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market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] corn gluten

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  • From: Road's End Farm <organic87 AT frontiernet.net>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] corn gluten
  • Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 21:34:15 -0500


On Jan 31, 2008, at 7:50 PM, Robert Schuler wrote:

Mark... I have been growing BT sweetcorn for the last 4 years with no synthetic pesticides applied and the BT gene is totally natural. Therefore if the corn was grown organically it should be organic.

The BT toxin is expressed continuously in every cell of the corn plant. There is nothing natural about that. Corn does not naturally express BT, and BT in a natural situation does not occur in such quantities. The corn plant has been artificially turned into a pesticide.

While BT not produced through GMO methods was acceptable for organic use, no responsible certifier would ever have approved an organic farm plan in which the farmer intended to continuously drench the field in the stuff. It was approvable for organic use in that form, not only because it was naturally occuring, but also because it broke down quickly, not persisting in the field.

One reason GMO's are not approved for organic use is because the techniques used for inserting genes in the plant may cause unexpected and poorly understood changes. Individual genes do not work in isolation within the cell or within the organism as a whole, let alone within the ecosystem as a whole. Work on understanding the interrelations among individual genes within a living organism is in its infancy. It's only recently been discovered, for instance, that some genes that were thought to be inactive are in fact regulating the expression of other genes.

-- Rivka; Finger Lakes NY, Zone 5 mostly
Fresh-market organic produce, small scale



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