That GM is not the answer to the world’s cropping problems has been evident for a long time, but in the past few days there’s been a flurry of new evidence. First, a panel of 400 experts working for the world food programme concluded:
“Assessment of the technology lags behind its development, information is anecdotal and contradictory, and uncertainty about possible benefits and damage is unavoidable.”
And a study of soybeans, one of the two great “successes” of GM, has found thatyields of GM crops are lower than their naturally bred relatives.
He grew a Monsanto GM soybean and an almost identical conventional variety in the same field. The modified crop produced only 70 bushels of grain per acre, compared with 77 bushels from the non-GM one.
The GM crop – engineered to resist Monsanto’s own weedkiller, Roundup – recovered only when he added extra manganese, leading to suggestions that the modification hindered the crop’s take-up of the essential element from the soil. Even with the addition it brought the GM soya’s yield to equal that of the conventional one, rather than surpassing it.
Another earlier study suggested two factors at work: 1. while you are GMming a variety, standard selection for desirable traits such as yield is continuing, while you’ve stood still, and 2. the modification reduces productivity.
The Ecologist (admittedly not exactly an unbiased source) sets out the full case against GM. (Hat-tip to Ruscombe Green for that one.
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