India Says No to Genetically Modified Eggplants

[scandal 951]

No matter what, GM is not equal to either cultivation, selection, or hybridization. To say they are on the same level is completely incorrect. One major issue with GM is the terminator issue. Although that could be seen as a great idea to prevent escape into the wild, the problems are several:

1. Most of our cultivated crops have basicxallt zero ability to survive in the wild without us helping/coddling them along anyway

2. You cannot save seed

3. They can wind-pollinate (big issue with corn) into non-terminator crops of the same species and sometimes genus, including wild cousins

I don't see how you can list Terminator as a "major" issue, when it's not even deployed commercially at this time.

I also don't understand your points.

Regarding 1., we don't want GMO seeds surviving on their own in the wild - these are domesticated crops we're talking about that are to be planted in a controlled manner by farmers. Do they need "coddling"? Well, doesn't conventional agriculture rely on fertilizers, pesticides, etc.? Maybe I'm missing your point here.

2. Correct. That's the intent of Terminator, and is a valid reason to be concerned, especially in developing countries. In the US- not so much. Farmers do very little seed saving today anyway.

3. This I don't understand at all. The whole idea of Terminator is that it effectively neuters the seeds. How can sterile seeds wind-pollinate with other plants?

Besides the fact that GM can violate religious law (which surprises me that Israel gets involved in this, but then again they have such a fractured society at times it's also not surprising... and maybe no one has really though about it OR they don't get involved in certain aspects of GM... I don't know enough about their programs to say one way or another-- maybe Scandal knows) with mixing of plant and animal, the terminator deal is a major issue IMO.

Israel is a country, not a religion. The majority of Israelis are non-religious and don't keep kosher. There is plenty of pork and shrimp to be found in Israeli shops. Kibbutz Mizrah, amongst others, has been famous for its pork production for decades. There is no religious restriction on Israeli scientists researching GMO. Your real question should be what is the JEWISH halakhic outlook on GMO. I.e. for those Jews who do care and follow kashrut restrictions, what is the impact of GMO technology. This would apply to Jews in Israel as well as outside of Israel equally.

Regarding GMO and kashrut laws (the laws regarding Jewish dietary restrictions), the basic underlying idea is that if you are importing single genes in minute quantities, it is "batel be'shishim". That is a halakhic concept meaning that if it's less than 1 part in 60, it can't contaminate the food. E.g. drop a teaspoon of milk into a large pot of chicken soup, and the chicken soup is not rendered treif (unkosher) by mixing of meat and dairy.

Here's a quote along those lines:

http://www.jcpa.org/art/jep2.htm

Kashrut

The kashrut laws delineate between species of animals which Jews are permitted to eat and those which are not permitted10 (all plants are considered kosher). When genetic material from non-kosher species of animals are mixed with kosher species of animals or with plants, does this render the receptor non-kosher? Most rabbinic authorities consider genetic material that is separated from or synthesized from the parent organism to be essentially "inert," in other words, independent of the defining characteristics of the parent organism. Rabbi Eliyahu Bakshi-Doron, Chief Sephardic Rabbi of Israel, points out that, generally speaking, the genetic material that is transferred from non-kosher species is not considered "food," has no taste, and is of negligible quantity relative to the permitted host species -- all important factors negating the effects of the transferred material. According to most authorities, genetic material from non-kosher species is not itself non-kosher and does not render the new host organism non-kosher.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

I don't see how you can list Terminator as a "major" issue, when it's not even deployed commercially at this time.

I also don't understand your points.

Regarding 1., we don't want GMO seeds surviving on their own in the wild - these are domesticated crops we're talking about that are to be planted in a controlled manner by farmers. Do they need "coddling"? Well, doesn't conventional agriculture rely on fertilizers, pesticides, etc.? Maybe I'm missing your point here.

The first terminator patents that came to public attention were those jointly owned by US Department of Agriculture and Delta and Pine Land Company, which Monsanto had intended to acquire.

...Monsanto had announced it will not commercialise terminator crops, to everyone's relief. Research and development, however, have continued unabated. Everyone has assumed such crops only exist in theory, when they have been out there for more than 10 years.

The USDA has ... committed itself to commercial development of the technology, and, like the UK ACRE, also argued in its favour because it could prevent GM gene flow. But it cannot [24], because male sterile lines will be pollinated by non GM crops, and there is no way to prevent horizontal gene transfer.

link

[Nasturtium 500]

1. That is exactly what I said-- nonterminator crops will die out super-quick because all our agricultural plants need coddling. They cannot compete with weeds and other natural occurances... which is why the more wild something is the better it can do without help... but most of our stuff is so removed from that, we shoudn't need to develop such a gene anyway. Terminator does exist, my great aunt buys corn with the gene.

