Book Review: Meat- A Benign Extravagance
Simon Fairlie
Chelsea Green 2010
pbck 322pp
My name is Graham, I’m 46 years old and I am a born-again carnivore.
Like many of my generation, my first act of rebellion was to become a vegetarian sometime around the age of 14, following in my sister’s footprints and unfairly taking out my concerns for other species on my mother’s cooking, which was mainly of the traditional variety of English food, including a wide range of meat dishes.
“Rich westerners’ eating meat is the equivalent of eating the children of Africa, South America and Asia” admonished a Marxist text that came into my hands around that time, making a profound impression on me: we in the developed rich world were taking more than our fair share of the global pie, and starvation in other countries was the end result.
Clearly we had blood on our hands, of both the animals themseleves and that of the poor. The reasons for this were that it takes several times more land and resources to feed omnivores than it does vegetarians; in a world where many were brought up to “eat what I was given because there are starving in Africa” meat became a symbol for extravagance and exploitation.
I dont think I ever really took an ideological postion regarding humans’ right or otherwise to take the life of animals for food. Social justice and environmental concerns were paramount- it seemed obvious to me then that land taken for animals was not available for the greater biodiversity afforded by woodlands, and thus an early interest in trees drew me naturally to permaculture with its vision of forest gardens and great diversity combined with habitat.
By this time, in the mid-1980s I was living in a small rural commune on the Welsh borders where I had gone to learn to grow vegetables. This happened to be a vegan commune, and although I was never ideologically a vegan, I was happy to partake of the vegan diet and learn the pleasures of home-made soya milk and tofu. One year we even grew a reasonable crop of soya beans.
There were however at least two broad categories of vegan in this commune. On the one hand, there were those from an urban Animal Rights background, who were not too fussy about other considerations such as food miles, or whether their food included meat-substitutes like TVP, and were happy to eat white bread and even to go skip-diving for free food. Anything went so long as it was vegan, and this extended to other animal products such as clothing and footwear. They had ties with hunt saboteurs and wanted to give over some of our land for ailing sheep as an animal sanctuary.
On the other hand there were other vegans there who just didnt like animals. They wouldnt tolerate pets of any kind, much less farmed animals, retired or otherwise; land was for growing vegetables or natural habitat, period. This group tended to be much more purist about food on many levels- had to be organic and wholefood, while they didnt object so much to leather clothes.
I abandoned the vegan diet towards the end of my stay in the commune in the midst of what I thought of as The Vegan Wars, but almost never ate meat until much more recently when I moved to West Cork and meat has become a once or twice weekly part of my diet- much to the relief of my mother for now when I visit she no longer has to make a special vegetarian dish.
Here I am surrounded by small-holders who often keep some animals and local meat, fish and poultry are readily available. While factory farming has always been distasteful to me and the problems of a diet of meat three times a day seem all too obvious, I have long been persuaded at the environmental benefits of eating some meat and the ecological functions of animals in a permaculture system.
It is to these, and many other, issues of meat, veganism and farming that land rights activist Simon Fairlie, editor of The Land Magazine has addressed his fascinating book “Meat- A Benign Extravagance”.
The book is information dense, packed with statistics and graphs,and Fairlie gives a comprehensive analysis of many aspects of meat, farming and sustainability.
Interestingly, he states in the opening section that it is specifically to counter the arguments put forward by vegans that he has written the book.
His initial chapters are aimed at addressing a common figure quoted by many in the environmental movement, that it takes around 10 times the land to feed a meat eater as it does a vegetarian. Fairlie’s analysis shows how difficult this is to actually quantify: not all meat is the same; pigs traditionally were able to eat food and crop wastes and so didnt necessarily take any land; sheep can run around happily gathering nutrients from marginal land not suited to crops; farm animals can also provide other yields and services, the most important of which is manure to add fertility, without which the vegan would require more land for green manures.
Two other important points he makes which are often missing from this debate: first, that animals can be herded and shepherded, thus making the default farming system of the landless poor; second, that keeping animals acts as a buffer against shortages, allowing feed to be diverted quickly for human consumption in times of hardship or failed crops- a function that works apparently both on the small farm scale, as well as the global scale.
Fairlie has done an important analysis of 8 different land use models and calculated the land requirements to feed Britain, comparing each of organic/chemical (conventional) versions of vegan, livestock and permaculture systems.
Because organic yields of wheat and potatoes are only 60% of conventional production, and the need for grain to feed high-yielding beef and dairy cows, he concludes orthodox organic livestock-farming would have the most difficulty feeding Britain on the available land, but that with the use of traditional and permacultural practices to enhance the nutrient cycling abilities of animals, together with more dispersed production and rural settlement, this could be improved significantly.
Fairlie concludes that the actual figure is much more favourable to meat production than conventionally believed, taking all factors into consideration “the effective ratio of human edible feed to meat and other animal products in US feedlot beef comes to about 3.2:1″
Having established this- and making a strong case that the ecological benefits could outweigh the extra land with good animal husbandry- Fairlie then takes on the vegans first hand: what would the British landscape look like if it were all vegan? He suggests that few vegans have really contemplated this, and that we break our long-standing relationship with animals at out peril: the immediate question for the stockless gardener becomes, how to deal with the pests- from slugs to deer- if we cannot kill them, and what indeed will our relationship to the natural world be at all if all the unused land is simply fenced off, as Failrlie envisages would be the case if some strands of vegan thought were carried to their logical conclusion. He pokes fun at the vegans:
Nothing causes sleepless nights for conscience-stricken vegans so much as the sound of rats scuttling in the cavities in their walls.
Worse than that, is the danger of vegan dystopias of concentrated high-tech urban settlements, with vegan food produced entirley without animals in labs, possibly including synthetic meat cultured from artificial animal tissue, genetic engineering, and even transhumanism. Such visions of the future are promoted for example by influential vegan philopsopher Peter Singer, who apparently sees such developments as the logical result of a Buddhist concern to reduce suffering.
Those of us who value the natural world, and more especially our relations with members of the animal kingdom, wild and domestic, would do well to keep an eye on the vegan agenda, for it may not turn out to be quite as meek, disinterested and innocuous as it might seem.
He even takes on Greenpeace and other activists who continue to oppose whaling even of species whos stocks have increased beyond danger levels, and defends the rights of the hunter:
To the extent that they campaign against whaling on humane grounds, WWF, Greenpeace, Sea Shepherdand the like are no longer protectors of the environment, but have set themselves up as the world’s ethical policemen.
Fairlie goes onto argue that this dysfunctional vegan ethic has had a disproportionate influence on the permaculture movement, and gives an analyisis of the core text for cool temperate permaculture, Whitefield’s “The Earth Care Manual”, which he says reflects the general permaculture bias towards nuts, woodlands and forest gardens and hardly any mention of grass:
What some seem to forget is that permanent grass is an entire ecosystem of perennial species (with its own stacking system) which doesn’t have any above-ground infrastructure to maintain” and goes on to sing the virtues of grass: “it is highly bio-diverse and resilient, it creates organic matter in the soil, it introduces nitrogen and improves fertility, its fertility can be moved easily from one place to another with the aid of animals, it can be cut up for mulch, it opens up ground for sunlight, it can be walked on or driven on when mown or grazed, it is the easiest surface for picking up windfalls or shaken fruit, and it is good for playing football on.
