Long-term Effects of GMO Crops

[SallyA]

I'm concerned about the long-term effects of GMO crops because we really don't know what, if any, effects there are to people's health, and I grow my garden organically, saving my seeds from the current year to plant the next.

I can't help but believe eating crops that have been genetically modified to withstand Round-up, a powerful weed killer, will have devastating effects on people's health. It just doesn't make any sense to me that they would not.

As one who saves seeds from one year's garden to plant the following year, my concern is that Monsanto's GMO crops, used by 70% of the farmers in my area, will cross-pollinate with mine, especially the corn.

It's not beyond the realm of possibilities that sooner or later, all varieties of certain crops will contain GMOs. Monsanto has a patent on their Round-up Ready varieties and has been known to sue farmers whose crops have been cross pollinated with those varieties, even though it was through no desire or action on the part of the farmers.

Perhaps I'm being paranoid, but it seems to me that having corn and other patented crops that cross pollinate with non-GMO crops is a scary thought. Could we someday be forced to buy Monsanto's patented Round-up Ready corn, potatoes, and other seeds if we want to plant any crops at all? Why did our government not require more research into long-term effects of such crops before allowing widespread use? Why was a patent for a food product given to Monsanto when it had always been policy that no patents were allowed for food products? There are so many questions and so few answers.

[Midas]

I too have major concerns over the use of GM crops, based mainly around the seeming lack of long term testing that's been carried out to assure there are no unforeseen problems which might emerge way down the line. I was watching a documentary on this subject (National Geographic I think) several months ago, and it highlighted this particular aspect as being of greater importance to the safety of society as a whole than the need to 'improve' crops to meet short term agricultural problems.

We seem to far more aware of the issues with GM crops here in the UK than in the USA though, there being very strict controls on what can be planted and where, and there are very much fewer products which contain them available in the shops, and I might be open to correction here, but every product which does have a GM ingredient has to be clearly labelled as such.

[Barry]

Sudden death syndrome, GMO, Roundup, Monsanto: Scientist alleges link between GMOs and disease that's killing soybeans - latimes.com

Farmers call this "sudden death syndrome," a plant disease that has plagued the country's heartland and the nation's estimated $36.8-billion soybean industry. Scientists, who first spotted the disease in Arkansas in 1971 — more than 20 years before Monsanto introduced its Roundup Ready soybeans in the U.S. — blame damp weather and a fungus that rots the plant roots.

But, Friedrichsen said, "for years, I've wondered whether there wasn't something else."

Now, despite mountains of research to the contrary, one soil scientist is roiling the agricultural world with claims that there might be some truth to the farmer's unease.

Don M. Huber, an emeritus professor at Purdue University who has done research for Monsanto on chemical herbicides, alleges that he has found a link between genetically modified crops and crop diseases and infertility in livestock: an "unknown organism" he and other researchers claim to have discovered last summer in Midwestern fields like Friedrichsen's.

"This organism appears NEW to science!" Huber wrote in a letter in January to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack about the matter. He added, "I believe the threat we are facing from this pathogen is unique and of a high-risk status. In layman's terms, it should be treated as an emergency."

Here's some alarm bells ringing...

[Deb4953]

We seem to far more aware of the issues with GM crops here in the UK than in the USA though, there being very strict controls on what can be planted and where, and there are very much fewer products which contain them available in the shops, and I might be open to correction here, but every product which does have a GM ingredient has to be clearly labelled as such.

I live in the States and would like to clarify what is happening over here concerning GMO crops and foods. Awareness of the population is probably much greater than it seems (or that the media is portraying). Our main problem here is the FDA, and I believe the USDA is involved, too. There are no requirements for labeling of GMO foods and ingredients in foods here in the States, unlike the UK and almost every other country on earth. Also, the government has allowed farmers to plant GMO crops, especially (or maybe only right now) corn and soybeans. Planting of GMO corn and soybeans is so widespread here that around 70% or 90% (I believe it is 90%) of the corn and soybeans planted in my area is GMO.