2. Most large commercial farms do not save seed. Smaller business can. I come from a large farming family, some of which uses GMO and some of which does not.. some of which has smaller commercial farms (300+ acres), some of which have just plain small farms (80+ acres).

3. Seeds do not pollinate-- pollen pollinates. Terminator can exist on two levels-- a sterile gene carried that acts on its own or one that needs two genes to activate. The "two genes" is the problem one. This is like equating the making of a mule-- a donkey and a horse on their own are not sterile, but in combination, the offspring becomes sterile. If you are making mule, you always have to have the donkey and the horse-- because if you bred them out all into mules, you'd be at the end of that process and left with nothing in one generation. The issue will be for the plants, of course, not first-generation cross but any subsequent generations-- the F2 and beyond. The test fields aren't just in remote areas. I live quite close (literally a mile or so) from several. People here have learned they must bag their corn if they want to avoid cross-contamination at any rate though, so in a way it's not terribly affecting us. You had to do that before because of people growing popcorn, etc.

I am aware Israel is a country and not a religion... Isn't everyone? They do make concessions at times for religious groups though, depending on how much pull that group has. I fall on the ultra-strict side of rendering something treif, so the lackadaisical attitude does not surprise me.

I don't see how you can list Terminator as a "major" issue, when it's not even deployed commercially at this time.

I also don't understand your points.

Regarding 1., we don't want GMO seeds surviving on their own in the wild - these are domesticated crops we're talking about that are to be planted in a controlled manner by farmers. Do they need "coddling"? Well, doesn't conventional agriculture rely on fertilizers, pesticides, etc.? Maybe I'm missing your point here.

2. Correct. That's the intent of Terminator, and is a valid reason to be concerned, especially in developing countries. In the US- not so much. Farmers do very little seed saving today anyway.

3. This I don't understand at all. The whole idea of Terminator is that it effectively neuters the seeds. How can sterile seeds wind-pollinate with other plants?

Israel is a country, not a religion. The majority of Israelis are non-religious and don't keep kosher. There is plenty of pork and shrimp to be found in Israeli shops. Kibbutz Mizrah, amongst others, has been famous for its pork production for decades. There is no religious restriction on Israeli scientists researching GMO. Your real question should be what is the JEWISH halakhic outlook on GMO. I.e. for those Jews who do care and follow kashrut restrictions, what is the impact of GMO technology. This would apply to Jews in Israel as well as outside of Israel equally.

Regarding GMO and kashrut laws (the laws regarding Jewish dietary restrictions), the basic underlying idea is that if you are importing single genes in minute quantities, it is "batel be'shishim". That is a halakhic concept meaning that if it's less than 1 part in 60, it can't contaminate the food. E.g. drop a teaspoon of milk into a large pot of chicken soup, and the chicken soup is not rendered treif (unkosher) by mixing of meat and dairy.

Here's a quote along those lines:

Edited February 15, 2010 by julianna

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

The current government in India pays lip service to the left but is nothing more than a cabal of corrupt bastards.

This, and many other things, will change once someone better is in office.

[Ban Hammer 14,668]

The current government in India pays lip service to the left but is nothing more than a cabal of corrupt bastards.

This, and many other things, will change once someone better is in office.

i hope this gets better once aj takes office!

[Dakine 26]

We have 1000s of acres of Monsato BT corn here in Hawaii.

No idea yet if it's a positive or negative trip.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

i hope this gets better once aj takes office!

Oh, no! AJ has got the bomb!

[scandal 951]

I fall on the ultra-strict side of rendering something treif, so the lackadaisical attitude does not surprise me.

You keep kosher? Mehadrin?

[Nasturtium 500]

You keep kosher? Mehadrin?

The issue I was specifically thinking of (with some mixing of religion and alteration of SOME policy/function on an individual level) was the shmitta. There was a lot of concession made for that, although clearly not universal throughout the country by any means. The reason I define that kind of rabinnical logic as lacadaisical is that it's basically taking a fairly obvious NO commandment (DO NOT... Vayikra/Lev 19:19) about cross-breeding/species mixing and then saying, well, it's OK because it's so small. It reminds me of kid logic (it's OK as long as I only do it this once)... or back-seat makeout logic (it's OK because I will only do the tip). It's meh to me though overall. I keep track of myself and my own choices. If I don't like something, then I need to make sure I avoid it, right? If the whole country moved GMO, then I would just be responsible for growing my own which I do a lot of anyway, and keeping my seed source clean (which anyone close to anything has to do anyway. Again, not much of a change.). Where it would change from meh to an issue for me is if I was being told I was forced to do X.

