The farmers being sued are claiming they ended up with fields of GMO crops because of cross-pollination from neighboring fields of GMO crops ... which is statistically impossible
A coalition of 300 organic farming interests, farmers seed growers and producers, have just lost a legal suit against Monsanto GM seed corporation in which they claim they might be victims of accidental GM contamination of their crops, and thus subject to Monsanto lawsuits.
If it was easy to cross-pollinate these crops, hybrid varieties would be developed, just like it is now done for corn
Now in field trials, GMO Wheat
ur right... i must be a dumbass... GMO wheat isnt even here yet...
Goertzen Seed Research
The identity-preserved hard red wheats were grown from seed germplasm developed
by Goertzen Seed Research (Haven, Kansas), which had been acquired jointly by
Cargill’s North American Flour Milling and North American Grain in 1994.
Improving endosperm quality was one of the primary goals of the Goertzen wheat-Dr. M. Boland / International Food and Agribusiness Management Review Vol 6 Iss 3 2003
11
breeding program. A flour miller wanted the maximum amount of flour extraction
per bushel, whereas a baker wanted protein quantity and quality. Cargill also
owned a Bake Lab near its Minneapolis headquarters, where various wheat samples
were analyzed for baking qualities. Cargill informed breeders of the importance of
milling and baking quality traits. Consequently, public and private wheat breeders
gradually were developing “loaf bread,” “noodle,” and “cracker” wheats.
Cargill had also long sought hard white wheats. Goertzen Seed Research developed
an early hard white wheat variety, Snow White, and contracted with producers for
its use in Cargill’s mills. However, it was not well adapted to the Great Plains.
Cargill cooperated with wheat breeders at Kansas State University in the
development of their first hard white wheat varieties in 1999 and developed one of
the first identity-preserved wheat programs in the Great Plains with the
Karl/Karl92 hard red wheat varieties which possessed excellent baking qualities in
1993. To encourage producer adoption, Cargill had developed a program that paid
producers economic incentives to grow hard white wheat. Because these wheats had
to be kept separate, North American Grain developed identity-preserved programs
near its elevators in western Kansas and eastern Colorado.
Certified Seed and Farmer-Saved Seed
The key problem with identity-preserved hard white wheat was providing sufficient
economic incentives to ensure that producers planted enough wheat to satisfy
demand for large-scale flour mills, so as to obtain the cost savings from the higher
extraction rate. However, wheat producers were unique in that much of the wheat
was grown from farmer-saved seed. Certified seed from public varieties and seed
varieties of private companies was defined as seed that had passed field inspection
and seed testing standards for varietal purity, absence of certain wheat, and other
crop seeds and certain diseases. In addition, most certified seed and private seed
were treated with a fungicide to control seedborne and seedling diseases. Typically,
certified seed also exceeded 85 percent germination.
Non-certified seed was called farmer-saved or homegrown seed. Certified seed was
more “pure” (less weeds or foreign material) because it had been cleaned, but it also
had higher costs. The overwhelming majority of producers planted certified seed the
first year and then used farmer-saved seed for one to two years until seed purity
declined, and then they purchased certified seed again. Very few producers plant
certified wheat seed on all of their acres.
Mixing red and white wheats would result in severe discounts. If white wheat and
red wheat were planted next to each other in a field, the potential existed for crosspollination. Seedcoat color was a maternal characteristic. If a red wheat plant
pollinated a white wheat plant, the wheat remained white. But if that wheat plant
were saved back as seed, then the next generation would be a red wheat plant.
lol... did you see this part? hes a power cat... ur alma mater... quibble over semantics.... its GMO... eugenics...
Associate Professor, Department of Agricultural Economics, Kansas State University, 342 Waters
Hall, Manhattan, KS 66506, USA
http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/bitstream/34397/1/0603ca01.pdf
