Reply #120: Haha...

[WriteDown]

Yeah, the solution is to grow things like spinach in Africa. Its brilliant. Why hasn't anyone thought of this before?

The author of your article is LITERALLY a tree hugger. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vandana_Shiva

Here's some more info that may help you. This time concerning cotton. And I'll actually INCLUDE the good with the bad (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bt_cotton )

Possible problems
Further information: Genetically modified food controversies

The most celebrated problem ever associated with Bt crops was the claim that pollen from Bt maize could kill the monarch butterfly.<33> This report was puzzling because the pollen from most maize hybrids contains much lower levels of Bt than the rest of the plant<34> and led to multiple follow-up studies. In the end, it appears that the initial study was flawed; based on the way the pollen was collected, they collected and fed non-toxic pollen that was mixed with anther walls that did contain Bt toxin.<35> The weight of the evidence is that Bt crops do not pose a risk to the monarch butterfly.<36>

There was also a report in Nature that Bt maize was contaminating maize in its center of origin.<37> Nature later "concluded that the evidence available is not sufficient to justify the publication of the original paper."<38> A subsequent large-scale study, in 2005, failed to find any evidence of contamination in Oaxaca.<39> However, further researchs confirmed initial findings concerning contamination of natural maize by transgenic maize <40>.

There is also a hypothetical risk that for example, transgenic maize will crossbreed with wild grass variants, and that the Bt-gene will end up in a natural environment, retaining its toxicity. An event like this would have ecological implications, as well as increasing the risk of Bt resistance arising in the general herbivore population. However, there is no evidence of crossbreeding between maize and wild grasses.

As of 2007, a new phenomenon called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) is affecting bee hives all over North America. Initial speculation on possible causes ranged from cell phone and pesticide use<41> to the use of Bt resistant transgenic crops.<42> The Mid-Atlantic Apiculture Research and Extension Consortium published a report on 2007-03-27 that found no evidence that pollen from Bt crops is adversely affecting bees. The actual cause of CCD remains unknown, scientists believe that it may have multiple causes. <43>

A 2008 study carried out by Navdanya, an organisation that promotes organic farming, compared the soil of 25 fields where Bt-cotton had been grown over three years with adjoining fields planted only with non GMO crops. The study found statistically significant drops in microbes and beneficial enzymes. The most significant drops were Acid phosphatase which contributes to the uptake of nutrients by microorganisms (-26.6%), Nitrogenase which fixes atmospheric nitrogen (-22.6%), Actinomycetes which break down cellulose to make humus (-17%), Bacteria (-14.2%) and Dehydrogenase an oxidiser which increases beneficial microbial activity (-10.3%).<44>