Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Livingstone Maluleke: This is also one of another complicated questions but that may need perhaps the approach and more information from the biological part of it or the scientific part of it. But then we should also take into consideration that it does not take a genetic approach to be able to identify what crops are environmentally negative or which are not affected or having negative implications. But in my understanding this would lead people to take in an informed decision; and, therefore, it needs further thought and like I said it is a bit awkward for me to answer this question.

by Livingstone Maluleke

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Mae-Wan Ho: I think the situation is worse than that. The risks of genetically modified food crops, many of them have been predicted, a lot of them have actually been confirmed. Unfortunately, all this information has been kept away from the public. It has been suppressed. It has been misrepresented. It has been dismissed. So, we already know that genetically engineered food, exposure to genetically modified pollen can cause problems, illnesses in people and animals. Unfortunately, companies like Monsanto have been able to say to regulators, “Look, we’ve tested it ourselves and we found no problems.” And, our regulators have let them get away with it. I am among a group of independent scientists that are demanding independent public inquiry into the safety of genetically modified crops. And, until and unless we can do that, there should be a global moratorium on further releases of GM crops. And, at the same time, a comprehensive shift to non-genetically modified sustainable agriculture that are proven to be beneficial and successful all over the world.

by Mae-Wan Ho

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Mahsa Shekarloo: Well, we take -- well, I don’t know who “we” are, actually, but lots of times in the past risks and are still in the present such risks are being taken without fully understanding the effects and implications first. For example, with medicines [inaudible], there’s tons and tons of drugs that get released into the market before the effects and implications on the body, on the mind have been fully understood. So, you know, this is an era of short-term gratification. Lots of people live in the here and now. And people who are looking for that short-term gratification live in the here and now. I’m not talking about people who live in the here and now because they don’t know how they will survive or if they will survive tomorrow, or if – how they’ll feed themselves. I’m talking about people who want to be gratified quickly. They live in the here and now. They pretty much ignore the past, and they don’t particularly care about the future. So this is part of a larger problem, this idea that change has to occur in the here and now. And this is even with social change and cultural change. Some of that stuff that needs to be done today, we won’t necessarily see the results until after we’re gone.

by Mahsa Shekarloo

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Martin Almada: The FAO is the UN agency which deals with genetically modified cultures and which established recommendations that are not respected by the countries of the First World. It is evident that the will of the multinational companies is superior to the will of the FAO. In my country, Paraguay, in 2002, the US-company Deltapine, in order to avoid paying large sums for the burning of their junk products, in concrete seeds of genetically engineered cotton, sowed in Paraguay for manure for the farmers. These cotton seeds sowed by Deltapine provoked the death of many people in my country, of many people. Judiciary actions were started, but the Deltapine advocates prevented the company from beeing sentenced, due to the enormous economic power that this company has. So it is causing growing concern that these multinational companies produce and send to the Third World these genetically modified, not recommendable seeds.

by Martin Almada

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Masami Saionji: Well, you know that scientist have a strong sense of curiosity. They can create the future from nothing and invent and discover new things. This way of life is excellent for the scientists. Genetic manipulation and its products are invented in this way. Since these products are new for us, we have no study the effect of them on the human body. That is, no one knows what happen on our body, when we keep eating the genetically modified foods for 20 years, 50 years and 100 years. No one knows whether it is a right thing, a wrong thing or a bad thing for human beings. The reason to take a risk of inventing genetic manipulation is that the human conscious requires this method and each human being accepts this method. That is, the genetic manipulation is invented because each mankind accepts it. As population increases in nature world, people need more and more foods. In this point, it is right thing to produce them. However, we have no idea what the consequence for taking these foreign/unknown products/materials on the human body. It is the decision of each person to stop or continue genetic engineering technique. Although governments, scientists and companies want to go through with it, it cannot be done, when each of us do not accept it.

by Masami Saionji

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Masuma Bibi Russel: Well, many things we are doing today, not only the food crops that -- which is really ruining the environment, and it has lot of effect in people’s health. So, you know, some people are doing it, knowing it, for their own personal interest, you know, and some are doing it may be not knowing it. People who are doing it, that’s really terrible, that you are really ruining the environment, and ruining environment -- it means the people who are living around that area, you are ruining their health, and health is so important. So, many, many food crops, which is growing, which is using very harmful chemicals and thing which is ruining not only in health, in environment, it is also ruining agriculture, day to day lives, in many, many people.

