Can someone help me understand

[charliep]

As a poor old civil servant, can someone help me with a question.

I note all the discussion about GMO and conventional agriculture.

I see the conversations about increasing corn and soybean acres in western Canada - both GMO crops.

I will start by noting I am not anti and I realize corn has been grown in Manitoba. Having said, corn is host for fusarium graminearium. The area that is being exposed to this disease and from there, infestation areas has been expanding. Furarium head blight is down grading and a cost to the industry. DON (Deoxynivalenol) and other molds have severe health consequences for animals and humans.

I guess wheat molds are nature (which maybe makes them good) and the risk around it is reasonably well understood. Having said, we may not know all the human health consequenses here and from there, the ability of this disease to adapt to something more virilant.

Actually don't know where I am doing with this other that to comment how it is interesting how everyone percieves risk differently. Sometimes the unknown is percieved as being far worst than real risks we understand and deal with everyday.

[cottonpicken]

Your dealing with some of the worlds greatest risk
takers.

Wheat is worthless,screw it grow lentils,whats a
lentil,lets try canola,how far south should it be
grown,screw it try it,chickpea anyone,time to rebuild
my tractor engine,time to design another piece of
machinery that has not been invented but the major
manufactures will try to copy,why don't we try emu's
this year see if it works.....

Necessity is the mother of all inventions and i suspect
the pain of the thirties,eighties and nineties is a
driving force in the farming communities,unlike
american whos question is corn or beans or lets go
for coffee,the governments got our back anyway.

[mbratrud]

Amen Charlie, Corn is poison on our farm. Growing Durum in our area could become a thing of the past if the Corn acres continue to rise. Shake my head at guys growing Durum and Corn on the same farm.... Either they don't care or they don’t get it. Judging from the glazed look I’ve gotten from some guys ive had this conversation with that are doing just that, they are completely naive to the consequences of there actions.

[ianben]

Hi Charlie
I am not able to help only agree there is
no logic with risk or blame.
The good old days were awful with twenty twenty
vison
Just over100 years ago half my grandfathers
siblings died before they were 20. The local
church christened 63 children and buried 43.

I would not have survived childhood then, My
wife would have died giving birth to our eldest
and if she had survived all our other children
would have been born dead.

Do we just invent risk to replace the real risks
back then. How did they cope without the
counciling and trauma therapy? Did they accept
that people die?

How did we get from the fact that death was
common to now when we all should live for ever
and if we die someone is to blame.

[furrowtickler]

well said ian...

[Braveheart]

Charlie, interesting comments on the risk
paradigm. My own take is that people run a
greater risk of getting ill from improper food
handling, cleanup and storage than they will ever
from GMOs.

[sumdumguy]

Are you sure Braveheart?

[oneoff]

If we were honest we would all agree that every moment of a life involves some type of risk.

And though you mght take on some crusade; it is most probable that your worry will be far removed from the coroner's report at the end of your life.

Here are a ouple of thoughts to ponder.

Bovines do not live directly on the food they may eat. They digest and live on the bacteria which first eat the food that the animal "ate". Kinda easy to never have anyone mention that important difference between ruminants and monogastric species.

Another point previously mentioned is that absolutely nothing lives forever. Even a single cell is so complicated that its doubtful that we will ever fully understand all the processes and intricasies.

And finally; for those on their special interest crusades. There is a bigger picture in all cases. Just where do you think disease came from prior to something like Roundup being first manufactured.

There are hormone like componds in the most unlikely sources...like maybe in the coatings in tin cans that are used to contain every food imaginable. To blame health concerns on any one product; and promote your particular farming method as the savior and only way of safe food production is not being realistic or honest. If those people who are so sure of their "facts", opinions and beliefs; could only see that at least some of their safety concerns still would remain....then just maybe there could be a civil and reasoned discussion of continuing to attempt to reduce risks and hazards in the real world.

[oneoff]

Oh and Charlie

Your're always full of questions; and the questions you posed that prompt this thread are your best ones yet. Thanks for all ideas.

[wd9]

Quote sumdumguy "Are you sure Braveheart?"

EXACTLY what Charliep is talking about.

[rkaiser]

Honesty is the key word here oneoff.

Ianben post has a lot of common sense in it and if Braveheart would not have used the "more" word, his post makes sense as well. As some of your post does as well oneoff.

However, the special interest groups who have made their way to the top of the monetary food chain and into government positions have done a lot of that ladder climbing with deception and not honesty.

And yes they started with a special interest. Look what we can do to feed a starving world. Bull Shit. Look what we can do to make money and lets not worry about telling the public all the details.

The problem that I have with all the fact staters on this site is that you all state facts supported by scientists who work for these companies and the governments that they have infiltrated and conned.

Companies that originally bull shitted you into the idea that you need to feed the hungry and now have you by the nuts financially because there is too much food.

And it is all about power and control. And if these mega business leaders can find some collaboration to make even more money with collective deceit, they jump at the chance as well.

The food industry is almost as bad as the oil industry and may --- I said may --- actually cause more human suffering. Collateral damage and outright killing of soldiers in wars over oil has been nasty, and the potential --- I said potential - for damage to human life from these experiments is real.

There is no arguing the fact that the land is less healthy with chem farming. Especially the life in the land that insures health.

And the cattle oneoff; are doing a hell of a job trying to filter the shit out with their three stomachs, but try to buy a liver these days. Yes a liver, the largest and most important immune system organ that is so overworked in our conventional cattle that it is almost impossible to find one to eat. Not that ours are much better. LOL

The health of the earth and the animals on a farm that is either organic or simply traditional is obvious, from the birds to the worms to the bees and the plants.

And if everyone would simply recognise these simple facts, we could have a reasonable discussion on this board. LOL

[BFW]

Randy, surely an old cattleman like you knows that cattle have 4 stomachs not 3

[Braveheart]

Yes sumdumguy I am sure. I will take canola oil
squeezed from a seed with a gene inserted to
make it resistant to Liberty before ecoli or
salmonella.

Part of the problem with debating GMOs is that it
is often not even about GM. The anti-corporate,
anti-globalization, Marxists, Anarchists et al, jump
into the discussion to further their cause.

My problem with GM is that we were promised all
manner of output triats once sales from input
traits recovered some research money. I hoped
for output traits that would improve human and
animal health, or new products fro industry.
Something that could move farmers into a new
value chain. But nothing. Just more RR
everywhere.

[ColevilleH2S]

rkaiser; "There is no arguing the fact
that the land is less healthy with chem
farming. Especially the life in the land
that insures health."

He must be a cattle guy if he has missed
the revolution that has happened to the
cropland on the prairies in the last 20
years. More earthworms, more organic
matter, less erosion, higher yields. All
because if the adoption of modern farming
techniques.

And what else has happened in this time?
The typical western person's lifespan is
healthier and longer. Why would one
advocate for a return to something less?

[wd9]

Simple coleville, to sell organic food.
Its marketing.