Though people here are concerned about foods at the grocery store containing GMOs, from what I've found on the Internet, it is safe to assume that unless you buy a certain few brands from a health food store, the foods you buy, especially processed foods, contain GMOs. Without labeling requirements, which people are attempting to get passed through the government to no avail, people continue to buy products that are sure to contain GMOs.

[Olde Europe]

The mere fact that Monsanto is fighting on all (back) channels to avoid the requirement to label GM food should be enough of an indication that something really nefarious is going on here. In the land of the free, of course, the freedom to make an informed choice regarding food is being topped by Monsanto's freedom to force-feed you the sh!t they are producing without your knowledge. I am advocating violence very rarely but burning down GM crop fields is what I would consider to be legitimate self-defence.

[Deb4953]

The problem here is that our government no longer represents the people. If they did, Monsanto's GMO crops would never have been approved. There would be no reason to label foods because GMO foods would not exist.

Monsanto has the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in their back pocket. What Monsanto wants, Monsanto gets. Our congressmen and senators (lack of capitalization intentional) won't do anything because they do what big business wants, with no regard for the people or the effects on the environment.

Monsanto's freedom to force-feed you the sh!t they are producing without your knowledge.

Oh, we know that we're being fed the Monsanto-produced GMOs. All one has to do is find the lists of products on the Internet that contain them. There's not much, and probably more like nothing, produced by major companies, like Kraft, General Mills, and all the rest, that's not on the list. Even if one-half of the products on the list don't contain GMOs, there is still no way to avoid eating foods that contain them unless you buy from a small number of unknown companies that produce foods that are GMO-free. People have to eat and not labeling GMO foods allows people to have the false hope that what they are buying is GMO-free when they aren't.

[Midas]

I live in the States and would like to clarify what is happening over here concerning GMO crops and foods. Awareness of the population is probably much greater than it seems (or that the media is portraying). Our main problem here is the FDA, and I believe the USDA is involved, too. There are no requirements for labeling of GMO foods and ingredients in foods here in the States, unlike the UK and almost every other country on earth. Also, the government has allowed farmers to plant GMO crops, especially (or maybe only right now) corn and soybeans. Planting of GMO corn and soybeans is so widespread here that around 70% or 90% (I believe it is 90%) of the corn and soybeans planted in my area is GMO.

Though people here are concerned about foods at the grocery store containing GMOs, from what I've found on the Internet, it is safe to assume that unless you buy a certain few brands from a health food store, the foods you buy, especially processed foods, contain GMOs. Without labeling requirements, which people are attempting to get passed through the government to no avail, people continue to buy products that are sure to contain GMOs.

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For what it's worth though, I do largely agree with what you say about GMO. Not that I think that in themselves they won't ultimately prove to be very valuable, but simply because they're being rushed through their research and development stages far too fast and without the necessary long term studies being fully conducted.

The problems highlighted here are, I suspect, just the tip of the iceberg How accurate or unbiased these reports are I don't know, however they do provide backup evidence for the latest round of problems associated with GM crops - Microscopic fungus threatens your life and Genetically Modified Foods - American Academy of Environmental Medicine.

[johnofgwent]

I live in the States and would like to clarify what is happening over here concerning GMO crops and foods. Awareness of the population is probably much greater than it seems (or that the media is portraying). Our main problem here is the FDA, and I believe the USDA is involved, too. There are no requirements for labeling of GMO foods and ingredients in foods here in the States, unlike the UK and almost every other country on earth. Also, the government has allowed farmers to plant GMO crops, especially (or maybe only right now) corn and soybeans. Planting of GMO corn and soybeans is so widespread here that around 70% or 90% (I believe it is 90%) of the corn and soybeans planted in my area is GMO.

Though people here are concerned about foods at the grocery store containing GMOs, from what I've found on the Internet, it is safe to assume that unless you buy a certain few brands from a health food store, the foods you buy, especially processed foods, contain GMOs. Without labeling requirements, which people are attempting to get passed through the government to no avail, people continue to buy products that are sure to contain GMOs.