In similar vein, Fairlie takes issue with recent claims that ruminants contribute to significant amounts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions through their release of methane, which he argues are exaggerated and hide pressure for policy to favour a move towards intensive models over pastoral practices, at the expense of tackling the real causes of climate change,which is clearly burning fossil fuels.
Fairlie hardly tries to hide his own ideological bias: a small holder and stock-keeper himself, he clearly feels a strong cultural and “spiritual” need for our traditional relationships with animals in addition to the environmental benefits.
He lets his ideology run away with him however when he dismisses genetic engineering as part of a techno dystopia, in opposition to the pre-industrial rural lifestyle he clearly favours; and he criticizes initiatives like The Declaration in Support of Protecting Nature with high Yielding Farming and Forestry signed by 800 scientists and pundits of the Center for Global Food Issues:
The gist of this declaration …is that to provide sufficient nitrogen to feed a future population of 8.5billion which industrialisation will spawn, we will have to resort not only to nitrogen and other fertilisers but also to genetic manipulation. Any attempt to secure nitrogen and other nutrients through organic means would require undue encroachment upon natural habitats- if not their total destruction. If we want to feed the world and preserve biodiversity then we’d better continue with industrial agriculture. Rather than share agricultural land with nature we should spare land elsewhere. To protect nature we have to farm unnaturally.
It is a shame Fairlie does not seem aware of the essential “Tomorrow’s table” by Ronald and Adamchuk which argues that GE and Organics make the perfect bedfellows- precisely because GE is a biological, rather than a chemical approach. One might ask, what is the meaning of the world “unnaturally” in the last sentence. Why should GE be any more “unnatural” than conventional plant breeding, or indeed than any other use of technology, agricultural or otherwise? GE is just another technology, which could be and I believe is being used to help organic farmers also, and to make organic farming more competitive and sustainable- surely something Fairlie would welcome as part of his hoped for “biological agricultural revolution”.
Fairlie then goes on on the next page to accept that it is nonetheless hard to believe these more integrated, small-scale and low-tech approaches could work for the burgeoning populations in countries such as China, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Egypt, thus tacitly accepting that Center for Global Food Issues are largely correct: it is the richer countries who now do indeed have the luxury to examine their food and farming systems critically, for there is clearly huge scope for improvement; but Fairlie is wrong rubbish the Green Revolution as benefiting only the rich at the expense of the poor, as it clearly did achieve its aims of feeding millions of people and staving off famines.
He misses the point that Paalberg makes (“Starved for Science”), that the majority of the remaining hungry people in the world are in Africa where they have not yet had the benefits of the Green Revolution, and where they are already practicing traditional organic small-scale agriculture- that is why they are hungry and poor because yields are so low.
Fairlie also gives a hard time to the Haber-Bosch method of manufacturing artificial fertliser from the air: both scientists were associated with the Nazis, Haber supported the war effort and developed the chlorine poison gas; he later became head of the chemical Warfare Service but was discovered to be a Jew and removed from his post. He died in 1934 befroe he could see the gas he had helped develop be used in the death camps.
So Fairlie asks the interesting question, since the fertilisers we use were a bye-product of the war, what would have happened had we not revolutionized farming with them,increasing yields but creating a dependence on fossil energy and interfering with traditional practices of nutrient cycling in the farm? Could humanity have not taken a different path?
This rather smacks of romaticism to me: certainly chemical farming did help displace people from the land, but this process was already underway for other reasons, for example developments in horse-drawn machinery, which was already reducing the labour force on the land and causing migrations to the city. It is an interesting question, but I think one of those “what ifs?” that could be asked equally of every other major technological development we have seen- perhaps even going back to the discovery of fire.
Fairlie fails to make a convincing critical appraisal of his own clearly stated bias against modernity and preference for what appears to be a mode of living somewhere around 2-300 years ago, where people were poor but happy, living in small family groups and villages with a cow and a couple of pigs and going to country fayres. No mention of how for example education would have to be rather severely curtailed if we all went back to the land to this degree, nor any discussion of the downside of the typically conservative, religious and even oppressive values held in many rural communities, or the historic vulnerability to famines, both of which may have contributed to people fleeing the countryside when they got a chance to. Perceived negatives in this Fairlie’s romantic vision are all dismissed as a result of the pressures of capitalism and the march of modernity forcing people off the land.
Fairlie’s book is an important contribution to permaculture, and discussions on animals in farming and diet, and more broadly, humans place in relationship to nature and the landscape in an increasingly urbanised world. He does a very good job of unpacking the ideologies behind some aspects of vegan movement and asks some very interesting questions about how this may be have created a strong vegan bias within the permaculture movement, and made a strong case that an element of meat in the diet- albeit a modest component- can still be sustainable and that farm animals play a crucial ecological function in the landscape.
I admire Fairlie’s work with The Land and of course as a rural permaculturalist I support moves to make it easier for people to create sustainable livelihoods for themseleves on the land.
I suspect however that far fewer people than he thinks really want to do this, and for good reasons: the city offers more opportunities in many ways, and life on the land is far harder for a society as a whole without various backups than he suggests. I dont accept Fairlie’s general view, the conventional one within the environmental movement, that times were necessarily better in the agrarian past at some undefined point, and people have always been forced off the land against their will;
nor do I assume as he does that people living even more post-industrial lives than they do now, would necessarily be any less happy than the self-sufficient small-holder, even if they were fed on synthesised meat tissue grown in a lab. I dont have such a horror of possible future technologies, nor do I have such a contempt for the life of the urbanite.
In fact I do wonder just where exactly Fairlie is actually coming from when I read this extraordinary statement in the final chapter:
The natural world is controlled by God, while the technological world is controlled by scientists. Both are tyrannical, but as tyrants go the former has a better record than the latter.
At this point I part company entirely with the author, who although he has done a good job of exposing some of the more extreme warped versions of what “nature” means in the end may be just trying to replace them with another, equally fanciful, of his own making
I am however glad to have such a well-researched and argued book to back me up as I go off to cook me sausages.
Great review – thanks Graham.
As a permaculture-practicing, sustainable organic farming & livestock keeping carnivore myself, I really enjoyed this blog. I am surrounded by vegan farmers of varying degrees of religious fanaticism, and I have fun teasing them because their efforts to “nurture soil” are so labor-intensive and yet comparatively ineffectual when measured against the astonishing productivity of my own near-effortless manure-composted loam (I don’t even have to “turn” my compost — I let the livestocks’ hooves do all that work). Thank you for an enjoyable and informative read. I will be obtaining a copy of Meat- A Benign Extravagance, which also sounds like a fun read.
However, I can only assume that your actual first-hand reserach into the issues of GMO crops has been very limited, and (it would seem) you have bought into the PR spin that Big Ag invests so many millions every day, to spread dis-information about GE crops.
You ask, “Why should GE be any more “unnatural” than conventional plant breeding, or indeed than any other use of technology, agricultural or otherwise?” — the very fact that you ask that question shows you have not done much homework. Please, I beg you to take the time to learn a bit more, before you proselytize on behalf of Big Ag and the GMO industry.
