I did see a study a while back specifically on GMO vs non-GMO crops and the non-GMO crops wound up being much worse for the environment because they require far more land and water to get an equivalent yeild. But that study didn’t factor in all the other things that go along with organic vs nonorganic farming.
I also have no idea how I would find that study again and I’m far too tired/lazy to use my google fu right now so I don’t have anything to back that up with other than “trust me bro”.
But when it comes to personal anecdote I have personally seen that there is a huge difference even between conventional farming methods. My grandfather rents out a bunch of farmland on his property but he enforces certain healthier farming methods such as requiring crop rotations, restrictions on the fertilizers and other chemicals used, and forbidding the growing of certain more intensive crops. It isn’t quite organic farming but it’s much more restrictive than most large scale farming. He wants to keep the land healthy because he also actually lives on that land. Meanwhile his brother owns farmland across the road which he also rents out but imposes no restrictions on the farming practices used so the renter there just grows corn every year and fertilizes the piss out of it so that it actually grows. My grandfathers farmland is perfectly healthy even when just left fallow. Meanwhile his brothers land is a dusty barren washed out hellscape where nothing really grows even when left fallow. It’s a striking difference just between the two sides of the road.
It actually really annoys me that gmo is somehow seen as a universally bad thing when it’s really not very different from sped up selective breeding, and could do so much to help the environment and even increase animal welfare (what if there were GMO cows that don’t need to have their babies stolen to get milk from them).
But my only options are to either ignore any ethical production issues entirely or completely avoid GMO food.
GMO is kind of a red herring. It is often done to allow plants to survive Round Up, which had recently been shown to have toxic effects. There’s also compelling evidence that many people who think they can’t tolerate gluten actually can’t tolerate Round Up.
The genetic modification isn’t intrinsically a problem, but the chemicals that plants need to be modified to tolerate are.
I did see a study a while back specifically on GMO vs non-GMO crops and the non-GMO crops wound up being much worse for the environment because they require far more land and water to get an equivalent yeild. But that study didn’t factor in all the other things that go along with organic vs nonorganic farming.
I also have no idea how I would find that study again and I’m far too tired/lazy to use my google fu right now so I don’t have anything to back that up with other than “trust me bro”.
But when it comes to personal anecdote I have personally seen that there is a huge difference even between conventional farming methods. My grandfather rents out a bunch of farmland on his property but he enforces certain healthier farming methods such as requiring crop rotations, restrictions on the fertilizers and other chemicals used, and forbidding the growing of certain more intensive crops. It isn’t quite organic farming but it’s much more restrictive than most large scale farming. He wants to keep the land healthy because he also actually lives on that land. Meanwhile his brother owns farmland across the road which he also rents out but imposes no restrictions on the farming practices used so the renter there just grows corn every year and fertilizes the piss out of it so that it actually grows. My grandfathers farmland is perfectly healthy even when just left fallow. Meanwhile his brothers land is a dusty barren washed out hellscape where nothing really grows even when left fallow. It’s a striking difference just between the two sides of the road.
It actually really annoys me that gmo is somehow seen as a universally bad thing when it’s really not very different from sped up selective breeding, and could do so much to help the environment and even increase animal welfare (what if there were GMO cows that don’t need to have their babies stolen to get milk from them).
But my only options are to either ignore any ethical production issues entirely or completely avoid GMO food.
GMO is kind of a red herring. It is often done to allow plants to survive Round Up, which had recently been shown to have toxic effects. There’s also compelling evidence that many people who think they can’t tolerate gluten actually can’t tolerate Round Up.
The genetic modification isn’t intrinsically a problem, but the chemicals that plants need to be modified to tolerate are.