Wow.
My textbook has been talking about the transgenic corn bans in Mexico and concern about transgenic crops elsewhere for a good five pages now without once mentioning the fact that one of the big concerns with most bioengineered crops is that they usually make the farmer dependent on the manufacturer. Most of them are engineered to be sterile, after all, and if they aren't a lot of them are unstable and won't breed reliably or true. So you can't save seed. You have to buy more. And even if you manage it, in a lot of cases the bio company can sue or demand royalties.
I suppose this is an uninteresting problem to whoever wrote the book, although from what I've read it's probably one of the two biggest reasons behind rejection of such crops by farmers!
(The other reason? The older, local varieties are tastier to the people growing them. A lot of bioengineered crops consist of extra water weight.)
Bioengineered crops can easily become a method of economic colonialism.
ETA: Aaaaah. Here it is, a mention on a sidebar about that self terminating seed idea. Nine pages into the discussion.
ETA2: And we've finally mentioned the patent issue. Poor, poor Mr. Schmeiser.
ET3: Dude, how did I not know that Cuba has turned to organic farming with large amounts of urban gardening to feed its population post collapse of the Soviet Union? I had honestly never read anything about that before, although it makes a great deal of practical sense.
I suppose this is an uninteresting problem to whoever wrote the book, although from what I've read it's probably one of the two biggest reasons behind rejection of such crops by farmers!
(The other reason? The older, local varieties are tastier to the people growing them. A lot of bioengineered crops consist of extra water weight.)
Bioengineered crops can easily become a method of economic colonialism.
ETA: Aaaaah. Here it is, a mention on a sidebar about that self terminating seed idea. Nine pages into the discussion.
ETA2: And we've finally mentioned the patent issue. Poor, poor Mr. Schmeiser.
ET3: Dude, how did I not know that Cuba has turned to organic farming with large amounts of urban gardening to feed its population post collapse of the Soviet Union? I had honestly never read anything about that before, although it makes a great deal of practical sense.