If you only read ONE article, please let it me Genetic Engineering and the Failure of Science by Don Lotter (2 parts) . Lotter took enormous personal risks and effectively tanked his own career by having the courage to publish this expose of what has been going on behind the scenes at universities across the country.
You state, “GE is just another technology, which could be and I believe is being used to help organic farmers also, and to make organic farming more competitive and sustainable” — uh, no. Absolutely not. Again, and I don’t mean to be disrespectful or rude, but it seems you have been drinking Corporate Ag’s PR Disinformation Kool-Aide.
Please, take the time to learn the truth. This is too important an issue. Big Ag is pushing GMO’s for only one reason — greed. They push GMO’s to monopolize world agriculture, to make all farmers dependent upon corporate-copyrighted seeds, and to push the petroleum-dependent factory-farm model into every corner of the globe, solely for the purpose of maximizing Corporate Ag profits NOW, and to hell with the future of the planet.
They have destroyed seed banks, they have persecuted seed-savers. They are (effectively) destroying the very concept of sustainable agriculture. This is a crime — a crime against nature, and a crime against humanity.
Please, do the homework. Respectfully, Farmer Jefferson
by the way, if you are interested I can send you link to a recent article from China in which internal study concludes that the country’s best chance to feed itself in the future will be small-scale organic farming. Here in the USA it has been proven that small-scale organic farms are 80 – 100 times more food-productive per acre than large scale farms. Yet Big Ag continues to push the erroneous concept that large-scale farming is the “only solution” to world hunger.
Farmer Jefferson: There is a difference between the science of genetic engineering and the business practices of large agricultural corporations. Nothing in the methods of genetic engineering requires the creation of monopolies and patented seeds nor the suing of farmers. The bad behavior of corporations should not be seen as a wholesale indictment of a useful tool.
Hi Graham. Thanks for such a comprehensive book review, and from a different perspective than most others. You perhaps don’t need it, some other references to a beneficial link between biotechnology and organic farming come from: i) an article in New Scientist from 31 October 1998 where non less than Jeremy Rifkin wrote “genetic science could be used for developing a sophisticated organic-based agricultural production for the 21st century” Didn’t take him long to change his tune when he saw which way the rabble was heading. ii) a Lords select committee report from January 1999 that said that organic farming might benefit from GM technology. iii) but my favourite is James Lovelock, author of the Gaia theory and the inspiration for many seeking a sustainable life (and years before the organic movement clothed itself in sustainability rhetoric) who expressed his despair with environmentalists for their ignorance and hatred of science. He wished they “would grow up” and see biotechnology as one more tool in meeting the challenges of our world, and which does not necessarily end in “destroying the habitats of other creatures”
Anyway, I digress. As much as I admire Simon’s writing, especially the way he “pulls things apart to see how they work”, it does seem as though he’s manufactured an evidence trail in the book that is supportive of his chosen lifestyle. I guess we all do it to some extent. However, he does have a pretty conventional view of grassland and farming, thus complaining elsewhere that rangeland grazing is inefficient and leads to patches of thistles etc. This is a command and control view, characteristic of agriculturists for millenia. He also wrote this in Permaculture Magazine about an aspiration to free up land from the grip of farming for instead woodland and wildlife: “To some extent this is an ‘aesthetic’ matter, a question of personal preference” UHhhh? And followed it up with “Livestock provide the biodiversity that trees on their own cannot provide” This is the dogma of the “nature” conservation industry in Britain, wedded as it is to an Arcadian view of countryside and landscape that has given rise to a contemporary concern for favoured priority species that did well in the farmed landscapes of the Victorian era. Britain’s conservation industry thus tries to impose and maintain control against the dynamism of functioning ecosystems – farming by any other definition. It is the most unnatural system of nature conservation as it has no foundation in what is the prevailing evidence of what should be the natural ecology of Britain – see http://www.self-willed-land.org.uk/articles/barn_owl.htm
If there is a de-emphasis on grassland in Permaculture, then it is more in empathy with that natural ecology.
The latter touches on your recent piece on “Into the wild”. I have to declare an interest here – I absolutely have a commitment to the existence of biophysical wilderness on this planet! I’ve walked it in N. America and continental Europe. I have seen the wilderness dependent fauna and flora that thrive in these locations – wolf, bear, lynx etc.; the vast drifts of blue camas lily, arrowleaf balsam and mules ears whose bulbs were food for pre-agricultural societies, as were moose, elk, bighorn sheep and cutthroat trout.
I came across the book “Into the wild” in Boston some years ago on my way to walking wilderness in the White Mountain National Forest, but the sadness of the story – the fact that McCandless set off into Alaskan wilderness and died there – made me put it back on the shelf. I bought later on a trip to Colorado wilderness. Was Christopher McCandless foolishly ill-prepared when he walked alone into the wilderness of Alaska, or was he unlucky that his spiritual and physical journey led to his tragic death? The book chronicles other examples of people who have perished in wilderness after seemingly seeking relief from disaffection with their lives, and wanting to explore their “inner country”. Some were tragic romantics, others were clearly troubled souls. Not all of them gave up their life willingly, or that is the surmise as they left little evidence. McCandless kept a journal, but it has few philosophical revelations, concentrating mostly at his success or otherwise at finding food. That is the reality, the “daily transactions with nature that don’t allow for abstraction” because there is a narrow margin by which it is sustaining. But that does not mean to say that McCandless wasn’t in awe of his surroundings, or that he was indifferent to the importance of the species that gave him sustenance.
Which brings me back to farming. I feel oppressed by how dominant farming is in the British landscape. I just happen to notice that when farming pressure is taken off our landscapes, then there is a natural regeneration of native species that can provide food for humans, and which succeeds the farm grasslands that provide food only for livestock. I’ve done the self-sufficency thing, and it is a tyranny. To be honest, I’d rather live in a landscape where food was all around me, as it would also be for all other species in a wilderness. It is a basic denial of the freedoms of wilderness that McCandless sought, and which I do not have in Britain.
Hi Graham,
Very detailed review, thanks for taking the time to do it. I did want to pick up on one point though, with regards to your continued admiration for GM crops and your blanket dismissal of anyone who has problems with the technology. You often present those of us who are opposed to their spread, Fairlie included, as standing in the way of progress, being the forces of unreason, and that this is a benign technology which is spreading around the world purely propelled by its own brilliance and its own proved scientific efficacy, being unjustifiably held back by Luddite and, no doubt, Steiner-influenced Greens.
Yet, today’s Guardian reports on the latest Wikileaks revelations from US Embassy cables relating to GM. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/03/wikileaks-us-eu-gm-crops It is well worth a look. What the Wikileaks cables show is the degree to which this is not the case, with the US administration bullying and threatening European countries to accept GM. It says “in other newly released cables, US diplomats around the world are found to have pushed GM crops as a strategic government and commercial imperative”.
