Posted on 03/02/2007 5:55:35 AM PST by FLOutdoorsman
Stepping into the middle of a growing debate, a freshman assemblyman has introduced legislation that would make companies developing genetically engineered crops liable for damages if their work results in contamination of other fields.
The bill by Assemblyman Jared Huffman also would ban open-field production of genetically engineered crops used in the development of medications. And it would require growers to give county agriculture commissioners at least 30 days notice before engaging in open-field development of other genetically modified plants.
Huffman, D-San Rafael, said the measure is needed to protect California farmers against significant losses if their conventional or organic crops are contaminated by genetically engineered plants, seeds or pollen.
His bill would cover cases in which a grower claimed annual losses of at least $3,500.
He said an incident last year in which an experimental form of rice being developed by a German company showed up in grain elevators in Arkansas and Missouri should serve as a wake-up call for California.
Hundreds of rice farmers in Arkansas, Missouri and Louisiana have filed lawsuits claiming losses because of that contamination.
"It certainly underscores the urgency of taking action before things like that happen here," Huffman said.
The bill would clarify who would be responsible for damages if there was contamination. With some limited exceptions, it would be the seed producer, chemical company or other manufacturer paying for the genetically altered crop rather than the farmer growing it under contract.
"I'm not interested in farmers suing farmers...," Huffman said. "The kind of damage that can occur when cross-contamination does happen can be of a scale where you're not going to be able to make farmers whole unless they can hold the manufacturer responsible."
The measure also would identify who was involved in genetically modified crop production. Right now, no one seems to have a clear idea of how much of that activity is taking place in California.
The bill would prevent the mixing of pharmaceutical plants with other crops by preventing those projects from being conducted in open fields.
"We're seeing food crops being engineered to grow chemicals as an alternative way of producing things like vaccines and antibiotics," Huffman said. "That is fascinating stuff, but obviously you don't want those crops getting into the food supply."
Huffman's bill might go too far for some segments of California's agriculture industry and not far enough for others.
Greg Massa, co-chairman of the Rice Producers of California, said he welcomes Huffman's bill but added, "I don't really know if it's enough."
His group of 200 farmers wants a moratorium on genetically modified rice experimentation and production. A study it commissioned found that California growers could lose about 40 percent of their rice market if Japan, China and several other nations imposed trade embargoes to keep out genetically modified crops.
"We can't take the risk," Massa said. "The report we just put out said pretty clearly that our customers don't want (genetically engineered crops) and that contamination in California would be much more severe than in the South."
A California law adopted in 2000 might give farmers enough protection already, said Tim Johnson, president and chief executive officer of the California Rice Commission, which represents growers and marketers.
That statute, the California Rice Certification Act, provides for a committee representing growers, handlers, warehouses and researchers to suggest regulations designed to prevent the intermingling of different varieties of rice.
"That really has provided us, at least up to this point, the tools we need to manage customers' response to genetically modified crops," Johnson said. "That said, the industry will take as deliberative a review of Mr. Huffman's legislation as we did in developing the California Rice Certification Act of 2000."
The California Farm Bureau Federation opposes the bill "as it stands now," said Cynthia Cory, the bureau's director of environmental affairs.
But she said her group of 91,000 farmers and others in the agriculture industry, including companies engaged in genetic engineering, is willing to work with Huffman.
"Biotechnology across the board is very important to this state," she said. "I don't think the bill acknowledges that."
The bill's ban on open-field production of corn and other crops for use in medications could curtail "a cheap and effective way to produce the drugs," Cory said.
Huffman's bill may be unnecessary because legal remedies already exist, said Richard Matteis, executive vice president of the California Seed Association, which also represents some companies involved in genetic engineering.
"In California, I'm not aware of any growers being damaged because of the presence of biological crops in their crops," he said. "I think the system is working."
Huffman's bill is similar to legislation introduced in 2005 by Assemblyman John Laird. That measure passed the Assembly Judiciary Committee but died in the Assembly Agriculture Committee.
Laird, D-Santa Cruz, said his bill ran into "big fears that (it) would get in the way of certain agriculture production."
"I think those fears are misplaced," he said. "I think it's an issue of markets. There are potentially markets that will close themselves to American crops if they believe there is (a genetically modified crop) involved."
Huffman's bill might have a better chance of passing because of increased concern about the potential threat posed by the inadvertent spread of genetically modified grasses and crops since his bill failed, Laird said.
Several federal court rulings in the last six months have found that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has been lax in enforcing environmental protections on genetically modified crop projects, Laird said.
In one case, a judge ordered the department to conduct more detailed reviews of genetically engineered plant projects after studies found that pollen from weed killer-resistant grass had drifted more than 12 miles from plots in Madras, Ore., and bred with conventional plants.