[Niels Bohr 72]

It's more of the lack of understanding what GM foods is about in terms of religion. Or, there's the Vegetarians who think that by inserting the Anti-Freeze gene from the fish into Strawberries or Tomatoes makes it a meat group.

It's very weird when people (who don't really know the ins and outs of genetic engineering or biology) try to rationalize things.

[scandal 951]

The issue I was specifically thinking of (with some mixing of religion and alteration of SOME policy/function on an individual level) was the shmitta. There was a lot of concession made for that, although clearly not universal throughout the country by any means. The reason I define that kind of rabinnical logic as lacadaisical is that it's basically taking a fairly obvious NO commandment (DO NOT... Vayikra/Lev 19:19) about cross-breeding/species mixing and then saying, well, it's OK because it's so small. It reminds me of kid logic (it's OK as long as I only do it this once)... or back-seat makeout logic (it's OK because I will only do the tip). It's meh to me though overall. I keep track of myself and my own choices. If I don't like something, then I need to make sure I avoid it, right? If the whole country moved GMO, then I would just be responsible for growing my own which I do a lot of anyway, and keeping my seed source clean (which anyone close to anything has to do anyway. Again, not much of a change.). Where it would change from meh to an issue for me is if I was being told I was forced to do X.

I'm really not sure how shmitta fits into our discussion, other than perhaps (a) it is a mitzvah that only applies in Israel and nowhere else (b ) there has been controversy over how to deal with shmitta in our modern age of large scale agriculture. Otherwise, what's the connection between shmitta and GMO foods?

As to the controversy, I don't really get it. Granted - I'm not Orthodox and I don't keep kosher. So what the poskin decide really doesn't matter a whit to me, I would eat the same food regardless of what they say. But -- if it's acceptable to sell your chometz to a non Jew before Pesach, and if it's acceptable to have a shabbos goy turn out the lights in shul on a Friday night, why shouldn't it be acceptable to have a token-sale of the arable land for the year of Shmitta to get around the restriction? The alternative is to bankrupt farmers, which hardly seems right.

cross-breeding/species mixing and then saying, well, it's OK because it's so small.

Um, I just read this part more closely. Are you sure you meant shmitta? This sounds more like the commandment regarding shatnez.

[Nasturtium 500]

I said I wasn't sure how GMO wasn't on the minds of the more religious in Israel.

You said Israel was a country, not a religion and that there is rabinnical sanction for GMO.

I said I knew that. I then said shmitta was an example I could think of when there were market concessions to more religious stringencies, although clearly not on a wide scale by any means.

The connection being that if you felt GMO violated Lev 19:19, then you'd probably be opposed to it being sold at least unlabeled and that I was just somewhat surprised that it wasn't making some waves amongst those who are very strict such as shmitta did even though the religious (ultra Orthodox, etc) population was fairly small overall. It was an example only.

For the record, i think none of those "getting around restrictions" are right, just justification to do whatever you really want while keeping to the letter. Meh, again.

Also, GMO is not a savior messiah that has come to save the world from all it's farming woes. I wish people would see that. It is meant to address specific issues. Not using GMO doesn't equal starvation.

I'm really not sure how shmitta fits into our discussion, other than perhaps (a) it is a mitzvah that only applies in Israel and nowhere else (b ) there has been controversy over how to deal with shmitta in our modern age of large scale agriculture. Otherwise, what's the connection between shmitta and GMO foods?

As to the controversy, I don't really get it. Granted - I'm not Orthodox and I don't keep kosher. So what the poskin decide really doesn't matter a whit to me, I would eat the same food regardless of what they say. But -- if it's acceptable to sell your chometz to a non Jew before Pesach, and if it's acceptable to have a shabbos goy turn out the lights in shul on a Friday night, why shouldn't it be acceptable to have a token-sale of the arable land for the year of Shmitta to get around the restriction? The alternative is to bankrupt farmers, which hardly seems right.

Um, I just read this part more closely. Are you sure you meant shmitta? This sounds more like the commandment regarding shatnez.

Um, I just read this part more closely. Are you sure you meant shmitta? This sounds more like the commandment regarding shatnez.

This is regarding the GMO issue, not shmitta.

[Nasturtium 500]

It's more of the lack of understanding what GM foods is about in terms of religion. Or, there's the Vegetarians who think that by inserting the Anti-Freeze gene from the fish into Strawberries or Tomatoes makes it a meat group.

It's very weird when people (who don't really know the ins and outs of genetic engineering or biology) try to rationalize things.

The fact that it is all the same base-codes is irrelevant to my discussion, as is the fact that it is still clearly flora.