild that aren’t native species and most aren’t causing any problems. There are, however, plants like the Himalayan balsam which excludes other species. If you try to move it then it can damage the riverbank, so we accept this.”

Earlier this year the RHS expressed its concerns about the proposed EU regulation during a Commons Environment Audit *Committee meeting on invasive non-native species.

According to the European Commission, alien species are one of the major causes of biodiversity loss and species extinction. They can also spread disease and cause health problems such as asthma, dermatitis and allergies.

Officials argue that they can *damage infrastructure, forestry and agriculture with an estimated cost to the EU of £10billion a year.

The proposed ban on possessing such plants goes far beyond the existing regulations on non-native species in England.

In Scotland, the Wildlife and Nat*ural Environment Act does give the authorities power to enter property to destroy suspect plants, though there is no ban on possession.

The original cap of 50 species was rejected by most EU member states, leaving it unclear how many will be subject to the ban.

Dr David added: “How this new rule is interpreted is a concern if it is applied very strictly in terms of amateur gardening.


“We grow more plants than any other country in Europe, even the Dutch. A conservative estimate is around the 100,000 mark. We are seen very much as the people who look after rare plants and there are all the specialist societies for chrysanthemum and orchids.

“Since we grow a heck of a lot of plants these regulations do impact more on us than any other country.

“If you are not allowed to trade in them and you are not allowed to own them, these innocuous plants that are not causing any problems to anyone will be at risk.

“While the RHS welcomes sensible and proportionate steps to *prevent the spread of invasive non-native species, it believes this new regulation is too rigid, especially in its stipulation that a species listed as invasive in one EU country would be banned in all countries, regardless of whether or not they pose a threat.

“The RHS is keen to see any EU regulation recognise regional *differences to avoid ornamental plants which pose no threat in the UK being banned because they are considered a problem in other EU countries.”

ht tp://w ww.express.co.uk/news/nature/463863/EU-rules-let-inspectors-dig-up-our-gardens-for-plant-threats

Marvellous, innit? All the problems in our countries - many of them caused by the EU - and they're bitching about a few flowers.

[Bev]

A new report on genetically modified (GM) crops, commissioned by the prime minister, calls for more UK field trials and fewer EU restrictions.

The Council for Science and Technology (CST) wants "public good" GM varieties to be grown and tested in the UK.

It says GM crops should be assessed individually - like pharmaceuticals - taking potential benefits into account.

A new UK regulator similar to NICE (the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) should be set up, it says.

The UK is a world leader in plant biotechnology research, but GM field trial applications have fallen from 37 in 1995 to just one in 2012.




Environment Secretary Owen Paterson has spoken in favour of increasing UK research into GM, which he said offers the "most wonderful opportunities to improve human health."

The CST was asked by Prime Minister David Cameron for the latest evidence on the risks and benefits of GM technologies in agriculture, and for advice on UK and EU regulation.

In turn, it commissioned a group of leading plant scientists from Rothamsted Research, The Sainsbury Laboratory and Cambridge University to make recommendations to the prime minister.

The scientists say they are being held back by strict EU regulations - based on the principle that GM crops are inherently more dangerous than conventionally-bred varieties.

Only two GM varieties have been licensed for commercial harvest in Europe - despite the fact that 12% of the world's arable land is cultivating GM crops.

The CST report argues GM crops have now been shown to be safe - and may be necessary in future for Britain to grow its own food supply, rather than depending on imports.

It says the UK should regulate commercial GM varieties of wheat and potatoes based on their individual benefits and risks - rather than follow the EU's blanket approach.

It also recommends a new programme of publicly-funded field trials to test "public good" GM crop varieties, which it calls "PubGM".

"Public good" traits could include nutritional enhancement, such as antioxidants in tomatoes, or vitamin A in "Golden Rice".

They could also include "climate-proofing" properties such as drought resistance or heat resistance.

"With PubGM, seed companies, consumers and regulators will be able to decide, based on results of experiments, whether a GM trait has proved its worth in UK crops under UK conditions," said Professor Jonathan Jones from The Sainsbury Laboratory, one of the report's authors.


Sir Mark Walport, chief scientific adviser and CST co-chair, said: "We take it for granted that because our shelves in supermarkets are heaving with food there are no problems in food security. But there are.

"We're part of a global food market. Competition is likely to increase. The world is already malnourished and the population is growing.

"The challenge is to get more yield from the same area. GM is not a magic bullet, but it is one of a range of technologies that we should consider."

The report was welcomed by Dr Julian Little, chair of the Agricultural Biotechnology Council (ABC), which represents companies including BASF, Monsanto and Syngenta.

"Current EU regulation has moved in the direction of increasing political influence and undermining science.

"Europe risks being left behind and it therefore remains essential that action is taken to address the dysfunctional EU approvals process so that UK farmers may, in the future, be able to realise the potential of great British biotechnology research right here in the UK."

But the environmental group Friends of the Earth say GM will not make food more affordable or sustainable.

"GM crops have been hugely over-hyped. Despite decades of research they have failed to deliver the benefits they have promised - and have been an expensive distraction from real solutions to the challenges we face," said senior food campaigner Vicki Hird.

"Our food production system needs a radical overhaul to ensure everyone has access to healthy, affordable food that doesn't wreck the planet - but putting more power into the hands of multi-nationals is not the answer."

Prof Cathie Martin, of the John Innes Centre, one of the creators of GM purple tomatoes, said changing regulations would help scientists make progress with GM varieties that benefit society.

She told BBC News: "It takes 10 years to get European regulators to approve a new GM trial, and costs in the order of $150m. How can any small company do that?"

"NGOs complain that GM only benefits multinational companies - but that's because they're the only ones who can afford it. We can't afford to trial crops for the public good.

