Competition and Innovation: Did Monsantoos Entry Encourage Innovation in GMO Crops?

Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have been contentious for more than three decades. Only 24 countries grow GMOs commercially. Four countries (USA, Canada, Brazil and Argentina) account for 85% of the global GMO hectares. Four crops (soy, corn, cotton and canola) account for 99% of GM hectares. Despite the veneer of social validity that regulators cast, the GMO sector has failed to gain a social licence. Where GM labelling is required, food manufacturers avoid GM ingredients. GMOs have failed to gain price parity with their non-GM counterparts, and they attract price penalties. Segregation of GMOs and non-GMOs has failed (with a tolerance of 0.9% GM contamination in so-called non-GM canola). GM has failed the coexistence test with a GMO growers contaminating neighbouring farms. GMOs are a biosecurity fail, with test plots of GM canola planted in the late 1990s still monitored two decades later for rogue canola plants. Most GMO crops are glyphosate dependent. Glyphosate is globally subject to massive litigation claims and awards, and is implicated in the causation of multiple cancers. Mechanisms for compensating farms contaminated by GMOs are lacking. The GMO industry has taken no responsibility for contaminations. GMOs are a threat to the organic sector and the maintenance of certification and price premiums. Most countries (88%) do not grow GMO crops. This paper considers the global experience of GMOs and the Australian experience as a microcosm of the global experience and as a case study.

Download Full-text

Ancestral Genetic Resources Provide an Alternative to GMO Crops

Ethnobotany Research and Applications ◽

10.17348/era.1.0.21-30 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 1 ◽

pp. 021

Author(s):

Mary W. Eubanks

Keyword(s):

Genetic Resources ◽

Gmo Crops

Download Full-text

Not the Same Old Chestnut

Environmental Ethics ◽

10.5840/enviroethics2020111614 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 42 (2) ◽

pp. 149-167

Author(s):

Evelyn Brister ◽

Andrew E. Newhouse ◽

Keyword(s):

Genetically Modified Organisms ◽

Genetically Modified ◽

Castanea Dentata ◽

American Chestnut ◽

Conservation Value ◽

Regulatory Review ◽

Alternative Framework ◽

Gmo Crops ◽

Conservation Values

We argue that the wild release of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) can be justified as a way of preserving species and ecosystems. We look at the case of a genetically modified American chestnut (Castanea dentata) that is currently undergoing regulatory review. Because American chestnuts are functionally extinct, a genetically modified replacement has significant conservation value. In addition, many of the arguments used against GMOs, especially GMO crops, do not hold for American chestnut trees. Finally, we show how GMOs such as the American chestnut support a reorientation of conservation values away from restoration as it has historically been interpreted, and toward an alternative framework known as rewilding.

Download Full-text