What's New in Teams Calling, Meetings and Devices March 2024
Week 8 gmo
1.
2.
3.
4. Research, development, and technology – 1940s-1970s
Increased agricultural production around the world
New view for ag.- commercial sector than a subsistence
one
India Famine –plant breeding, irrigation,
agrochemicals…
“Saving a billion people from starvation”
High-yielding varieties of cereal grains
Expansion of irrigation infrastructure
Modernization of management techniques
Distribution of hybrid seeds
Synthetic fertilizers and pesticides
5. Semi-dwarf allowed countries
like Mexico and India to be
self-sufficient
Yields of rice and wheat
doubled
Higher profits allowed farmers
to expand
Instead of widespread famine,
cereal and calorie availability
per person increased by 30%
Wheat & rice cheaper
Raised farmer’s income
Stimulated rural nonfarm
economy – less poor families
Better nutrition
Depletion of groundwater
Increased monocultures
Excessive and inappropriate
use of fertilizers & pesticides
Increased income inequality
and asset distribution
Owners of large farms were
main adopters of new
technologies (access to
irrigation, fertilizers, seeds,
and credit)
Small farmers unaffected or
harmed – lower product
prices, higher input prices…
Worsened absolute poverty?
6. Pre Revolution – Indian farmers grew diverse food
crops
With new machinery, chemical pesticides and
fertilizers, and hybrid seeds = now planted cash crops
for export rather than local food consumption
Ex: Cotton – India opened its seed sector to
international agribusiness (small farmers competing
with giant cotton plantations and seed corporations)
7. What would have been the magnitude
of hunger and poverty without the yield
increases of the Green Revolution and
with the same population growth?
How does this relate to what’s
happening today with genetically
modified foods? Green Revolution II?
8.
9.
10.
11. Easing of world hunger?
Development of crops that
can be grown in marginal
soil
Reduced strain on
nonrenewable resources?
- Drought resistant crops
- Salt-tolerant crops
- Crops that make more
efficient use of nitrogen
and other nutrients
12. Reduced use of pesticides
and herbicides?
► Development of pest
resistant crops
► Reduced herbicide use is
better for the environment
and reduces costs for
farmers
13. Improved crop quality?
Frost resistant crops
Disease resistant crops
Flood resistant crops
Improved nutritional quality?
Development of foods
designed to meet specific
nutritional goals
14. In 2002, Monsanto “came to the
rescue” with higher-tech seeds than
hybrid seeds from Green
Revolution = GE Bt Cotton
“Miracle Seeds” would bring pest
resistance and higher yields
Heavily marketed in India with film
stars and religious deities
4-10 times more expensive than
hybrid seeds
GE “terminators” – seeds had to be
repurchased every season
15. Bt cotton required more pesticides spraying than
indigenous cotton
Created new resistant pests – farmers were using 13 times
more pesticides = more costs
Yields are low – Monsanto claims 1500kg per year but
farmers were getting only 300-400 kg per year
Crop failures are common – farming no longer financially
sustainable (can’t compete with cheap subsidized cotton)
1994 – 1 lb of raw cotton = $1.10
2006 – 1 lb of raw cotton = $0.54
“GM Genocide” – In 2009 alone, 17,638 Indian farmers
committed suicide
16. Vandana Shiva ‘s The Violence of the Green Revolution: the non-sustainability of
chemical industrial agriculture and the unproductivity of chemical monocultures.
20. Threatened by pollen in GMO maize
Rapid rise of crops engineered
to withstand herbicides
Monarchs lay their eggs on
milkweed / caterpillars feed on
milkweed
Milkweed thrives on edges of corn fields
Roundup Ready – farmers used regularly without
worrying about impact on RR crops
Milkweed plunged 58%; Monarch egg production
decreased by 81%
21. Feb 2013 - 1500 colonies of honey bees disappear in Mexico
CCD – Colony Collapse Disorder
Monoculture fields of GMO Bt corn inoculated with
pesticide called neonicoticoids (neurotoxins)
Disrupts their ability to learn, remember, and find their way
back to the hive
Coat 142 million acres of corn, wheat, soy and cotton seed
and common ingredients in home gardening products
Contaminate the pollen and nectar
Monocultures also fragment natural food supply
2006 - 30% of US bee population disappeared and bees
were imported; happening annually ever since
22. Bt – bacteria lives in the soil &
naturally produces a toxin
Bt corn – pesticide in pollen
2000 StarLink Bt corn designed
for stock feed
Found in Taco Bell taco shells
Not approved for human
consumption
Kraft recalled all taco shells
Ex. of lack of control to monitor
modified corps entering food supply
23. Soybean and Canola
Concern that plants engineered to
withstand weed killers = super bugs
& super weeds
Traditionally, farmers saved portion
of seeds for next year’s crop
Growers using GE / RR crops must
sign a contract agreeing not to save or reuse seeds
Court decisions have supported Monsanto’s right to
prevent farmers from saving patented seeds
24.
