| Online: | |
| Visits: | |
| Stories: |
Voracious Worm Evolves to Eat GMO Corn; Oregon to Map GMO Fields
Voracious Worm Evolves to Eat Biotech Corn Engineered to Kill it. Bt corn was first planted by U.S. farmers in 1996 causing populations of rootworms and corn borers to plummet across the midwest. Yields rose and farmers reduced their use of conventional insecticides that cause more ecological damage than the Bt toxin. As rootworms become more resistant farmers will turn to insecticides, thus increasing their costs and losing the ecological benefits originally gained by using Bt corn. The next pest-fighting trait “will fall under the same pressure,” said Shields, “and the insect will win. Always bet on the insect if there is not a smart deployment of the trait.” A growing population combined with growing appetites are putting pressure on the market to produce more food and risks have to be taken, say the farmers, to ensure sufficient food.
Oregon hopes to be first state to map GMO fields. Last October, Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber directed the state’s Department of Agriculture to map GMO field locations across the entire state and establish buffer zones and exclusion areas for GE crops. If it goes ahead, Oregon would be the first state to map fields and mandate preventive measures for modified crops.
Sources: Environmental Health News, Wired.
Paul Brown is a retired neuroscience professor whose primary interests are human rights, overpopulation, mass extinction, global warming, and the military-industrial complex. Links to all his Before It’s News postings are at /contributor/pages/189/210/stories.html.
