Aresa, A Danish biotech company, has developed a genetically modified flower that could help detect land mines and it hopes to have a prototype ready for use within a few years.
Article at Yahoo
Buried at the bottom of the article is Aresa’s assurance that these weeds won’t spread by themselves.
Oestergaard said the modified weed was infertile and unable to spread its seeds, meaning the risk was minimal that the plant would spread into unwanted areas.
While this should hinder some of the potential environmental problems (seeds blowing into neighboring food crops, possibly choking off necessary resources) it also guarantees profits for Aresa, through continuous sales. Is this a win-win situation?
Categories: In the News
10:23 am | 2 comments
January 28th, 2004 at 4:43 pm
It might be a win-win in this case provided that the plant doesn’t mutate or replicate in other ways…
The general concept of making a profit from infertile seeds is a problem, though, that is going to come up more often. Companies like Monsanto are trying to get farmers to exclusively switch to these type of seeds. The seeds would have the promise of lowering other costs (like pesticides, water, etc) or raising the sale price of the produce (putting vitamins or extra nutrients in them). Farmers do, however, rely on seed from their crop to lower the costs of new seed the next year. In the end, it will be a question of whether the math works out (increased costs of seeds vs. savings/extra income from GM seeds). The companies feel that they will (of course, they can always jack the price up later if there is no competitor for a particular trait… keep in mind the patent minefield that exists here). Some critics and farmers feel that they will be on the short end of this equation.
Time will tell, and that doesn’t even address the health risks, if any, from GM crops.
Sujal
January 29th, 2004 at 9:52 am
Did you just say “patent minefield?” I know you didn’t. Come on!