25. DNA genetically modified to
produce growth hormones
for its entire life
Grow at much faster rate than
wild salmon
FDA approved for human
consumption in US
AquAdvantage – grow 2x rate
Fear – interbreeding with natural salmon
Claims fish is sterile – only 95% actually sterile
Available at grocery store by end of year
26. 2013 – farmer sprays Roundup and finds green wheat
stalks
Monsanto never asked for government approval to sell
GMO wheat – growing it would violate the law
Tested positive as GMO wheat at Oregon State
If rogue genes are present in America’s wheat harvest –
Japan, Korea, and other customers
say they won’t take it (millions of
dollars)
Monsanto claims anti-biotech
activists stole the wheat and
staged it as sabotage
27.
28. Map indicating which states have pending GMO labeling bills or
upcoming ballot initiatives. Credit: Right to Know.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34. Is supporting Organic standards
the solution?
• USDA regulations allow food products that contain 95100% certified organic ingredients
• Prohibit chemical fertilizers, synthetic substances,
irradiation, sewer sludge or GMOs in production
• Prohibit antibiotic and synthetic hormone use in
organic meat and poultry
• Require 100% organic feed for
organic livestock
• Labeled “100% organic,” “organic,”
or just “made with organic
ingredients,” non-organic
ingredients cannot be produced
from GMOs
{"5":"Stimulation of rural nonfarm economy generated significant new income and employment of its own. Real per capita incomes almost doubled in Asia between 1970 and 1995. Went from 3 in 5 at poverty level to less than 1 in 3. Much of the steady decline in poverty in Asia and India is due to agricultural growth and associated with declines in food prices! Better nutrition came from raising incomes and reducing prices – people could consume and calories and diversify their diets (more veggies, fruits, and livestock).\nFYI – Sub-Saharan Africa did not reap these benefits – poor infrastructure, high transport costs, limited investment in irrigation, and pricing/marketing policies that penalized farmers made the Green Revolution technologies too expensive or inappropriate for Africa.\n","22":"Bacillus thuringeiensis; this bacteria lives in the soil and naturally produces a toxin that functions as a pesticide; BEES?; Kraft voluntarily recalled all taco shells but in weeks following, SL corn was detected in many other food products, some even outside US. Evidence of lack of control in place to monitor modified crops entering our food supply. Without tracking system as seen with the elevator from last week – how can any of this corn be tracked? \n","17":"Frankenfoods – campaign about how “safe” GMOs really are for the consumption of humans and animals and the environment; “monstrous creation that usually ruins its originator” \nGolden Rice – 1999 spliced 2 genes from a daffodil and 1 from bacterium into rice to include beta carotene; when consumed, beta carotene converted in human body into Vitamin D; hailed as solution to Vitamin A deficiency condition that threatens millions of people around the world with blindness or death; worried about lost of biodiversity and local food security by relying on a single nutrient approach\n","23":"Proponets claim that these genetically engineered soybeans are advantageous for the environemtn because herbicide resistant plants will reduce the use of artificial pesticides; while number of herbicdes treatments on soybeans resistant to glyphosate (active ingredient in RR herbicides) has decerased, the total amoun tof glyphosate used have actually increased. \n","29":"Zoom here - http://www.cornucopia.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/I-522-full.jpg \n","7":"Increase in food demand does not equate to an increase in food security. Many other factors come into play – level of government corruption, level of action government undertakes to solve food crises, financial ability of country to buy food… Green Revolution does not address the root causes – high birth rates… May help short-term but more negative impacts in the long-term?\n","8":"http://www.pbs.org/pov/foodinc/photo_gallery_quiz.php#.UUZxM1d-SSo - online quizA GM food is one that has sequences of DNA from another organism inserted into its genome in order to get a desired phenotype. The definition of GM foods may also include foods that have an a deleted gene, foods such as cheese that are made from enzymes that are from a genetically modified organism, and foods such as beef that have been fed genetically modified feed. \n","36":"DVDs, CDs, & books are available to help spread the word\n","14":"Bt cotton contains a bacteria gene, an insecticide that repels bollworm, cotton's most voracious parasite.\nnew seeds must be purchased every year from big seed companies, \nvery expensive and have to be repurchased every planting season \nat the same punitive prices.\n","3":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lg9-HTtgFOk 8 Minutes\n","31":"Proposition 37 registered a full 48.6 percent of the California vote last November. More than 6 million voters saying “yes” to labeling of genetically engineered (GE) foods - given that the No campaign (with major funding from chemical companies and packaged food giants such as Monsanto, DuPont, Dow, PepsiCo and Kraft) outspent the initiative’s supporters by more than $35 million dollars. \n","20":"Bt crops have also threatened the Monarch – pollen dusts milkweed plants have cuased caterpillars to develop slowly, consume less food, and die at higher rates\n","15":"Compared to traditional seed, genetically engineered seeds are very expensive and have to be repurchased every planting season \n","4":"India adopted IR8 – a semi-dwarf rice that could produce more grains of rice per plant when grown with certain fertilizers and irrigation. Dubbed “miracle rice” because it yielded 10x more than traditional rice. India became one of the world’s most successful rice producers and is now a major rice exporter.\n"}