"If this promotes field trials where you can look at something for the public good that would be fantastic."

Dan Crossley, executive director of the Food Ethics Council, said: "This report, like many focussing on GM technology, is framed around the question 'how can science and technology help secure global food supplies'.

"Instead we need to ask people at the sharp end of food insecurity what can be done - by scientists and also by others - to help fix the food system.

"In a resource-constrained world where a billion people go to bed hungry and a billion are obese, we must also tackle the scandal of food waste, as well as the issue of what we eat."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-26554969

All for the public good. What could go wrong?

[Bev]

One of agricultural biotechnology’s great success stories may become a cautionary tale of how short-sighted mismanagement can squander the benefits of genetic modification.

After years of predicting it would happen — and after years of having their suggestions largely ignored by companies, farmers and regulators — scientists have documented the rapid evolution of corn rootworms that are resistant to Bt corn.

Until Bt corn was genetically altered to be poisonous to the pests, rootworms used to cause billions of dollars in damage to U.S. crops. Named for the pesticidal toxin-producing Bacillus thuringiensis gene it contains, Bt corn now accounts for three-quarters of the U.S. corn crop. The vulnerability of this corn could be disastrous for farmers and the environment.

“Unless management practices change, it’s only going to get worse,” said Aaron Gassmann, an Iowa State University entomologist and co-author of a March 17 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study describing rootworm resistance. “There needs to be a fundamental change in how the technology is used.”

First planted in 1996, Bt corn quickly became hugely popular among U.S. farmers. Within a few years, populations of rootworms and corn borers, another common corn pest, had plummeted across the midwest. Yields rose and farmers reduced their use of conventional insecticides that cause more ecological damage than the Bt toxin.

By the turn of the millennium, however, scientists who study the evolution of insecticide resistance were warning of imminent problems. Any rootworm that could survive Bt exposures would have a wide-open field in which to reproduce; unless the crop was carefully managed, resistance would quickly emerge.

Key to effective management, said the scientists, were refuges set aside and planted with non-Bt corn. Within these fields, rootworms would remain susceptible to the Bt toxin. By mating with any Bt-resistant worms that chanced to evolve in neighboring fields, they’d prevent resistance from building up in the gene pool.

But the scientists’ own recommendations — an advisory panel convened in 2002 by the EPA suggested that a full 50 percent of each corn farmer’s fields be devoted to these non-Bt refuges — were resisted by seed companies and eventually the EPA itself, which set voluntary refuge guidelines at between 5 and 20 percent. Many farmers didn’t even follow those recommendations.

Fast forward to 2009, when Gassmann responded to reports of extensive rootworm damage in Bt cornfields in northeast Iowa. Populations there had become resistant to one of the three Bt corn varieties. (Each variety produces a different type of Bt toxin.) He described that resistance in a 2011 study; around the same time, reports of rootworm-damaged Bt corn came in from parts of Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota. These didn’t represent a single outbreak, but rather the emergence, again and again, of resistance.

In the new paper, Gassmann describes further incidents of Bt resistance in other parts of Iowa. He also found rootworms resistant to a second variety of Bt corn. Moreover, being resistant to one variety heightened the chances of resistance to another. That means corn engineered to produce multiple Bt toxins — so-called stacked varieties — won’t do much to slow the evolution of rootworm resistance, as was originally hoped.

Farmers likely won’t stop using Bt corn, as it’s still effective against other pests — but as rootworms become more resistant, said Gassmann, farmers will turn to insecticides, thus increasing their costs and losing the ecological benefits originally gained by using Bt corn. As entomologists concerned by rootworm resistance wrote to the EPA in 2012, “When insecticides overlay transgenic technology, the economic and environmental advantages of rootworm-*protected corn quickly disappear.”

Entomologist Bruce Tabashnik of the University of Arizona called Bt resistance “an increasingly serious problem,” and said that refuge sizes need to be increased dramatically and immediately. He and other scientists have pushed the EPA to double current refuge requirements, but so far without success.

“Biotech companies have successfully lobbied EPA for major reductions in refuge requirements,” said Tabashnik.

Entomologist Elson Shields of Cornell University agrees. “Resistance was caused because the farmers did not plant the required refuges and the companies did not enforce the planting of refuges,” said Shields, who has written that “a widespread increase in trait failure may be just around the corner.”

In addition to increasing refuge sizes, farmers also need to vary the crops planted on their fields, rather than planting corn season after season, said Gassmann. Breaks in the corn cycle naturally disrupt rootworm populations, but the approach fell from favor as the high price of corn made continuous planting appealing. “Continuous corn is the perfect habitat for rootworm,” said Gassmann.

Shields also lamented the difficulty he and other academic scientists long experienced when trying to study Bt corn. Until 2010, after organized objections by entomologists at major agricultural universities forced seed companies to allow outside researchers to study Bt corn, the crop was largely off-limits. Had that not been the case, said Shields, resistance could have been detected even earlier, and perhaps stalled before it threatened to become such a problem.

“Once we had legal access, resistance was documented in a year,” Shields said. “We were seeing failures earlier but were not allowed to test for resistance.”

There’s a lesson to be learned for future crop traits, Shields said. Rootworm resistance was expected from the outset, but the Bt seed industry, seeking to maximize short-term profits, ignored outside scientists. The next pest-fighting trait “will fall under the same pressure,” said Shields, “and the insect will win. Always bet on the insect if there is not a smart deployment of the trait.”

ht tp://ww w.thesleuthjournal.com/voracious-worm-evolves-eat-biotech-corn-engineered-kill/

So this is another side effect of the whole GM experiment - they develop a seed with in-built insecticide and so the insect evolves into a super-insect in order to survive. And now we need a stronger insecticide to continue growing this particular crop.....