by Masuma Bibi Russel

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Mayank Mehta: Some kind of genetically engineered crops we are allowing, and we have been doing it for the longest time. Such as the development of tomatoes which can be shipped over long distance in frozen carriers and so on. So that has been going on for a while. On the other hand, some other kind of genetic modification, which are engineered by recent technologies, perhaps they are much more dangerous, and yes, it should not be done. We are doing it because perhaps some people as I said it before in response to the previous question are engaging in short term profit and without thinking of the long term consequences and that too is quite interesting paradox. Why is it that people want to make sure their children will have a healthier life tomorrow and will prosper, not only the children, but they themselves? Yet, when it comes to making profit, they are willing to throw that aside and go for the short-term profit. I think is because they don’t realize or don’t see the amount of harm that will come to them directly so that’s the source of this trouble. All we can do is to be more vigilant and refuse to buy any products, which are made from such modified products. If that is done, the incentive to generate these products we market them will go away. The incentive is gone, then we will have less of those product, so, it’s at the end relates to the consumers. If there is no consumer, there is no market; there is no production of such stuff. So, it comes down back to us. If we the consumers or the people look carefully at what we are consuming and using, we will be less risk of getting accidental contamination, if we [award the intention.]

by Mayank Mehta

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Michael E. Tigar: Well, we really are not taking that risk. That risk is being taken for us. Let me tell you a story. There was a farmer in the Middle West who planted just his ordinary corn crop, but over in the next field owned by somebody else, the farmer was planting one of these genetically altered crops. Well, through a process of pollination and migration and so forth and so on, some of the genetically altered substance gets involved in the non GM0 farmer's crop. So now in the next planting season, he's actually got some seed that contains some of this genetically altered material and he gets sued by the agricultural conglomerate that invented the genetically altered material saying why he's appropriated their intellectual property and now he has to pay a royalty. Well, that story illustrates the problem here. GMO material, this genetically operated stuff, supposedly has these great benefits but what it actually is is a device by which multinational agricultural conglomerates can increase their own profitability and actually own the rights to these life forms and thereby derive enormous profits that would otherwise go to farmers and take that profit out of the food chain, thus making food more expensive when it reaches your table and contributing to the [corporatization] of agriculture of the world around. Now, all of these consequences are being adversely felt as we speak and they are consequences of this corporate greed driven by and sustained by rules that permit this form of proprietary acquisition of the very information on the basis of which are vital food supply is based. And that's what's going on and it needs to be resisted, as it is.

by Michael E. Tigar

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Michael Laitman: We do not have a choice: we are compelled to use all of these technologies, all replications and genetic technologies, because otherwise we will not feed everyone. We do not have a choice; we are nevertheless obligated to now think about how to provide food for everyone. If we are all on the egoistic level and are unable to control the specifics of food, then we will be able to do this later by means of the altruistic method. Then we will do everything for the good of man, and it will not be that one person will think about how to develop something—it does not matter whether it is useful or harmful for humanity's future—only on the condition of receiving as much profit as possible. People will change internally and will relate to others as to their loved ones, as to themselves, and this will already compel us to think about the optimal technology and the use of the developments of biology and genetic engineering, thanks to which we will really be able to provide ourselves and all of humanity with the best food.

by Michael Laitman

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Michael P. Totten: There was a certain hubris on the part of the industry advancing genetic modification to not at the very outset take seriously a large number of the public concerns about the health and safety. I know this is a very controversial area with strong advocates on both sides. One of the areas that I have seen the industry deficient in is enforcing the boundary and the barriers to keep genetic seeds from drifting over into say organic fields which contaminate those fields, which [inaudible] the criteria in not being able to market their produce, but also there has been some early indications by biologists that there may be some adverse impacts on some pollinating species. And there is certainly a question of scalability. It’s one thing in a laboratory setting or in a small plot setting to say for this short period of time on this small plot we see no problems. It’s another thing when you scale up to vast areas and over a long period of time. We should be doing extensive measurement and monitoring, as well as being transparent in letting people know in the market what crops are genetically modified, so that they can have a say in deciding whether they want to support with their consumer dollars genetically modified food. Some say, the genie is out of the bottle, and so -- and also a starving world needs genetically modified foods. I think that fails to recognize some important issues found in the millennium ecosystem assessment report about the importance of the resilience of ecosystems, and not to make them too brittle. And one of the concerns I have about genetically modified foods is that they will reinforce a monoculture cropping system that has already been shown to be quite vulnerable to weather variable disruptions, and we should be thinking more about diversity of crop systems.

by Michael P. Totten

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Mohau Pheko: I think that there is such a powerful lobby, especially in the agri businesses like Cargill, Monsanto, etcetera, who obviously want to make enormous amount of profit, pushing out GMOs into the marketplace. And it's not that they are for the good of society, it's not even that we need these sorts of foods for food aid because there is plenty of non-GMO food that can be distributed for food aid, because so many farmers across the European Union themselves are producing surplus food to the extent that we really need genetically modified foods to the be put on the marketplace. I think that the power behind genetically modified food is what we need to question and we need to question why there is refusal in many countries to label these foods as genetically modified if it is our democratic right to choose what type of food we want to eat, why isn't this food labeled, so that people can have a democratic choice to use their dollar or their currency or their rand as in my country in the marketplace to decide whether they want to eat genetically modified foods or traditionally grown foods that are healthy for us. So, it's not the question of that we are allowing as much as there is a powerful lobby that we need to bring to a stop, and we need to lobby powerfully against as consumers, first, demand labeling of this or ultimately to stop GMO products from being pushed into the marketplace and demanding for food systems that are healthy and good for us.

