One of the nation's most widely planted crops — a genetically engineered corn plant that makes its own insecticide — may be losing its effectiveness because a major pest appears to be developing resistance more quickly than scientists expected.
The U.S. food supply is not in any immediate danger because the problem remains isolated. But scientists fear potentially risky farming practices could be blunting the hybrid's sophisticated weaponry.
When it was introduced in 2003, so-called Bt corn seemed like the answer to farmers' dreams: It would allow growers to bring in bountiful harvests using fewer chemicals because the corn naturally produces a toxin that poisons western corn rootworms. The hybrid was such a swift success that it and similar varieties now account for 65 percent of all U.S. corn acres — grain that ends up in thousands of everyday foods such as cereal, sweeteners and cooking oil.
But over the last few summers, rootworms have feasted on the roots of Bt corn in parts of four Midwestern states, suggesting that some of the insects are becoming resistant to the crop's pest-fighting powers. end quote:
2nd quote same source:
Seed maker Monsanto Co. created the Bt strain by splicing a gene from a common soil organism called Bacillus thuringiensis into the plant. The natural insecticide it makes is considered harmless to people and livestock.
Scientists always expected rootworms to develop some resistance to the toxin produced by that gene. But the worrisome signs of possible resistance have emerged sooner than many expected. end quote.
There are several problems here for those of you unaware of them. First, the whole point of Monsanto genetically modifying corn by introducing insecticide into the germ of the genetics of the corn seed means that you and I are eating insecticide that "CANNOT" be washed off but has to be ingested. Though Bugs and organisms can adapt very quickly to such modifications, we as humans adapt very slowly. As more and more people die from genetic manipulations worldwide, whole groups of people with as yet undiagnosed allergies to new genetically manipulated grains will be permanently eliminated from human genetic stocks. And, since Monsanto's main purpose is to make farmers buy new corn seed from them every year instead of gathering their own seed stocks from their own growing corn as has ALWAYS been done before since farmers first started farming thousands of years ago, I never have thought genetically modified seeds whether they be corn, soybeans, wheat, rice or whatever was a good idea unless you are interested in eventually extincting the human race or so genetically debilitating it that it might just die out from the lack of genetic diversity. At this point I am not totally convinced that you can even call genetically modified grains as food. Because their food value and usefulness to a human or animal body is questionable.
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