Archive for March, 2008

Influential UK magazine roots for GM foods

The influential UK magazine, Country Life, this week editorialized on the controversial issue of genetically modified (GM) foods. The editorial’s author, Mark Hedges, strongly vouched for GM foods, a stance which earned him barbs and ridicule from anti-biotech groups like the Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth (FoE).
In this editorial entitled, Time to Love [...]

Time to love GM foods

Source: Country Life
Aurthor: Mark Hedges
Date: March 20, 2008
The sudden rise in the price of food surely focuses the mind on how the world’s population can be fed in the future, says Country Life. Read more….

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Asia Embraces Biotech, Despite the United Nations

Source: Far Eastern Economic Review
Author: Henry Miller
Date: March 17, 2008
It is hard to open a newspaper without finding a new example of corruption, malfeasance or misconduct by United Nations officials or agencies. But such aberrations are not the only cause for concern: The organization’s business as usual, most of which occurs outside public scrutiny [...]

Ohio State Crop Scientists Discover Gene That Controls Fruit Shape

Source:Ohio State University
Date: March 17, 2008
WOOSTER, Ohio — Ohio State University crop scientists have cloned a gene that controls the shape of tomatoes, a discovery that could help unravel the mystery behind the huge morphological differences among edible fruits and vegetables as well as provide new insight into mechanisms of plant development. Read more….

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The new organic

Source: Boston Globe
Author:Pamela Ronald
Date: March 17, 2008
BEGINNING IN 1997, an important change swept over cotton farms in northern China. By adopting new farming techniques, growers found they could spray far less insecticide over their fields. Within four years they had reduced their annual use of the poisonous chemicals by 156 million pounds - almost as [...]

Farmers eager to plant herbicide-proof beets

Source: Billings Gazette
Date: March 16, 2008
Montana farmers might not put the controversy surrounding Roundup Ready sugar beets to rest, but they will be putting the seeds in the ground within weeks, growers say.
Genetically engineered to resist the powerful herbicide Roundup, the sugar beet seeds have been on farmers’ wish lists for years. Growers expect their [...]

Stop this violence against science

I, and I’m sure most of you, detest the use of force to protest the use of new technologies. We’re all familiar with protestors storming coal plants; or staging protests against the building of nuclear plants, like it happened in Austria in 2001; or blocking airport runways to prevent “greenhouse gas-emitting” jets that activists charge [...]

Gene to increase yield through genetic engineering, uses less land and resources

Source: Check Biotech
Date: March 12, 2008
Genetically modified plants can be developed that perform significantly better than existing varieties in dry and saline soils. This is the conclusion of the doctorate thesis, to be defended by Shital Dixit at Wageningen University on March 14. Read more….

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Demand for GM foods growing with food prices, say supporters

Source: Food Navigator
Date: March 10, 2008
Rising food prices are set to increase acceptance of genetically modified crops for food use, opening up new markets for US products, say proponents of the technology.
South Korea last month purchased its first GM corn for use in foods, citing rising prices of non-GM corn and dwindling supplies as [...]

New report indicates large GM potential for South Asia

Source: GMO Compass
Date: March 10, 2008
A new compendium of studies addressing the use of genetically modified plants in South Asia forecast major economic benefits. Drought- and salt-tolerant rice may provide a added value of about three billion US dollars for India.
The report was compiled by the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University. Entitled “Economic and environmental benefits [...]