this post was submitted on 26 May 2024
251 points (91.7% liked)

News

23274 readers
3444 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil

Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.

2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.

Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.

3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.

Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.

4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.

Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.

5. Only recent news is allowed.

Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.

6. All posts must be news articles.

No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.

7. No duplicate posts.

If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.

8. Misinformation is prohibited.

Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.

9. No link shorteners.

The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.

10. Don't copy entire article in your post body

For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
251
‘A catastrophe’: Greenpeace blocks planting of ‘lifesaving’ Golden Rice (www.theguardian.com)
submitted 5 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
101 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Scientists have warned that a court decision to block the growing of the genetically modified (GM) crop Golden Rice in the Philippines could have catastrophic consequences. Tens of thousands of children could die in the wake of the ruling, they argue.

The Philippines had become the first country – in 2021 – to approve the commercial cultivation of Golden Rice, which was developed to combat vitamin A deficiency, a major cause of disability and death among children in many parts of the world.

But campaigns by Greenpeace and local farmers last month persuaded the country’s court of appeal to overturn that approval and to revoke this. The groups had argued that Golden Rice had not been shown to be safe and the claim was backed by the court, a decision that was hailed as “a monumental win” by Greenpeace.

Many scientists, however, say there is no evidence that Golden Rice is in any way dangerous. More to the point, they argue that it is a lifesaver.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 17 points 5 months ago (4 children)

I'd like to point out that Greenpeace or the local population doesn't have to prove that GM rice is bad. It's the other way around:

Big corps have to prove that GM rice is good and has no adversarial long-term effects, which is impossible to prove.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Which big corps would that be exactly?

It's perfectly possible to show that it's safe to any reasonable standard: https://www.irri.org/golden-rice-faqs

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jafc.9b01524

The only biologically meaningful difference between GR2E and control rice was in levels of β-carotene and other provitamin A carotenoids in the grain. Except for β-carotene and related carotenoids, the compositional parameters of GR2E rice were within the range of natural variability of those components in conventional rice varieties with a history of safe consumption.

How exactly do you propose that the genetic makeup of the rice is going to impact the person eating it, if chemical analysis shows it's not meaningfully different from any other rice?

You can't demand that people prove something beyond unreasonable doubt. At some point you have to be able to articulate a concern to justify further scrutiny.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

That would be Syngenta, the big agricultural corp involved in the project.

  • Syngenta retains commercial rights, although it has no plans to commercialize Golden Rice.
  • "Humanitarian Use" means (and includes research leading to): 
  • Use in developing countries (low-income, food-deficit countries as defined by FAO)
  • Resource-poor farmer use (earning less than US$10,000 per year from farming)

The key part to me is the under $10,000 USD per year from farming requirement. What happens when a larger farm gets accidental cross pollination?

What happens to farms with organic certification if their neighbours start growing golden rice and it cross pollinates?

There is a history of Western nations using “humanitarian” outreach to sabotage developing nations.

Assuming that Syngenta are entirely altruistic is a huge risk for developing nations.

Source: http://www.goldenrice.org/Content2-How/how9_IP.php

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

This is a good point, we shouldnt use this well tested and seemingly safe life saving scientific advance to save the lives and health of children because someone might have ulterior motives. Outright ban instead of a legal framework to protect against the abuse.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 5 months ago (1 children)

What big corps? Golden rice is developed by scientists working for universities and distributing it via NGOs for free.

And they've produced dozens of studies over the past 24 years showcasing its effectiveness and safety.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago

Honestly, that's where my comment started... But everything I found showed that studies had proven that it was safe. So I changed tack and started focusing on the Greenpeace side.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

Big corps have to prove that GM rice is good and has no adversarial long-term effects, which is impossible to prove.

Do you say this for every new organism that is patented or is it reserved solely for gmos?