The leaks, from the US Embassy in Paris state that “Country team Paris (i.e. the US Embassy there) recommends that we calibrate a target retaliation list that causes some pain across the EU since this is a collective responsibility, but that also focuses in part on the worst culprits. The list should be measured rather than vicious and must be sustainable over the long term, since we should not expect an early victory. Moving to retaliation will make clear that the current path has real costs to EU interests and could help strengthen European pro-biotech voices”. It shows that a number of US diplomats also work for Monsanto. It shows how Spain, the most pro-GM country in Europe has been working with the US to try and water down anti-GM legislation in the EU, and that “not only did the Spanish government ask the US to keep pressure on Brussels but that the US knew in advance how Spain would vote, even before the Spanish biotech commission had reported”.
Many things, such as the relentless onwards march of the supermarkets and the destruction of local economies, are often presented as being inevitable, as just ‘one of those things’, and the relentless onward march of progress. When you look behind the scenes however, such as in Andrew Simms’ book ‘Tescopoly’, you see the strongarming of the planning system, the corruption, the intentional eradication of small business competitors and so on. GM is not spreading because there is an overwhelming appreciation of its benefits, nor because there even are many benefits, but because a huge industrial and governmental lobby, as the Wikileaks cables reveal, is out-muscling and out-legislating governments and NGOs around the world.
If GM becomes our dominant agricultural system, it will not be because the decision was made by you and I, or by the farmers of the world, but because a decision was made in distant un-elected boardrooms. Personally speaking, I found those Wikileaks cables terrifying. You might argue that the technology itself and this kind of industrial bullying are not the same, that GM could be decentralised and so on, but that is not what we see happening in the world. I hope that, at the least, these Wikileaks cables might provide some food for thought…
Best wishes Rob
Brilliant job, Graham! As always you provoke excellent debate and manage to tease out issues, which others sometimes neglect. I look forward to reading more!
I would just like to echo the sentiments in Rob’s comment above. Despite having had a long email debate with Graham re: GE crops and challenging him to list genuine benefits of current GE in agriculture I remain unconvinced that the technology is especially important regarding ‘feeding the world’ at the moment.
Granted, idealistic opposition to the technology ‘just because’ is equally damaging but there is good evidence to show that money spent on non GE agricultural research has a better cost benefit than GE research. This is not to say that this will always be the case but it appears to be so at the moment.
I am still concerned at the extent to which Graham has swallowed the arguments of Robert Paarlberg as gospel despite the fact that Paarlberg cannot be seen as an independent voice considering his ties with Monsanto.
Hi Rob Yes I saw the wikileaks thing to. It is essentially a trade dispute- a “Retaliation list” is standard practice in WTO disputes: http://bit.ly/dTi0hn It does strike me though that ones reading of it will vary according to prior opinion: on the one hand, if you read it already firmly convinced that a)the technology is evil and b) big corporations (and especially Monsanto) are evil then it certainly conjures up images of diabolical backroom dealings by shady men in suits conspiring to take over the world. However, if one believes that this is a potentially useful technology with a proven safety record which is being unfairly discriminated against on ideological grounds by a powerful green lobby which deliberately misrepresents the science to fool the public, engaging in blatant scaremongering, then you might see it in a different light. I am assuming you have “done your homework” (as Farmer Jefferson has requested I do) and read Tomorrow’s Table. See Ronald’s website here: http://scienceblogs.com/tomorrowstable/ Ronald argues that GE is one important way that organic farming can progress, and should be embraced by the organic movement, and gives lots of examples of significant projects that are undertaken by independent scientists, humanitarian organisations, universities and so on not connected with Monsanto or big corporations; the problem is, as I have pointed out elsewhere, the success of the anti-GE lobby to put up so many restrictions and obstacles has actually pushed the technology into the domain of the big corps, who are the only ones who can afford to develop it. This may be part of the reason GE struggles to prove cost-effective, if that is the case. As Tom says, this is potentially the strongest case against GE. The weakest is that some pro- GE writers like Paalberg are linked Monsanto. This is not surprising in the context of the technology being so dominated by a few big corporations- partly as I say because of punitive regulations.
So it is perfectly possible to be opposed to the way Monsanto operate in some or all ways, but in favor of democratizing the technology by lowering the bar. There is a perfectly good discussion to be had also about the cost-effectiveness of GE- but why, if the anti-GE lobby is impartial, will they not accept that the technology is itself safe and not at all scary?
http://post.ly/1QraG
It doesnt make sense to support a ban of GE on the grounds that it is not cost-effective- it should simply be seen as one potential technology among many options (including mutagenesis for example, which is permitted under organic standards) which may be cost-effective in some cases and not in others. Surely, if it is not cost-effective it will not succeed. One might also ask, is Organic Farming “cost-effective” -given the higher price and lower yields? Might not GE help make Organic Farming more cost-effective? One thing is for sure: we wont be able to answer these questions satisfactorily while the technology is handcuffed by regulations and debate is dominated by whacko Steiner-friendly homeopaths!
@Tom- In the exchange we had that you refer to, I am likewise concerned at your apparent willingness to accept uncritically the opinions and quality of evidence supplied by the anti-GE websites like ISIS who you referred me to- they clearly misrepresent the science on risks and health benefits; I havnt seen any flaws in Paalberg’s scientific arguments. Who is more credible?
Happy New year to you both!
@Tom
here is an recent paper on how GE has benefited corn growers- even those not using GE corn!
http://tiny.cc/og4xx
@Rob @Tom here is a paper on Golden Rice explaining that not all GE crops are developed by big corporations:
http://is.gd/k6rIJ
“Golden Rice as a humanitarian project
Golden Rice was originally developed by a team of researchers led by Ingo Potrykus of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology and by Peter Beyer of the University of Freiburg in Germany. Later on the project was also supported by a group of seed companies, coordinated by Syngenta, who donated royalty-free intellectual property (materials and patented processes and technologies) for the development and humanitarian use of Golden Rice. For this reason – and contrary to often repeated claims by activists – smallholder farmers in developing countries will be able to get Golden Rice without additional charges and they are free to save the seeds for replanting. The work on Golden Rice is being continued and coordinated by the International Rice Research Institute. Target countries for the introduction of Golden Rice are the Philippines and Bangladesh, but also India, Indonesia and Vietnam. “
The paper goes on to discuss cost-effectiveness:
“Impact and cost-effectiveness of Golden Rice
To determine the potential impact of Golden Rice on this burden on public health, we simulated the consumption of Golden Rice based on real consumption data of a representative sample of 120,000 households in India. We found that under more optimistic assumptions the widespread consumption of Golden Rice in the target groups could reduce the disease burden of VAD in India by almost 60 percent. Even under pessimistic assumptions the burden could still be reduced by almost 10 percent – i.e. over 200,000 “healthy life years” (DALYs) could be saved. Setting off these gains in terms of lives and health against the research and development costs (incl. distribution, awareness campaigns, etc.) showed that Golden Rice could prevent the loss of one DALY for less than $20, even under pessimistic assumptions. In contrast, other vitamin A interventions cost between $80-$600 per DALY saved. Hence, while this was only a computation, it was a very thorough one as we worked on the wider project for three years, and it should not be too far off the mark (and there is a long way from under $20 to over $80). Therefore our conclusion was that pursuing the development of Golden Rice further is justified. The finer details of this study can be found in the scientific articles below. “
Re: Golden Rice: This is quite good:
http://www.ifrik.org/golden-rice-way-solve-malnutrition
Thanks Tom this gives some interesting background, written by prof. Protrykus who was involved with the Golden Rice project: http://www.agbioworld.org/biotech-info/topics/goldenrice/tale.html
Thanks both… I can’t help feeling Graham that you have somewhat dismissed the concerns I joined this thread with. I agree that of course where one stands on GM will affect whether you see this story as alarming or not, but only up to a point. This is, by my reading anyway, more than just a ‘trade dispute’. And it is not so much whether it conjurs up images of “diabolical backroom dealings by shady men in suits”, it is the fact that the Spanish government’s supposedly independent and impartial biotech commission, whose advice would underpin Government policy and would then, by extension, feed in to EU policy making, was a done deal, its findings agreed in advance with the US, many of whose ambassadors it turns out are directly employed by Monsanto. That is not a decision based on science, it is a decision based on US government/corporate pressure.
