Saturday, January 9, 2016

The GMO Cross Pollination Question

I am beginning to see many comments along these lines as an objection to GMO crop:
Of course RW would just say "don't buy GMO". Cross contamination means that you won't even have that choice in the future. This is libertarianism for some planet that is not planet earth.
Actually, cross contamination is not a problem for GMO product  in all cases.  Steve Savage notes:
For thousands of years farmers have known how to take cuttings of desirable fruits and get them to root, or how to take buds of the desired fruit variety and graft it onto a rootstock.  The grapes in Mendocino county had been propagated that way for centuries.  A block of Cabernet planted next to a block of Chardonnay is not a “genetic contamination” issue, because the seed is never planted.  This same principle applies to almost all fruit and to other vegetatively reproduced crops like potatoes, cassava, sweet potatoes, sugarcane and many others.  GMO versions of these crops would not represent any “genetic contamination risk”  at all.  That is why it is so sad and absurd that activists in France destroyed a GMO grapevine trial because of needless “contamination” fears.
Of course, in crops where cross pollination could occur, property rights shouldn't be violated, A farmer shouldn't be allowed to plant a GMO crop that could contaminate a nearby crop, that is unless the contaminating farmer paid, or simply got permission, from nearby farmers to plant crop that could contaminate.

Further, it is not difficult to appreciate the fact that in a free market the technology to prevent cross pollination could develop, Indeed, crude methods to prevent cross pollination have been around for a very long time.

 Tor Janson and Steve Carlson write:
 In his book, Corn Among the Indians of the Upper Missouri, published in 1917, George Will describes 14 distinct corn varieties maintained by the Mandan Nation of North Dakota. He writes that the Mandans maintained purity by growing each variety “a couple hundred yards” apart, and by careful ear selection for their seed corn. 
There are also natural barriers to cross pollination. Janson and Carlson again:
[M]any natural barriers for pollen dispersal, such as forested areas and rugged limestone bluffs [exist].
If there are natural barriers, it is not difficult to understand that commercially made barriers could emerge.

I am not in any way a specialist in agriculture and my intention is not to suggest a specific cross pollination prevention technique will work. I am just making the point that the  possibility of cross pollination itself is not  a legitimate objection from a libertarian perspective to GMO crop.

Of course, a farmer shouldn't be allowed to contaminate another farmers crop with GMO crop, unless he receives permission to do so (paid for with cold hard cash or otherwise).

But there should be no objection to GMO product, from a libertarian perspective, if a technique is used that prevents cross pollination from occurring or those exposed to such pollination give permission.

Robert Wenzel is Editor & Publisher at EconomicPolicyJournal.com and at Target Liberty. He is also author of The Fed Flunks: My Speech at the New York Federal Reserve Bank. Follow him on twitter:@wenzeleconomics

8 comments:

  1. I don't if government is the answer here, but as an engineering/science person I'm not really convinced the gene splicers know what the hell they are doing. It is one thing to improve plant varieties by natural pollination and man made selection or maybe some irradiation (Ruby Red grapefruits were created this way). We simply don't know the long term affects of consumption on the human body.

    Of course, it is not coincidence that some aspects of American and world agricultural are the creation of the government and not market forces.

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  2. Robert,

    "Of course, in crops where cross pollination could occur, property rights shouldn't be violated, A farmer shouldn't be allowed to plant a GMO crop that could contaminate a nearby crop, that is unless the contaminating farmer paid, or simply got permission, from nearby farmers to plant crop that could contaminate."

    Is this a Coasean statement or am I misreading it? I am focusing on what appears to be a contaminating farmer's ability to pay nearby farmers without having the permission.

    Jim

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    1. Not Coasean.

      I am not thinking of a " a contaminating farmer's ability to pay," but rather a farmer being willing to be paid off to allow contamination of his crop.

      Delete
    2. Ok. To clarify, I am using "ability" as a legal right to payoff nearby farmers without their approval, not "ability" as having the financial means to pay.

      As long as the nearby farmers are willing to accept payment for the contamination, I have no issue.

      Thanks.

      Jim

      Delete
  3. Bob, "A farmer shouldn't be allowed to plant a GMO crop that could contaminate a nearby crop,"

    Isn't this like saying "A gun owner, who could shoot an innocent person, shouldn't be allowed to stand next to him?"

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    Replies
    1. No, it means a gun owner shouldn't be allowed to shoot into a neighbors yard. That is I am thinking of the current possibilities where cross pollination is very likely .

      If, however, a GMO farmer can plant in a way that there is no cross polination, he can plant all day.

      Delete
  4. Joel Salatin has been making these arguments for years: If Monstanto's GMO seed pollutes a farmer's crop, the farmer should be able to sue Monstanto for trespassing.

    Also, when I was in Central America last year, we stayed with an organic farmer who grew his corn inside a greenhouse to prevent the corn from being contaminated with GMO pollen (since corn is wind-pollinated).

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  5. The point is that GMO, the way it is produces TODAY, under the legal structure, there is very little or no recourse to action. In fact if your crop gets polluted, and the pollution level goes over whatever threshold that Monsanto has decided means that you are using their patented product, it is YOU that is going to get sued, and Monsanto will win.

    Not to mention there are specific laws protecting Monsanto from any liability. If you want to deal with GMO, lets deal with it by comparing how it is done today in reality, to how it would work in a libertarian world. Most likely in a libertarian world GMO would be highly limited. So why the support of GMO now?

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