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In reply to the discussion: Defending GMOs on grounds that they are not poisonous is like defending manufacturers who exploit [View all]NickB79
(19,233 posts)If your concern is the monopolization of our food supply, you're 50 years late to the party.
Once hybrid crops derived from conventional cross-breeding hit the farming scene following the Green Revolution of the 60's and 70's, it was game over for open-pollinated, heirloom seed strains that farmers could save year after year. Sure, the COULD save their own seed, like they had for generations, but new hybrids (which you can't save seed from, GM or non-GM) yield so much more per acre that only a fool wouldn't buy them every spring from the big agribusiness firms.
Think you're fighting the good fight against monopolization by eating organic? Think again: organic farms get their seed from subsidiaries of big ag companies like Monsanto and Syngenta, because Big Ag has been making non-GM, hybrid seed for decades already.
You could remove every GM seed on the face of the planet, and your food supply would still be owned by a small conglomerate of mega-national seed companies.
And beyond that, most organic farms these days are now industrialized mega-farms, just like the non-organic farms that us GM crops. Think 1,000 acre fields, massive GPS-guided tractors, sprayers with 50-ft booms (only they spray organic herbicides and pesticides instead of synthetic), etc. The organic produce you eat doesn't come from small, independent farms anymore; it mostly comes from mega-farms just like everything else. You think places like Walmart would be sourcing from hundreds of small farms? Hell no: http://grist.org/food/why-you-should-be-skeptical-of-walmarts-cheap-organic-food/
But what do I know? My entire family has been almost entirely farmers for the past century, and several of them currently farm large-acreage organic farms.
Personally, I hate it. If I were Emperor, I'd return us to the days of small, 100-acre family farms with dozens of fields, woodlots, ponds, streams, etc, and re-vitalize the rural community. Food prices would double or triple, but I really don't like factory farms.