Let’s imagine that we were instead talking about climate change here, for which there is a far far more convincing scientific consensus than GM. I want to see the rapid adoption of carbon reduction measures and international legislation, in the same way you probably do on GM (and on climate change I’m sure), but if I saw that the way such a thing was being pursued was through threats to “start a military-style trade war against any European Union country” which opposed it, having lots of ambassadors who are also employed by renewables companies and therefore with a clear conflict of interest, and where the US government knows the outcomes of national independent commissions on climate change before they even report their findings, that would cause me considerable disquiet. Of course the reality, as the Wikileaks reports from the time of Copenhagen show, is that the US was using strongarm tactics at Copenhagen to achieve quite the opposite result, but I am trying to establish a principle here.
If GM is so good, and the case so convincing, it really ought not to need to be forced onto nations in the face of overwhelming public opinion which is, at present, against it. As I said before, if GM is taken up worldwide, it will not be because it has been embraced by the people, nor because it has convinced everyone, but because it has been forced on people through just the process revealed in the Wikileaks cables…. I think it is really important not to be naive to that… We all want to see certain changes in the world, especially in relation to climate change, but do we want to achieve that through abandoning democracy, decency and by allowing the corporate take-over of government? These are, I would suggest, questions we need to be asking… and they go way beyond simple ‘trade disputes’….
I am no expert on Golden Rice, but is there not a case to say that from a permaculture perspective, a better solution would be to support the communities at risk (easily identifiable I’d imagine) in growing cassava, broccoli, carrots and so on, learning the skills, transforming the places where they live, creating social enterprises and so on? Working with parents to give support in terms of understanding nutrition? Perhaps, in the short term, with the kinds of supplements Steve Collins uses at Valid Nutrition… ? That would offer a future of diversity, skills, food security, empowerment, the protection of each area’s biodiversity, whereas I can see little advantage to Golden Rice. It may solve the problem of Vitamin A, but it certainly isn’t the only, nor the best way to do so. Is it overly cynical to suggest that the former approach, a bottom-up, permaculture-inspired, localised food security building, would generate very little income to Western research organisations, whereas Golden Rice would?
When I was a permaculture teacher, I always understood the idea being to see the problem as the solution, to look at the resources you have available, and then based on the principles of Earth Care, People Care and Fair Shares, to design locally based responses. If I were working with a community in the developing world suffering from VAD, I would be looking to support people in creating intensive food gardens, perhaps processing food into a more easily digestable format in the place, perhaps working with local farmers too to grow high Vitamin A crops…. . I would also be interested to know in places that suffer from VAD how much of what is grown locally is produced for export on land no longer locally owned? As we see more and more of the buying up of ‘cheap’ land by Dubai, China and so on in order to meet their food needs, and more and more dispossession of local small scale farmers, providing a diet with enough Vitamin A will become more and more of a struggle. I always understood permaculture as being about thinking holistically about problems, seeing them in the round…
Thanks…. Rob
Rob: Firstly I think it is important to emphasise that you have clearly stated a strong ideological (rather than rational or informed) stance on GE technology:
“I feel that GM is simply unnecessary, there is no need to interfere with plants and animals in that way, that we are tinkering in a way that we barely understand, and have no sense of the long term consequences of, and we are abandoning the Precautionary Principle. I don’t have scientific papers to back that up, it is an instinctive revulsion at the very concept.”
http://tiny.cc/edgwl
It seems to me this “instinctive revulsion” is what informs your position more than anything else, and that this is also the situation with the vast majority of the anti-GE lobby: they are informed to a greater or lesser extent by ignorance of the science and an emotional attachment to the absurd idea that “we shouldnt tamper with Mother Nature”- although tampering with other Nature IS Human nature.
It isnt really possible to have a rational discussion with an ideologue; I also think you have ignored all the points I made.
Secondly, as with every other anti-GE ideologue I have debated or read, you are conflating different issues: corporate control, politics and technology and science. We may agree (or disagree) on the politics, but just answer me one thing: is it democratic to go and pull up crops? I believe we have several mutual friends who have engaged in such “democratic” processes.
“Let’s imagine that we were instead talking about climate change here, for which there is a far far more convincing scientific consensus than GM…”
What specifically about GE (please use the technically correct Genetic Engineering- nearly all of our cultivated food plants have been genetically modified, over thousands of years) do you think there is not a scientific consensus on? Most major scientific academies around the world have published reviews broadly in support of the technology. There is no convincing science that GE poses more of a risk than other forms of breeding crops (read the links above!!). Climate science is way more complex, so I would argue the opposite- in terms of consensus, the science on GE is much clearer.
By contrast, the anti-GE lobby continues a campaign of misleading and scare-mongering invective supporting a blanket ban and “democratic” direct action, routinely pointing to discredited research and ignoring any possible benefits or success of the technology. What is democratic about deliberately misleading the public in order to further a quasi-spiritual ideological agenda?
“I always understood permaculture as being about thinking holistically about problems, seeing them in the round…” which is why permaculturalists should not be ideologues, should not be afraid of technology, should be open to knew and potentially useful tools when they come along.
As I have said numerous times before, GE is just a tool like any other. It can be used for good or ill. I am not a huge fan of round-up ready crops; nor do I think they are a unique evil. GE could easily be put towards perfectly benign purposes which have genuine benefits, and is being. Noone is saying GE should be the only approach- read the link I gave in the last comment.
There is also a real issue with people in the first world who have abundance of food- and dont see any need for yet more technology in agriculture- dictating to the poor who are hungry. They need all the tools they can get to increase yields.
Please do your homework and read Tomorrow’s Table. Paalberg “Starved for Science” is also essential and poses important questions about the “democratic” nature of the anti-GE lobby and the way the threat of trade sanctions have been used against Africa to dissuade them from accepting GE, even as food aid. Why dont you speak out about that if you are so concerned about democracy?
I haven’t read the book Graham – but I’m wondering if you’re making a storm in a teacup? I’ve just re-read the quote from Fairlie in your review and he doesn’t seem to be dismissing GE – rather he’s grudgingly accepting the conclusions of the declaration you mention.
Do you have specific quotes from the book where Fairlie “dismisses genetic engineering as part of a techno dystopia”?
The link above you’re asking me to read re: GE Corn is broken – it links back to this page….