"Two things are inevitable on this issue," Huffman said. "One is genetic engineering is here to stay. We're going to see it more and more.
"But the second is there is going to be some regulation of this, and hopefully we can put a coherent policy in place before California experiences a cross-contamination disaster like the one that happened in Arkansas."
Thanks for the twenty minutes of no-so-useless info!
WRT D-Con on cornflakes:
I think you're unaware that many people on high blood pressure or thrombosis medication are doing just that. There is no functional difference between the anti-coagulant rat/mouse poison and many blood pressure medications -- some even use the exact same active ingredient, warfarin. You might know it under the human drug label Coumadin(r).
Matter of fact, warfarin isn't used in vermin poisons any more due to secondary kills. But it is still used in human medication.
That's ok, all our corn is now being used to make ethanol. /sarcasm>.
How do yeast like the stuff?
Is it filtered out during subsequent processing?
What are the combustion byproducts?
Cheers!
So that's where the phrase "bleeding-heart liberal" came from :-)
...and I betcha Dick Cheney wouldn't mind a serving of that right about now.
Cheers!
We all ingest all sorts of stuff, which if refined or administered in large enough doses, could be fatal. Water even meets this criteria, as we have seen recently from stupid radio station stunts. If you accumulated the nicotine from enough stop-smoking patches, you could drop a horse in its tracks with it, never mind a human.
So why do I bring up nicotine? Because nicotine, as deadly a poison as it is, is a terrific organic pesticide. No GMO necessary. Completely natural. Come to think of is, so is strychnine. Deadly? You betcha. Does it meet the qualifications (as written) for an organic pesticide?
Yup.
NB: There is no specific antidote for strych poisoning. LD50 of 1mg/kg of body weight in mammals. That's pretty toxic stuff. And again, it is completely naturally derived.
So in this context, do I see GMO plants as an unqualified bad thing? No. They're a management tool, like any other, in ag production. There's plenty of bad-assed chemicals out there that aren't created by various corporations and their junior Dr. Strangeloves in a lab. And I haven't even gone off on my rant about the really thin science that has gone into organic food standards for composting manure and preventing e. coli contamination in organic food. Point is, there is danger everywhere. Ain't no getting away from risk in this world.
In your question, the GM plants are being engineered to produce a drug to replace the same drug taken from animal sources.
Yes, aprotinin has been engineered into test plots of corn. My reading of the medical circular on Trasylol makes it look to me that it is a good deal more involved than a simple anti-coagulant. It isn't something you administer to someone for hypertension, it is used in cardiac procedures to reduce post-op inflammation and blood loss as well as thrombosis. But I'd defer to any MD who might want to comment on this. All I'm doing is reading the Trasylol product circular.
The reason why there is interest in producing aprotinin from GM corn is that Trasylol is currently derived from bovine lung tissue. There is concern that the drug, therefore, is a possible carrier of prion-based diseases (eg, vCJD or BSE). I can see why pharma companies would want to find another way to obtain this drug. The drug company is seeking to reduce risk to the patients. You see this as increasing the risk to you or your kid(s).
From what I see, (and I could be wrong, but the math I doodled out seems to indicate such) the danger from aprotinin in GM corn to consumers of said corn or corn products won't be from the medicinal action of the drug itself, since it will be found in very, very, very low rates in as much corn as you could care to eat in a week -- the possible problems come from anaphylactic or anaphylactoid reactions in someone consuming said corn products -- much like the allergic reactions that some hyper-sensitive people have to foods like peanuts, shellfish, etc. -- ie, one bite, three minutes and they can't breath sort of allergic reaction.
That's pretty much the same problem many of these hypersensitive people already have today from processed foods. eg, a kid is hypersensitive to peanuts. So you keep your kid away from peanuts, peanut butter, etc. You ask/inspect all foods for evidence of peanut content. And one day, your kid has a really bad reaction... and it is because there was peanut oil used in the food prep. Or the packaging. No GMO necessary, same result as above.
Why corn as the target? Good question. I'm guessing that economics plays a big role in the choice -- ie, they have a lot invested in grafting into corn, so they're going to get a ROI on that investment.
The various GM companies have obviously thought of the problems with escapes, and they even engineered a way to deal with it. Remember the flap over the "Terminator gene", whereby the seeds that are produced by the GM corn would be sterile?
Man, did you ever hear a hue and cry over that. Oh, the calamity, oh, the yelling.
So they didn't put it in.
So you get what we have here -- the proposed legislation, which seems like more of an inducement for the GM companies to create terminal genes in their GM products as a way of reducing their liability. What they need is a way to program the gene to terminate if it escapes.
