Are GMOs good or bad?

by Alvin Zhu

Introduction
Before I start the PowerPoint, let me answer two
questions that you probably have:
What are GMOs even, and whats the issue?
GMOs are genetically modified organisms that have
been genetically in some shape or form. Genes from
the DNA of one species are extracted and artificially
forced into the genes of an unrelated plant or animal.
These genes may come from bacteria, viruses,
insects, humans, etc. This process can also be called
genetic engineering or genetic modification. With
genetic engineering, we can choose how we want our
food to be like! However, there are many debates
about whether GMOs are really the right way to go.
For this PowerPoint, Ill be discussing both sides of the
situation, and you can choose which side you want to
stick with.
(will be focusing mainly on GMOs with food)

GMOs are good! [Producer 1]

GMOs have the potential to be one of the most useful things

to farmers, mainly because you can technically improve any
trait you want in a certain crop.
For example, if you wanted to, you could make your
tomatoes last longer and be able to withstand extreme
weather conditions. You could also make it so that it
produces more tomatoes than usual, making you (the
farmer) more money.

If you wanted to, you could make it so that your tomatoes

arent damaged as badly as they wouldve been by pests if
they were non-GMO.

An example of this is with papayas. In the 1990s, Hawaiian

papaya trees were being infected by something known as
the ringspot virus.

This caused the papaya trees to not properly produce the

papaya fruit.

Scientists developed a transgenic fruit called the Rainbow

papaya, which is resistant to this virus. Today, 77% of the
crop grown in Hawaii is resistant to this virus.

GM foods can be engineered to have a high amount of a

specific nutrient that isnt present in the crop/area. The
vitamin A rich 'golden rice' is one example of a GM food that
has been engineered to have high levels of a nutrient.

An example of this is golden rice. Vitamin A is very

important for the human body, especially for eyesight.
However, in some parts of the world, Vitamin A isnt always
just there. Golden rice can help change that.

Golden rice was specifically made in order to have high

amounts of Vitamin A while being safe for human
consumption, which can help poorer countries that dont
have access to Vitamin A as much as we do.

This wont matter to some people, but GMOs can also make
the food that is modified taste better.

Another example of GMOs being useful is with soy. Soy can

be genetically modified in order to have high levels of oleic
acid, which is naturally found in olive oil. It can help lower
LDL cholesterol. (the bad cholesterol)

GMOs are good! [Consumer/Health 1]

Remember, any company can inject anything they want

into a certain product, even if its bad. If someone really
wanted to, they could use GMOs for their own greed, and
put others in a bad position for their own good. Basically,
people are greedy.

An example of this happening is with a big company

named Monsanto. This company has been caught making
suicide seeds, which causes the seeds of the plant to kill
themselves.

This isnt much of an issue until you realize that Columbia

forces farmers to buy GMO seeds, or else they would be
imprisoned. This means that farmers would have to
depend on this company every year to get seeds. Not only
that, but think about how much money farmers are
wasting buying these seeds! A lot of farmers have already
lost their jobs because of this.

GMOs are bad! [Producer 1]

GMOs are bad!

[Producer 2]

Another thing that Monsanto is guilty of is

purposely encouraging farmers to buy/use an
insane amount of herbicides, which basically
kill unwanted weeds and bugs. Farmers tend to
buy a ton of herbicides after learning about the
fact that most GM seeds arent affected by
them. They dont realize that if they use too
much, it could cause mutations to occur within
a bug/weed, causing super weeds/bugs to form
(super bugs/weeds are basically mutated
bugs/weeds that are super resistant/strong
against a certain thing, like toxins).

This forces farmers to buy stronger toxins, use

it for a while, and realize that the bugs/weeds
have gotten used to them, and buy even
stronger toxins, therefore wasting a ton of
money (sometimes even forcing farmers to
give up their jobs, since they cant sustain
themselves).

GMOs are bad! [Producer 3]

The last thing that Monsanto did (possibly the worst) that
could be somewhat controversial is the fact that since GMO
is relatively a new concept, they take advantage of this by
obtaining a patent that restricts anyone else from
researching the side effects of the GMO products that they
sell.

Because of this, GMO creators (specifically Monsanto) now

have the right to sue farmers whose non-GMO fields are
cross-pollinated with GMOs, even when it occurs naturally.
GMOs therefore show a serious threat to farmer sovereignty
and to the national food security of any country where they
are grown (especially in developing countries).

According to environmental activist Vandana Shiva, the

harsh reality of GMO innovation is that it leads to global
famine and poverty as the seeds are controlled and
patented by Monsanto.

There are also many health risks with GM products as well, mainly because of the
chemicals that are used in order to make GM products.

Several examples include increased hormone levels, infertility, immune problems,

accelerated aging, faulty insulin regulation, and changes in major organs. Some may also
trigger allergies.

A very specific chemical doing this is the Bt-toxin. The biotech industry claims that this
toxin is harmless to humans and mammals in general, since the natural bacteria version
has been used as spray by farmers for years. However, there have been signs of hundreds
of people reacting with allergy-like symptoms.

There have even been cases of GM foods causing you to be allergic to non-GM foods as
well!

GMOs are bad!