by Mohau Pheko

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Monira Rahman: I think it is again coming with this making profit, profit making. There is no regulations or controlling this - using chemicals for preservation or for agricultural purposes. Obviously, it is important to take care of that and to see the risk many people are not aware about; this risk, especially in agricultural feed. We want profit. We always are looking for profit and therefore we are trying to make more food within a short time, and we want to preserve that food for long time and therefore we are using that are genetically engineered. But obviously, it is important that we understand the effects and implications on our health and the long term health consequences in that way. We have to be careful in protecting our food crops from any source of genetic engineering.

by Monira Rahman

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Nadja Halilbegovich:

by Nadja Halilbegovich

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Neela Marikkar: I think it's shortsightedness on our part and I think it's also – it is also fear of the future resources and the need for market growth and increased consumerism of trying to drive more and more, you know, increase the quantum of manufacturing of farming so that you get higher yields. But, I think this is very shortsighted, because yes, it might give you short-term profits, it might increase your bottom-line, it might increase -- governments might look at it as a positive, but then you have to assess the long-term reality. And, I think the long-term is that they are huge risks that we are taking and one needs to take stock of that and really decide whether one should be tampering in this area at all. What are the long-term benefits? And if there aren’t any and if there are more detrimental side-effects, then there should be a way of curbing excessive use of this method.

by Neela Marikkar

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Norbert Servos: I believe that the 'we' in the question is wrong, because we are not doing this. Those who do it are first of all food companies and seeds firms, which are extremely hungry for profits. They do it out of an interest in profit. But we, the population, have no interest in doing it. Generally you could say that governments shouldn't allow for genetically manipulated food to be brought on the market as long as you don't know which consequences follow and which changes are triggered off by this. But to talk about 'we' would mean that we identify with it. This is not necessarily the case.

by Norbert Servos

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Oliviero Toscani: Well, we never really know the effect and the implication on whatever we do, you know, anything new we don’t really know. They affect the implication. And taking risk belong to somehow the creativity. There are a lot of people that starving and probably genetically engineered food would save life, I don’t know, it could be also that way. I can’t really say if it is right or wrong, but I know that it is new. I know that we don’t know exactly, we will see in the future, you know, but the whole technology could be discussed that way. I mean, this technology that I think to use because all kind of technology somehow do conflict – are in clashing with nature. There is already a lot of technologies already used in agriculture. It is not really natural growing anymore since a long time, intensive agriculture, intensive growing and so on. You know, to fight against technology is a retrograde battle. I don’t really feel so sure that we should not really let technology go ahead.

by Oliviero Toscani

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Oscar Olivera: Genetically engineered food is allowed by transnational companies seeking economic profit. We, common people do not allow this type of genetically emgineered food. It is bad for the human race, bad for our health and bad for biodiversity. I think, these huge transnational companies are the ones, that produce and bring genetically engineered food to the markets through the back door, without our knowledge. We, common people, are not going to allow this, even more, we are going to fight against these selfish economic interests that damage entire humanity.

by Oscar Olivera

Sep 9, 2006 4:25:00 PM cite

Paul D. Miller: You know, I agree with the question, and the question has to be rephrased. Potentially harmful effects of bringing new forms of crops into existence have been around as long as farming has been around. The problem right now is that we're actually getting more precise at manipulating and controlling these effects. So what I want to sort of pose as a counter-question is saying, is genetic engineering as it's done in the laboratory different than when you breed plants with one another in life outside of the lab conditions? One would find it very hard to get a definition of genetic engineering that wouldn't be able to include breeding tomatoes or carrots or potatoes or you name it in a way that gets people to think about them as natural byproducts of selective breeding. Same with cats and dogs. Human beings have been doing that for thousands of years. The doberman pinscher, the dachshund, the greyhound, you name it. Those are breeds of dogs that we have manipulated over millennia. Essentially, dogs are domesticated wolves, so I think that we have to broaden our question of what is genetically modified. The problem is, is that it's all happening so quickly that we don't, we haven't developed an ethical structure, and it's hard to respond to anything that says that this is controllable, because it's not controllable, and I think anything that humans beings do is part of nature. Including and up to our own destruction as a species, so we are just as responsible for our actions, and we have a sense of agency. The problem is, is that we perhaps haven't accepted the sense of agency as a realistic and ethical position to work from.

by Paul D. Miller