Some criticism of Robert Paarlberg:
http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Robert_Paarlberg
and a linked piece which shows that a ‘Green Revolution’ was tried in Africa but failed due to many African countries depending on non Green Revolution crops for the bulk of their subsistence:
http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Robert_Paarlberg
I am of course getting quite off-topic here… The main point for me is the GE food is not a very important issue re: ‘feeding the world’: power, poverty, inequality, education and optimising existing technologies are much more important. Why keep banging on about GE when we could solve food problems by tackling other issues? As you know I’m not opposed to GE food – I just think there are more important things to worry about.
Did you read those Jules Pretty books yet?
Hi Tom Sorry about the corn link- here it is: http://bit.ly/axr8jK We might be getting our wires crossed? My comments were mainly in response to Rob- yes a long way from the topic of Meat which hardly mentions GE, but Fairlie is definitely dismissive of GE and I would guess shares Rob’s uninformed views- just read the quote from my review again and realise that out of context it reads the opposite of what he means- his intention was ironic:
“, we will have to resort not only to nitrogen and other fertilisers but also to genetic manipulation. Any attempt to secure nitrogen and other nutrients through organic means would require undue encroachment upon natural habitats- if not their total destruction…”
In the context of the book (I dont have it with me right now) it is clear he is being ironic, making a jab at those who think we can’t feed the world with organics alone because it would take up too much land. I dont find his arguments compelling.
I dont understand your last paragraph- I know that’s the approach you take but it doesnt make sense to me unless you think we should feeze all existing technology of all kinds at its current state, and cease any new developments. Try replacing “GE” in your sentence with any other technology- tractors, computers, conventional plant breeding methods. Surely if you are not opposed to GE you should direct your comments to the vast and powerful anti-GE lobby. Why do they “keep banging on about it”- why dont they have “more important things to worry about”? Why do you ignore the point that we cannot judge its usefulness very well when we have a powerful misinfirmation campaign against it for ideological reasons? I agree with you- GE is just one technology amongst many that we have to choose from- let’s just stop this puerile ideological opposition and get on with it.
I havnt read Jules Pretty yet- does he discuss GE? Trying to prove that “we dont need GE” is actually IMO an anti-GE ideological stance- why not take the same stance with regard to tractors? computers? mutagenesis? Surely it is obvious that GE may have a very valuable role to play in some cases, while other approaches may be better in other cases? Why single out this one approach for special treatment? Let’s say you have a wonderful swaled permaculture landscape and you want to grow a certain crop there; someone produces an improved variety using mutagenesis, or even ordinary plant breeding. You got a problem with that? You going to go to great efforts to prove we dont need this new variety? So why would you have a problem with an improved GE variety?
“let’s just stop this puerile ideological opposition and get on with it.” – in an ideal world yes. But unfortunately the general public in Western Europe would vote against intro of GE food if there was a referendum tomorrow. As the majority of people aren’t supportive of GE at the moment then it’d be a bit totalitarian to just go ahead, no matter how ill informed the public may be (and surely the anti-GE misinformation isn’t as well funded as the pro GE misinformation?!). (Same goes for politics in general – all those silly people voting for parties that want economic growth… the people have been subjected to a massive and pervasive misinformation campaign to convince them that economic growth is desirable…. a far more important ‘lie’ than the anti GE stuff …)
My point is that GE food isn’t yet offering any compelling examples of feeding the world or massively reducing pesticide use. Perhaps when there’s the ultimate blight resistant potato people will start to come round. For now, the fact the people are sadly misinformed isn’t that big of a deal – let it go!
Re: your last paragraph, I’m not ‘trying to prove we don’t need GE’ – you made that bit up so you could have a good argument with yourself! I’m signing off now as self-discipline is required to keep focused on some other stuff. ‘Please do your homework’ and read the Pretty books! Looking forward to a review of those.
As mentioned in the first comment thanks for a great review
“As the majority of people aren’t supportive of GE at the moment then it’d be a bit totalitarian to just go ahead, no matter how ill informed the public may be (and surely the anti-GE misinformation isn’t as well funded as the pro GE misinformation?!)” I dont know, but wouldnt make an assumption on that basis- Monsanto have not served the GE lobby well in terms of public relations, as Paalberg acknowledges. His view and the view of biotech scientists like Ronald is that the public havnt accepted GE in the rich world primarily because the first generation of crops was designed to help farmers, who make up a very small part of the population. The next generation will be aimed at consumers- improved taste, greater variety, improved nutritional content, and cheaper food. If these improvements are delivered, opposition will quickly fall away- I think this will certainly happen, it is just a matter of time. It is important to acknowledge that Greenpeace, the Organic lobby, and the whole anti-GE movement are extremely well-resourced and powerful enough to combat Monsanto and the big corporations, and the US Government. That is pretty powerful. They should not be portrayed as the underdog, and they have clear vested interests of their own.
“My point is that GE food isn’t yet offering any compelling examples of feeding the world or massively reducing pesticide use. Perhaps when there’s the ultimate blight resistant potato people will start to come round. For now, the fact the people are sadly misinformed isn’t that big of a deal – let it go!”
Forest gardening doesnt play a significant role in feeding the world, nor does organic farming; neither does GE have to have to either to be important or to be accepted- depending on what you mean by “significant”- it just has to be more cost-effective than the alternative. There are two very obvious reasons why this relatively new technology may not yet have fulfilled its potential: 1)it’s new 2) it is subject to a powerful opposition campaign which has thus far proved very successful, making R&D prohibitively expensive. However, I think it is clear that there are many successes and farmers frequently choose it, suggesting it is in fact beneficial. If it isnt beneficial to farmers, it will simply fall into disuse- there is no need therefore for a opposition campaign. Meanwhile, the potential of the technology to address both world hunger and climate change, and reduce the impacts of chemical farming make it far to important to drop as a topic of discussion. Why you would try to dissuade anyone from blogging about it is frankly bizarre- unless you are actually trying to oppose it. You are absolutely welcome to absent yourself from the discussion whenever you wish if you do not think it important.
Jules Pretty’s books are a few years old (Agri-Culture first pub 2002) and do not as far a s I know discuss GE so Im not sure what direct relevance they have.. GE and Agro-Ecology/Organic approaches are perfectly compatible. Whatever system of farming you use, you will want the best seeds, the best varieties; it is simply irrelevant to the farmer what method was used to produce those varieties. What is important is that we keep trying to improve them. The notion that we should stop improving crop varieties is nonsensical.
From yesterday’s Independent re the Coming Hunger, by Prof. Paul Collier: http://tiny.cc/39n6k
“To counter climatic deterioration we need to accelerate crop innovation. It is ridiculous that in the face of a mounting food crisis Europe and most of Africa ban the use of genetically modified organisms. And America should drop its extravagant subsidies of diverting grain into biofuels. If it wants to use biofuels, it should buy them from Brazil, which can grow them far more efficiently.” Amen to that.