[Consumer/Health 1]

GMOs are bad!

[Consumer/Health 2]

This is somewhat proven in an experiment done with mice. Scientists gave

mice GM foods and see how they would react to them.

The mices digestive enzymes were reduced significantly, and it impaired the
digestion of some of the mice. This caused unwanted allergy-like effects.

The mice also started to react to many other non-GM foods in a negative way.

More than half the babies that were fed GM food died within three weeks.
Male rats fed GMO foods had defects in their testicles, which also affected
sperm cells.

The DNA of the embryo of the mice acted differently when their parents were
fed GM food.
The longer the mice were fed GM foods, the smaller and less offspring were.

Female rats fed GM soy showed changes in their ovaries and uterus.

Of course all of these examples are somewhat exaggerated and arent present
in humans, but this just shows how much we dont know about GMOs. It isnt
safe to just allow GMOs to be sold to the consumers like this. What if a GM
product that had similar effects listed above, but instead, it affected humans?
What would we do?

Final Points (pro-GMO)

Although we dont know too much about GMOs at the moment, this concept has a lot
of potential to help a lot of people in various of ways, and it even has the potential to be
one of the most important discoveries that we have found. GMOs are NOT unnatural,
even if it may seem like it. Nature has been doing what we are currently doing for
millions of years, but instead it wasnt controlled. It was just nature randomly choosing
traits and seeing what it could get away with by doing so. GMOs are essentially the same
thing, except for that we have control over what traits we actually get. This has been
already shown with GM corn, rainbow papayas, golden rice, and many other products.
Super weeds and super bugs isnt the GMOs fault. GMO products cant control how
much herbicides farmers want to use in their farms, even if it means the creation of
more super weeds and super bugs. This isnt something that GMO companies can just
control.

Final Points (non-GMO)

At the moment, we just dont know enough in order to deem GMOs as safe. Even if
GMOs have the potential to help many, many people, we still dont fully understand if
there are any undesirable side effects that we are unaware of. There has already been
signs of undesirable allergic reactions from many people, which doesnt help.
We dont even know if we can trust most companies that have power in the GMO
industry, including Monsanto. What else are they doing that we (the public) arent even
aware of?
What if a GM product gets sent out and we dont realize that its actually toxic in
some shape or form? What are we supposed to do then? Imagine how many people
could be crippled and broken because of one small accident

Conclusion
In conclusion, there currently is no real clear answer. Neither side is right or wrong. It
just depends on what we decide to do with it ourselves; use it for greed or use it for
good. Another thing to take note of is that we dont know too much about GMOs still, its
still a relatively new concept So maybe we should research a bit more about GMOs and
potential side effects.

Opinion/How this is tied to the original

article
In my opinion, GMOs are a good thing. GMOs have done so much for us over the past
20 or so years, its unbelievable. (golden rice especially, to me at least) The only thing
we have to watch out for is potential side effects and companies using it for their own
good. Otherwise, GMOs are the future to me, not just in food, but in general.
This is tied to the original article, asAnyways
it talks about how GM foods/GMOs in general,
and how it could help (or ruin?) society.

Thanks for reading!

Anyways

(sources and answers to questions will be shown after this slide)

The questions
1). What is the origin of the modern peanut?
The origin of the modern peanut is from the mix of two South American wild legumes,
Arachis hypoga and Arachis ipaensis cross pollinated.
2). On what questions did the researchers focus?
The researchers focused on whether or not the combination of Arachis hypoga and Arachis
ipaensis really did lead to the modern peanut.
3). What were the results of the research?
The results were that the combination of Arachis hypoga and Arachis ipaensis really did
lead to the modern peanut.
4). Why is the peanut genome project significant?
This project is significant because if the results were true (which they are), this could help
scientists understand how peanuts could be made better, as well as breed new types of
peanuts that are unique in their own way. (disease resistance, heat tolerance, etc.)

Sources
https://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2016/10/21/substantially-equivalent-gmo-crops-safe-organic-conventional-foods/
https://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2016/10/21/substantially-equivalent-gmo-crops-safe-organic-conventional-foods/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/gmoanswers/2016/10/04/nature-and-gmos/#f1d23f381de3
http://westhawaiitoday.com/news/local-features/gmos-good-or-bad
http://www.geneticallymodifiedfoods.co.uk/fact-sheet-pros-vs-cons.html
http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-problem-with-an-all-or-nothing-approach-to-gmo-foods-1476669961
http://time.com/4521582/2016-election-food/
http://www.drperlmutter.com/the-real-reason-gmo-matters/
http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php/news/archive/2013/15210-nearly-300-experts-agree-gmos-not-proven-safe
https://www.askdrmaxwell.com/2013/03/the-gut-destroying-toxin-you-eat-everyday/
http://www.agprofessional.com/news/industry/gmos-are-safe-conventional-choices-says-tufts-study
http://responsibletechnology.org/gmo-education/
http://responsibletechnology.org/gmo-education/health-risks/
http://www.marxist.com/gmo-human-need-corporate-greed.htm
https://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2016/01/04/gmo-patent-controversy-3-monsanto-sue-farmers-inadvertent-gmo-contamination/