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nutrition STORY
simpleJanuary 19, 2002 The story was on about page 12 of the newspaper. Little more than a footnote really, compared to the huge holiday ads that filled the spread. Bt corn has been found growing openly in Mexico. To the typical news reader who doesn't yet care about genetically engineered (GE) foods it didn't warrant a read. I submit that one day that little footnote of a story may become the biggest little story on Earth. Literally. The demon is out. Actually its a multi-headed demon but this particular head bites and the bite leaves permanent damage. For a number of reasons, Mexican corn or maize farmers have begun turning to GE corn. This is a disaster of potentially biblical proportions. An exaggeration? Cynics and republicans might say, "There goes another liberal alarmist crying, "Wolf!" again." Well... I'll risk being so labelled. Let me elaborate. Mexico is considered the most important center of biodiversity for corn anywhere. The gene pool of Mexico's thousands of corn varieties and plant relatives, including the progenitor species of corn, teosinte, is unique in the world. It is being, right this moment, irreversibly polluted. "So what. Then Mexico will have to buy corn from us. We'll get even richer!", "they" might say. Well consider this. In 1970, part of the US corn crop was destroyed by a Southern corn leaf blight. The losses were significant and led to some marketplace shortages. By tapping into the genetic pool of thousands of traditional corn varieties cultivated in Mexico, U.S. growers were able to locate several which were resistant to the corn blight. Using conventional cross-breeding a blight-resistant hybrid variety was developed, the blight was controlled and the corn crop rebounded. To this day blight resistant varieties of corn are the main method of controlling blight. What if the genetic pool of corn in Mexico had not been available because it had been lost to the cheaper GE corn? And what if the corn leaf blight then took in the ENTIRE U.S. crop? Or what if it was the wheat crop? Maintaining crop biodiversity is absolutely necessary and the random genetic tinkering that the Dr. Frankenfoods of the world are doing is insane. If you think its an exact science, look into it. It's not. What do we do if a few years down the road we find that Bt corn is deadly long term, but that it has genetically polluted all the corn? We stop eating corn. Simple. Natural BT sprayed on a plant evaporates in 2-7 days. BT genes in corn, are ... in the corn. Bt corn is designed to put holes in the intestines of certain insects to kill them. But what does it do to the intestines, immune system,and other vital organs of humans and animals? A good question. They don't know. I suppose what its going to take is a GE disaster of Enron proportions. Perhaps it'll be Bt corn or Roundup Ready soy beans or canola oil. Whatever it is, it will eventually happen. Some weird GE food will get into the market place, perhaps it already is, and people will start dying, or cancer rates will rise, or birth defects... It'll take some time to link the deaths, disease and defects to the mutant food since they aren't labelled in the U.S. but one day it'll happen. More than likely the rich profiteers and their paid politicians will crawl back under their rocks and get away. They usually do. We can stop it of course by simply refusing to buy and eat mutant foods. Mutant food development is driven by money. Money is the only way to stop it. We must vote with our dollars. Its the only nopartisan vote we have. Simple. – dave © Copyright iriguchi 2002 |
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