Tom: PS the Wikipaedia article critical of Paalberg you linked to is clearly biased (I have actually read Paalberg’s book) viz: “Paarlberg says there’s no “scientific evidence” of health risks posed by GMOs – ignoring the large body of evidence that has accumulated showing such risks.[5] ” which then links to another anti-GE website: http://www.bangmfood.org/publications/4-short-leaflets/1-genetically-modified-gm-foods-renewed-threat-to-europe This is pure woo. The overwhelming scientific evidence is that GE poses no more health threats than any other kinds of food. Is a website calling itself “BanGMFood” likely to present a balanced view of the science? How about looking at what actual scientific bodies say about this? You are simply not going to get a balanced view of GE crops if your only source of information is anti-GE websites! And yes, a lot of these groups are no doubt connected to anthroposophy and homeopathy. Scientists on the whole think GE is safe and that it is already playing an important role in world food production, with great potential to increase this role. But I forgot. You’re not opposed to GE, you’re just opposed to me trying to counter the misinformation that people like you keep throwing up about it.
So I’m ‘uninformed’ now? Thanks Graham, I am rapidly remembering why I stepped out of debating things here at Zone 5. I entered this conversation to make one simple point, which was that based on the Wikileaks cables that related to US policy on GM and how it was bringing pressure to bear on other nation states an employing disgraceful strongarming and bullying with a clear conflict of interest, that your statement “…I think it is clear that there are many successes and farmers frequently choose it, suggesting it is in fact beneficial. If it isnt beneficial to farmers, it will simply fall into disuse- there is no need therefore for a opposition campaign” is massively naive. The world simply does not work like that, as the Wikileaks cables starkly reveal. There we go, point made, again. Take or leave it. I felt it was a useful contribution to this debate, yet I am summarily dismissed as ‘uninformed’. Always a pleasure….
Aaaargh! It’s not a ‘wikipedia’ article. And I agree that the piece of criticism you point to is not good. But there is lots more criticism on that page that is good…
The Pretty books are of course a ‘few year old’ and it’s not because of GE that you should read them. Of course GE is compatible with other techniques of farming.
Aaaarrgh again! “If it wants to use biofuels, it should buy them from Brazil, which can grow them far more efficiently.” Amen to that.
Come on Graham – is that really how you see a sustainable future for the world?! Time to do some reading on the environmental impacts and (lack of) potential for replacing fossil fuels of biofuels I think!!
Aaaargh 3! I am not trying to dissuade you from blogging about GE! Really – I’m shocked that you should think so. I was just encouraging you to focus energy on topics of more current importance that could actually make a difference to people’s lives today. You are of course free to write about whatever you like
Aaargh 4: “Forest gardening doesnt play a significant role in feeding the world, nor does organic farming” – what on earth are you one about – I never mentioned them.
Aaaargh 5: “The notion that we should stop improving crop varieties is nonsensical.” – is that really what you think I’m suggesting?!
“http://www.bangmfood.org/publications/4-short-leaflets/1-genetically-modified-gm-foods-renewed-threat-to-europe This is pure woo.”
IMPORTANT NB: I’m not saying I support the aims of ‘bangmfood.org’!
But many of the referenced studies are far from ‘pure woo’. For example citation 27 is interesting if you look up the study. This has then been followed up by this study:
http://www.biolsci.org/v05p0438.htm
Many of the other citations linked are also interesting. Sure the site itself is anti GE – but Paarlberg is pro GE. It’s not possible to find truly independent discussions on this issue because it’s application across global agriculture is a complex mix of politics, power, appropriateness, cost effectiveness and ongoing research. The conclusions one reaches are going to be influence by where one places the relative importance of these and other issues.
bangmfood.org will of course have cherry picked studies that support their view. Likewise Paarlberg has picked studies that support his view. That is all.
“He misses the point that Paalberg makes (“Starved for Science”), that the majority of the remaining hungry people in the world are in Africa where they have not yet had the benefits of the Green Revolution, and where they are already practicing traditional organic small-scale agriculture- that is why they are hungry and poor because yields are so low.”
Here’s an interesting study from 2009 in Ethiopia that contradicts this viewpoint (it’s not about GE):
http://www.rff.org/RFF/Documents/EfD-DP-09-01.pdf
An excellent critical review of Paarlberg’s ‘Starved for Science’ that appeared in Nature:
http://www.steps-centre.org/PDFs/GM%20crops%20in%20Africa%20(aug%204).pdf
Tom: “Aaaarrgh again! “If it wants to use biofuels, it should buy them from Brazil, which can grow them far more efficiently.” Amen to that.
Come on Graham – is that really how you see a sustainable future for the world?! Time to do some reading on the environmental impacts and (lack of) potential for replacing fossil fuels of biofuels I think!!”
Maybe you misread?! Collier is opposed to US subsidies for biofuels- he merely points out that Brazil does them much more efficiently.
Rob: “So I’m ‘uninformed’ now?” Actually I didnt use the word “uninformed” at all- but not to split hairs, as the quote from your own website that I gave proves, you have yourself told us unequivocally that your position on GE is based on an “instinctive revulsion at the very concept” and that you “don’t have the scientific papers to back it up.” These are your words, and I really dont see how you can complain that I interpret this as you stating that you are “informed to a greater or lesser extent by ignorance of the science and an emotional attachment to the absurd idea that ‘we shouldnt tamper with Mother Nature’ “- which is what I did say. ie. not that you are “uninformed” but that you are informed by your “instinctive revulsion” rather than science.
Your points were not dismissed- but curious you have ignored my response: the point I was making was, not much point bleating about the (messy) politics of trade wars over GE crops in Europe when the current situation of a Europe -wide ban, which has influenced Africa (which really could benefit from the technology) is hardly democratic in its nature, and a result of the ideologically motivated (read: quasi- religious) powerful anti-GE movement which exists largely to protect the commercial interests of Big Organic… of which you are a strong supporter… but I’m repeating myself. No doubt if I came into your garden and pulled up the crops you were growing because of a religious objection I happened to have, you might not like it but you would strongly support my democratic right to do so!
Rob Hopkins 7 Jnauray 2011 “bringing pressure ………… employing disgraceful strongarming and bullying with a clear conflict of interest”
Blow me! That brings back memories! I was a member of the Soil Association Council a decade or so before Rob Hopkins was on their Council, and those were pretty much the tactics of the Soil Association.
I would be hard pressed to find any redeeming quality in the Soil Association since the principal characters who robbed the organisation of any apparent integrity back then are still there, and it is still the situation that a charity is able to aggressively promote a protected “brand” and then profit by that. Thats what is usually called a restrictive trade practice. The Charity Commission has at various times had complaints, but has done nothing other than do one of their “visits”.
I turned my back on the organic world over biotechnology, not that I am an advocate of it, I just couldn’t stand the stinking hypocrisy of the campaign waged by the Soil Association, and the pressure on all other organic organisations to fall into line. In that, Prince Charles colluded and was used by the Soil Association, since his various positions as patron/president of organic charities gave him a role as ringmaster, and an ability to enforce what is in effect a political view. Patronage, like the ability of a charity to use Highgrove as a venue for raising money, could thus be conditional.
