Several pro-science NGOs are trying to expand Africa's access to modern farming technologies, including biotech crops and pesticides. The Marxist busybodies at Jacobin would rather poor people across the continent go hungry.
GMO
Reporters like to portray themselves as truth tellers who hold the powerful accountable. In reality, many of them are hired guns who publish propaganda under the guise of doing journalism. The good news is that a growing number of Americans are abandoning the legacy media for better sources of information.
For decades, excessive, unscientific regulation has slowed innovation using molecular genetic engineering. Policymakers must awaken to the realization that regulations based on pseudoscience or nescience are destructive and regressive. Tremendous innovations await, if only we have the wisdom to permit them to be developed.
Indian activist Vandana Shiva opposes the tools and practices of modern agriculture and science and advocates regressive policies that cause widespread malnourishment, famine, and death to the very people she claims to champion. And she's no friend of the environment, either. She should never be given a podium.
Technology has helped to double food production in the last 50 years. We have the cheapest, safest, most abundant food supply in history, but the enemies of progress, both foreign and domestic, continue to attack the technologies that have made that possible.
For two decades, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, which advises the Pope on scientific issues, has made wise observations about the importance of molecular techniques for genetic modification and the most appropriate approaches to regulating them. It's a cardinal sin that most of the world has ignored them.
The ignorance surrounding what agricultural practices are truly "sustainable," even among people and institutions that should know better, is astonishing. The contributions of genetic engineering will be essential.
Flawed regulatory policies and decisions have inflicted tremendous damage on the biotech industry and on American consumers.
Her dishonest advocacy does incalculable damage to the most vulnerable.
The Biden Administration's attempt to boost the "bioeconomy" is burdened with bureaucratic requirements and busy-work initiatives and projects. It will fail.
The EPA's intransigent regulation of genetically engineered bacteria that could mitigate frost damage to crops prevented their commercialization. Especially when inflation is boosting food prices, the last thing we need is the continuation of an irresponsible, unscientific government policy that lowers crop yields, increases prices to consumers, and threatens farmers’ profits.
Part 1 of this two-part series described the “Stanford University paradox” – the uncritical embrace of politically correct concepts that contradict its reputation as a cutting-edge, science-grounded institution. I described the contrast between the university’s outstanding research and its dubious view of “sustainability,” which includes a commitment to organic farming practices. I elaborate on the latter here, in Part 2.