Now, the organic movement should be very careful in what they wish for, because I can see the following happening as a result:
Conventional farmer is next to an organic farmer. Organic farmers do a pretty poor job at weed control without tillage. Tillage causes soil erosion, especially due to blowing soil. There has been a concentrated effort at no-till farming for the last 20 to 30 years in the US. So now the organic types go back to tillage, their fields blow, resulting in damage to neighboring conventional cropping. Tit for tat, it is now time to sue. The legislation made it precedent to sue for losses as a result of cropping practices, right? Well, what is good for the goose is good for the gander, and now the litigation comes full circle.
Or take this alternative scenario: organic crop suffers from a e. coli outbreak. Let's say it is some table vegetable. Choose your favorite.
As a result of a widespread recall, people stop buying said product for months -- even the conventionally produced, non-infested, products. I think the conventional producers should be able to sue the organic companies for the loss of revenue and market as a result.
So organic producers might want to think real hard about what they want in this legislation. But that's not likely to happen, because the "organic movement" is more about feelings and less about science.
As to imadicloprid and bees: I'm not buying it as the cause of colony collapses. The residue trials show there isn't enough AI left in the plant tissues to cause the effects claimed. The speed with which this problem is flashing over between bee colonies and between states where imadicloprid isn't used heavily indicates to me that it appears to be a contagious biological problem, not one introduced through a chemical vector.
We used to have some colonies of feral leafcutter bees here in this valley, holdovers from when there was some alfalfa seed production attempted. They're kind of a pain in the neck, actually -- they clip off leaf matter from alfalfa and hay stands, and then tuck these bits of plant matter into every nook and cranny on the side of a building. They're very gentle and inoffensive bees, but they're messy. They've been part of the area of decades.
In the last year, I noticed that the leafcutter bees simply disappeared. There is no imadicloprid used in this area at all, as seed treatment or applied over crops, because we simply don't grow any of the crops for which imadicloprid is labeled. If the bees have disappeared (and I don't know this for a fact other than by personal observation -- ie, since the colonies are feral, I don't know whether they've disappeared or simply moved), it is because of something other than imadicloprid, because we're surrounded by a hundred mile radius of BLM controlled land where almost no insecticides are used.
The only "science" that is used to back up this "cause" of imadicloprid's effect on bees comes out of France, and after tests showing that their initial science was inconclusive, the French want to apply their luddite "precautionary principle" and simply ban it. Well, this shows nothing but the idiocy of this whole green movement. First, the greenies want to get rid of well known, well studied broad-spectrum insecticides in the organophosphate and carbamate families. OK, fine, let's agree that they're nasty products and poisonous to mammals and pretty much everything with a nervous system. So that happens by regulatory fiat.
Still, producers need new products, and the EPA (and other regulatory agencies) stipulate to the chemical companies that the replacements cannot be as broad spectrum, cannot have the toxicity to mammals, birds and fish the way the old products did, so the industry comes up with what is required: less toxic pesticides, of which imadicloprid is one.
Now the public wants to run in circles, screaming and shouting that the new, less toxic, products should not be sold or labeled for use. And as usual, they don't want to do any science or math homework, they'd prefer to simply scream and shout.
Ultimately, I'm betting on some foreign fungus or virus being the cause of bee die-off in the US. I remember how nice it was to farm before West Nile Virus -- I didn't have to get out of equipment and shoot&bury crows, ravens and magpies that fell out of the sky in front of me and lay there twitching and almost dead. Thanks to "free trade" and inviting the whole of the third world into the US, we now have all these new and wonderful non-native pathologies to contend with.
Is this long enough?"Xytect Infusible is a new formulation of imidacloprid for root flare infusion. Use the M3 Infuser for fast uptake in situations that require quick results."
| foliar spray | soil application | tree infusion | |
| formulation | Xytect 2F Xytect 75WSP |
Xytect 2F Xytect 75WSP |
Xytect Infusible |
| insects start dying | same day | In 30 to 60 days | 7-14 days |
| residual performance |
several weeks may require multiple applications |
season long control fall applications can provide season long control the following year |
season long control |
Good point, but wouldn't there be dead bee bodies laying around the hive?
Effects of sub-lethal imidacloprid doses on the
homing rate and foraging activity of honey beesTreated honey bees also showed anomalous flying behaviour: they often fell in the grass and their flight direction was not towards the hive. Treated bees seemed to be disoriented, and that could be the cause of their disappearance.
[Ultimately, I'm betting on some foreign fungus or virus being the cause of bee die-off in the US. ]
You could very well be right. I just hope that, whatever it is, some colonies have resistance and the bee population recovers.
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