Here is more about Mark Lynas, who is mentioned, without much explanation,
in the article by Ken Cook, below.--Tom
_http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/elist/eListRead/a_rebuttal_to_
mark_lynas_gmo_reversal/_
(http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/elist/eListRead/a_rebuttal_to_mark_lynas_gmo_reversal/)
===========================================================================
===
More about the Cook article:
What Ken Cook misses is the fact that of all those people working in the
natural sciences--biology, chemistry, and physics--only biologists have the
ability to destroy the subject matter of their science. Chemists cannot
destroy the chemical elements, which are the subject matter of their science.
Physicists cannot destroy such things as energy, space, and time, the
subject matter of their science. But biologists now have the capability, by
genetically engineering life, to destroy life as it has existed for billions of
years. The subject matter of biology, after all, is life here on Earth,
which is the only life of whose existence we are certain.
Consider the immense power achieved by the science of biology when it
became possible, starting in 1973, to engineer the genetic structure, or
genome, of an organism by transferring into that organism one or more genes from
a totally unrelated species. Consider too, that the engineered genes become
a permanent part of the plant or animal's genome, passed on to all future
generations.
Then understand please, that it is not hysteria, as Cook seems to imply,
but a reasoned moral stance, to insist that the power of genetic engineering
be strictly regulated. In particular everyone who cares about protecting
our natural environment, including, of course, the many life forms in that
environment, should support a ban on releases of genetically engineered
plants, animals, and microorganisms into the environment.
In Iowa such a ban has not been implemented, as our state has become
probably the most genetically-engineered place on Earth, with thousands of acres
planted to GMO crops. Only two species, so far, comprise the vast majority
of acres planted to GMOs in Iowa: maize (corn) and soybeans. (Genetically
engineered organisms are also called genetically modified organisms, or
GMOs.)
--Tom Mathews
===========================================================================
===
In a message dated 1/20/2013 7:32:31 A.M. Central Standard Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:
NOTE: Ken Cook is the President of the Environmental Working Group.
---
---
Another Environmentalist Apologizes Over GMOs
Ken Cook
Huffington Post, 18 January 2013
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/don-carr/another-environmentalist-apologies-gm
os_b_2505033.html
I need to start by publicly apologizing for not engaging in the debate
over genetically engineered crops, technically, genetically modified organisms
or GMOs, until two years ago.
When I co-founded the Environmental Working Group in 1993, Mark Lynas was
ripping up farmers' crops. Back then I dismissed people like Lynas, then
affiliated with those who criticized GMOs. Their attacks did not seem
grounded in science and did not approach our very real food and farming challenges
with the same research-based intellectual rigor that we practice at EWG.
Nor did I fight beside smart organizations like the Environmental Defense
Fund, Consumers Union and the Center for Food Safety to make the scientific
case to the federal Food and Drug Administration in the late 1980s and
early 1990s. We should have persevered even when FDA decisions left advocates
with no way to raise scientific objections, as we do with pesticides.
At the time, it seemed quixotic to campaign against GMOs. The FDA and USDA
were blithely rolling on their backs for multinational corporations that
were poised to reap billions of dollars in profit from the technology.
Now I see the error of my ways.
Had I paid more attention, I might have foreseen how badly this technology
would go awry. Toxic chemicals would be slathered on crops to battle
GMO-resistant pests and weeds. According to a recent study by Washington State
University professor of agriculture Chuck Benbrook, the use of herbicides
has increased by 527 million pounds, or 11 percent, since 1996, as more and
more GMO crops have been planted.
I might have been prescient enough -- given EWG's experience with Monsanto
-- to recognize that the company's assertions that GMOs were viable were
not to be trusted.
And I totally missed the boat by failing to anticipate that GMO
technology, as much as misguided government policies, has driven the spread of corn
and soybean monoculture across millions of acres of American farmland. In
the last four years, farmers have plowed up more than 23 million acres of
wetlands and grasslands -- an area the size of Indiana -- to plant primarily
corn and soybeans.
Oddly enough, Lynas did not extend an apology to the farmers whose crops
he destroyed. And while he's apologizing to those farmers, he should
apologize to the organic farmers he falsely impugns by suggesting organic food is
less safe than food manipulated by scientists in Monsanto lab coats.
Regarding the safety of organics, Benbrook says:
"The most significant, proven benefits of organic food and farming are:
(1) a reduction in chemical-driven, epigenetic changes during fetal and
childhood development, especially from pre-natal exposures to endocrine
disrupting pesticides, (2) the markedly more healthy balance of omega-6 and -3
fatty acids in organic dairy products and meat, and (3) the virtual elimination
of agriculture's significant and ongoing contribution to the pool of
antibiotic-resistant bacteria currently posing increasing threats to the
treatment of human infectious disease."
Lynas drives home a fact that many of us know: to continue to feed the
world's booming population, we must intensify crop production. Yet even the
United Nations, in a recent report, notes that "in order to grow, agriculture
must learn to save" and highlights that herbicides can be replaced with
sustainable practices like integrated weed management. While Lynas claims to
have discovered science, he seems to have missed the fact that feeding the
world would be a lot easier if more crops were consumed by people rather
than by animals or by cars burning environmentally-damaging ethanol.
The truth is, the scientific community has not reached a consensus on
GMOs. Experts have grave doubts about the "coordinated framework" the U.S.
government employ to review GMO crops. Several smart people, among them
journalists Jason Mark and Tom Philpott and the Union of Concerned Scientists'
Doug Gurian-Sherman, have categorically debunked Lynas's claims that the
science is settled.
What the science does conclusively show is that we don't need GMO crops to
better manage water-polluting chemical fertilizer. So says the Leopold
Center for Sustainable Agriculture, which recently found that a diverse crop
rotation reduced nitrogen fertilizer use by 86 percent while maintaining
yields. It concluded that diverse rotations "reduce the risk of creating
herbicide-resistant weeds."
It turns out that we need better farmers and a better farm bill, not
better seeds.
In short, I shouldn't have allowed unscientific, hysterical ideologues
like Lynas to color my views about a fight clearly worth engaging -- and that
we've belatedly launched -- on GMO labeling. At least with labeling, Lynas
and I agree that consumers deserve, as he says "a diet of their choosing."
As this blog and others demonstrate, the debate about GMOs in not over. In
fact, it's just begun. Millions of Americans came out in support of
federal and state initiatives to require labeling on food with GMO ingredients in
2012, their momentum helping new initiatives, such as I-522 in Washington,
sprout up in the new year.
Luckily, Lynas assures us we are "entitled" to our views. As Americans, we
are also entitled to the right to know what we're buying, eating, and
feeding our families. That right, and its surrounding dialogue, have yet to be
silenced.
................................................................
Website: http://www.gmwatch.org
Profiles: http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/GM_Watch:_Portal
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GMWatch
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/GMWatch/276951472985?ref=nf
This email should only be sent to those who have asked to receive it.
To unsubscribe, contact [log in to unmask], specifying which list you wish
to unsubscribe from.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
To unsubscribe from the IOWA-TOPICS list, send any message to:
[log in to unmask]
Check out our Listserv Lists support site for more information:
http://www.sierraclub.org/lists/faq.asp
To view the Sierra Club List Terms & Conditions, see:
http://www.sierraclub.org/lists/terms.asp
|
