

Mexico Bans GMO Corn Effective Immediately - teawithcarl
http://ecowatch.com/living/mexico-bans-gmo-corn-effective-immediately

======
mynewwork
Disappointing. In a world where hunger remains an issue, it's sad to see fear-
mongering preventing us from using the best technology available to produce
the most food with the least negative externalities.

Oh well, I guess if we just dump a lot more pesticides, herbicides and
fertilizers, along with using more fresh water for irrigation, we can almost
replicate the results of GMO seeds.

~~~
joe_the_user
Well,

As I understand it, the most common form of GMO corn is "round-up ready". This
is a variety which is immune to the common herbicide. But this immunity means
that the crop invites more, not less, use of herbicide in the environment and
it has naturally lead, in the US, to Round-up resistant pests.

The problem isn't genetically modifying organisms as such but rather the
modification schemes involved. So far they haven't been terribly far-sighted.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate)

Edit: Note also that "hunger remains an issue" today but not through the world
not producing enough food. The world produces enough food to feed everyone.
The primary question is distribution, which GMO crop, of course, aren't going
to solve.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Um, RoundUp is an herbicide, not a pesticide. RoundUp resistant pests are a
non-sequitur.

In fact, RoundUp is supposed to be among the most benign possible herbicide,
since it binds instantly to the soil and breaks down. It is a contact
herbicide; you have to brush it on the weeds to kill them, which is done with
a variety of wicks and boom arms on tractors to touch the weeds poking up
above the corn and miss the corn.

I suspect GMO fear is all FUD and no science. Even intelligent people spout
nonsense on the subject (maybe even me I suppose).

~~~
joe_the_user
Jeesh Mr. Pedantic,

Pesty herbs, eg weeds, can you not parse in context or isn't that the point.

Round-up is _supposed_ to be one of most begin herbicides, yeah but throw
enough of a supposed good thing around and you get problems.

see:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate#Resistance](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate#Resistance)

Edit: The better way to deal with weed, insects and what-do is Integrated Pest
Management, IPM, where one adopts an integrated, _sustainable_ approach to the
plant and animal, uh, _pests_ that hinder food production.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_pest_management](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_pest_management)

~~~
JoeAltmaier
All very cute when you have 2 acres of organic potatoes to manage. Throw in
20,000 acres of variable corn seed and 150 microclimates (waterways, wood
boundaries, roadsides etc). Go ahead and write that app (to manage pests
manually) but until then its more efficient (profitable at all) to do a
single-pass application of chemicals.

Reading that article, it has little or nothing practical to offer the farmer
of over a acre or two (lets call them 'gardeners'). 'hand-picking, erecting
insect barriers, using traps, vacuuming'. Try any of that over 10,000 acres.
Its ludicrous.

Farm application rates for herbicides (any chemicals actually) are regulated
by federal law. Also, chemicals cost money so only a fool over-applies.

The problems with chemicals getting into the water etc are because of city-
dwellers who are exempt from the law; you can put any amount of chemical on
your home lawn you like and flush it down the storm drain. So that's a
problem, sure.

------
pella
Nassim Nicholas Taleb : _" Genetically Modified Organisms, GMOs. Top-down
modifications to the system (through GMOs) are categorically and statistically
different from bottom up ones (regular farming, progressive tinkering with
crops, etc.) To borrow from Rupert Read, there is no comparison between the
tinkering of selective breeding and the top-down engineering of taking a gene
from a fish and putting it into a tomato. Saying that such a product is
natural misses the statistical process by which things become “natural”.

What people miss is that the modification of crops impacts everyone and
exports the error from the local to the global. I do not wish to pay —or have
my descendants pay — for errors by executives of Monsanto. We should exert the
precautionary principle there —our non-naive version — simply because we would
discover errors after considerable damage."_

Mathematical Definition & more -> [http://blog.longnow.org/02013/07/08/the-
artangel-longplayer-...](http://blog.longnow.org/02013/07/08/the-artangel-
longplayer-letters-nassim-taleb-writes-to-stewart-brand/)

~~~
Bluestrike2
Whenever I stumble across someone arguing about the transference of genetic
material and how one method is "more natural" than the other, I can't help but
walk away with the feeling that the author is working from a series of
fundamental misunderstandings of genetic science.

~~~
tghw
Agreed. "Natural" doesn't mean that it's better. And, there are very few
things we eat at this point that are natural anyways.

Shoes and clothing are not natural, but I don't see Mr. Taleb running around
barefoot and naked.

~~~
autodidakto
Taleb does enjoy barefoot running.