When the issue kicked off in the UK we were told that we, the population of the united kingdom had NO CHOICE in the matter because ALL SOYA exported from the USA included some GM component because it had been DELIBERATELY arranged that GM and non-GM soya were MIXED TOGETHER before export.

Do you have any insight on the truth of that ? Was this a cop-out by UK importers or was this really the case.

As to the other issue, of "creep" of the modified gene into non-GM crops I fear this will indeed eventually lead to someone, PROBABLY Monsanto, bringing the agricultural equivalent of a "look and feel" lawsuit such as was popular with Microsoft in the 70's and 80's before they found it was cheaper to just buy up the opposition in order to close them down.

Those of us in Europe should not look for aid from the EU when this happens, they moved years ago to deny the public the means to continue planting certain varieties of long used crop by banning the sale of the seeds and tubers so as to force people to use ones THEY approved of.

As someone whose academic qualifications and early career lie in the field of biochemistry I have a question for the OP'er though. You say you collect the seeds of one harvest and use it to create another. All very well but how do you know what you are planting, the Abbe Mendel had a few things to say about the results of such practices in successive harvests did he not ?

[Lois Lane]

The problem here is that our government no longer represents the people. If they did, Monsanto's GMO crops would never have been approved. There would be no reason to label foods because GMO foods would not exist.

Monsanto has the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in their back pocket. What Monsanto wants, Monsanto gets. Our congressmen and senators (lack of capitalization intentional) won't do anything because they do what big business wants, with no regard for the people or the effects on the environment.



Oh, we know that we're being fed the Monsanto-produced GMOs. All one has to do is find the lists of products on the Internet that contain them. There's not much, and probably more like nothing, produced by major companies, like Kraft, General Mills, and all the rest, that's not on the list. Even if one-half of the products on the list don't contain GMOs, there is still no way to avoid eating foods that contain them unless you buy from a small number of unknown companies that produce foods that are GMO-free. People have to eat and not labeling GMO foods allows people to have the false hope that what they are buying is GMO-free when they aren't.

I think this goes a long way to look at the REAL reason for GM crops. Money.

It is right to say that cross-pollinating and grafting etc are also examples of GM proccesses but no one who ever did this did so with the same lock-down patent-protected legal protection which also demands using some of their other products to make them successful OR made it impossible to use the seeds of the product again. I have to give them A for intelligent villainy wrapped in do-gooders' clothes.

There is a real movement afoot in Europe to better know where products come from. If you go to a supermarket in France you can know where the cow that is now your mince was living right down to the address, and where it was slaughtered. You can go to that farm and chat with the farmer since much of the produce is local. Provenance is really important to people. If people can, they usually have a veg garden of their own.But further down the aisle there are tins of tomato concentrate which most likely contain GM material. Apparently there are certain products which do not have to be labelled though I am not an expert in this. So I am afraid that the uS is whipping a dead horse in trying to push GM food although I am aware that some farmers are paid huge sums to plant experimental GM crops which causes problems since the pollen has to be contained and not allowed to drift into othr fields of non-GM crops.

I fear the same conceern for provenance is nto there in the uS nad Monsanto have used the lack of concern to make billions of dollars and worse still, creating a stitched-up corner of the food chain. It is the same moral outrage we feel when we consider that one compny is patenting a gene. Now if that principle is allowed to exist in law, what OTHER genes can be patented? Your own? Your pedigree dog's? So that every time your dog is used to create a litter you are paid vast sums by the buyer UNDER LAW and that offspring pedigree pup is sterile?

It is about more than health, though that is of course of pirmary impotance. It is IMO about the PRINCIPLE of one huge company OWNING the right to create something. Food was always a relatively "free to access and produce" necessity. To want to make billions of dollars messing with what should be by any morality a completely open market is IMO meddling with what has always been a fundamental right to unfettered access to any foodstuffs without one huge black hole swallowing up the proceeds.

And while we are at it, I would love to see growth hormones banned. But that is another subject.