I observed this in my unique situation of being on the council of the Soil Association as well as another organic charity, and having links with a third, and at the same time being a Council member of the Permaculture Association. As a scientist – the only one on the Soil Association council – I could also witness the anti-science bias of the Soil Association internally, and their misuse of “research” to support the prejudice of their anti-biotechnology campaign. It became increasing hard and then impossible for the other organic organisations – one of which had four other scientists on its council as well as myself – to take a view independent of that prejudice. The Director of the Soil Association wrote at that time in a brief to Council that “This campaign is ours for the taking”. He colluded with other anti—GMO groups without the knowledge of the Council, and used SA funds to support them. The Soil Association bullied its view onto the rest of the organic movement. FACT.
You would not be surprised that the Chair during my time on its council was a Daily Mail reader, and who famously heckled a scientist speaking about BSE at the AGM in York. Draw your own conclusion as to why, which is what the scientist did. One of the staff wrote a brief for a council meeting in which an employee of another certification body was defamed, and stated the aim to put that body out of business to achieve a monopoly in certification. I note years later that they tried to do the same for another certifying body by trying to poach all its members. Is this acceptable behaviour for a charity with a subsidiary trading company? Homeopathy is enshrined in EU legislation in the standards for organic livestock production. This legislation is binding on the UK for any organic certification body. If we are uncertain whether this be provided on the NHS (Big Ears apart) why are organic advocates enforcing this on livestock when animal welfare is supposed to be key to organic farming? (It seems DEFRA is at least banning their use in pets!)
I see conspiracies as much as the next person. Blame big business for doing what our regulatory systems – and therefore us – allow them to get away with. But don’t for one minute think that the Soil Association and all the network of sycophants and chancers around Prince Charles aren’t manipulating everything to their own world view as well. And as many have pointed out, these hypocrites want you to do what they say rather than what they do.
Surely Rob doesn’t want to be associated with people like that?
GE may not be such a strong concern as often assumed amongst Europeans: http://bit.ly/hW2HoN
Worth noting that the SA still promotes Biodynamics: http://www.soilassociation.org/Events/tabid/940/vw/3/ItemID/142/d/20100907/Default.aspx see more on BD and anthroposophy here: http://www.dcscience.net/?p=3853 as for its support for homeopathy for animals, that is just repulsive. At least humans have the choice.
Ooh – interesting comment from Mark Fisher – have to say I had similar(ish) experiences with UK organic movement back in 1991.
Graham: “Maybe you misread?! Collier is opposed to US subsidies for biofuels- he merely points out that Brazil does them much more efficiently.”
No I didn’t misread – I was just very surprised that you are saying ‘Amen’ to the idea of the US importing biofuels from Brazil. However I must apologise and revise my opinion of this as it seems that ethanol production in Brazil is far less damaging and has far more potential than I thought:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethanol_fuel_in_Brazil#Environmental_and_social_impacts
All interesting stuff!
“GE may not be such a strong concern as often assumed amongst Europeans: http://bit.ly/hW2HoN“
I just had a look at that report (not the summary on the linked page which is a bit loose with the data it picks) – the report shows on page 22 that 66% of EU consumers are “Very worried or fairly worried” about GMO’s in food. This is a healthy majority of people which is what I suggested originally.
Hi Graham,
Interesting debate here, a pleasure to read as always. Funnily enough, I happened to order Meat two nights ago so look forward to getting through it now. Also ordered The Vegetarian Myth by Lierre Keith at the same time, which you might be interested in looking up, so looks like I’ll be giving up my near life-long vegetarianism for something more sustainable in the next few months.
Jules Pretty is very much worth a read and does indeed discuss GE, albeit not at length. Some of his work’s dated at this stage but you’ll be glad to know (as I am) that he’s open to it as a potentially useful technology, used in accordance with proven agro-ecological and other methods.
@Tommacg Thanks for the tip on Lierre Kieth, Ill look it up. Interesting that you feel like changing your diet away from vegetarianism- I dont think vegetarianism is necessarily a bad thing though for some!
Good piece on Ronald and Adamchuk GE and organics here: http://j.mp/NEWag
“More than anything, Ronald seems to wish GM crops were placed back into the backwaters of technical, rather than political, debate. One should not get hung up on whether a crop is GM or not and “just use the most appropriate technology,” she said. In some cases, like her flood-tolerant rice, it will be advanced breeding; in other cases, genetic engineering.
While they argue for rapprochement, Ronald and Adamchak have left the details for how organic methods can be applied to GM-friendly industrial models to others. Promising research is being done at Iowa State University, Adamchak said, where their chief investigator into sustainable agriculture, Matt Liebman, has experimentally tested organic-style crop rotations that could be competitive with typical industrial models.”
Interesting discussion of meat vs. vegetarian food production here:
http://www.biofortified.org/2008/09/life-cycle-analysis-in-animal-agriculture/
Some contradictory comments from the 2 most recent pieces you linked to. In the Biofortified article we have:
“reduce or eliminate synthetic nitrogen fertilizer (which can be done at least partially with genetic engineering)”
but in the NY Times discussion about Ronald and Adamchuk’s book we have:
“…it should be made clear that they have not yet successfully been developed and have long been promised. It also remains questionable how much genetic engineering could really lower nitrogen use, said Thomas Sinclair, an agronomy professor at the University of Florida.
“Plants have evolved over hundreds of thousands of years to be very conservative with nitrogen,” Sinclair said. “Since 75 to 80 percent of the nitrogen accumulated by a grain crop ends up in the harvested grain, I don’t see how things can be improved very much.”"
The latter assertion sounds more plausible to me…
Monsanto claim Nitrogen Utilisation Trait for Corn Moves Closer to Reality http://bit.ly/hImHvY
And from the same Dakota Farmer website: Glyphosate Resistance Wrecks Havoc in Mid-South:
http://dakotafarmer.com/story.aspx/glyphosate/resistance/wrecks/havoc/in/midsouth/9/45374
Looks like they’ve been using those GE crops a bit too much!
Oh -and instead of trying to eke out an extra 3 or 4% from wheat yields – why not make a law requiring people to eat less meat in the USA that would reduce the size of the biggest sector of this pie chart you linked to:
http://images.uanews.org/images/request/0002_maize_uses_h.jpg
You could do that tomorrow unlike the “No, you won’t be able to cut back on N rate this year because of genetic breakthroughs in corn. And it certainly won’t be next year or the year after that. But not too far down the pike, Monsanto researchers believe it may be possible to plant hybrids that utilize nitrogen better than traditional hybrids.”
The world produces enough food – we’re just choosing to make some people obese while others starve.
“why not make a law requiring people to eat less meat in the USA that would reduce the size of the biggest sector of this pie chart you linked to:…”
Good idea! Why isnt there a campaign for this? For example, why isnt all that energy that the anti-GE lobby is able to muster not diverted into such a campaign? But unless you have an ideological stance against GE- for example, some people think there are too many people in the world and we should not try to feed them- you will of course support research into new technology as well. Different approaches are not mutually exclusive.
“The world produces enough food – we’re just choosing to make some people obese while others starve.”
It’s not so simple. People are hungry because they are poor; poor farmers need technology (as well as other approaches) to increase yields and reduce inputs. Can you think of a country or society that came out of poverty without the help of technology?
Interesting discussion in the comments to this article on GE, complexity, the likelihood of collapse, can technology save us… something for everyone! http://tiny.cc/3w8f0