In Sean Pratt’s story titled “Industry slow to defend GMOs, says ag minister,” federal agriculture minster Gerry Ritz described his struggle to combat misinformation about GMO technology.
“We’re muzzled. We’re muffled. But somehow we’ve got to come up with a way to get around that,” Ritz said.
“A commentator on Producer.com who identified himself as Jason took exception to this portrayal:
“This coming from the Conservative government that has been muzzling scientists since they got into power. Wow… The most anti-science, anti-freedom of information from scientists government is complaining that the science and voices from scientists are being drowned out by groups just trying to make a buck. Perhaps now Ritz will know how it feels to be one of those “Radical” environmentalist his government has been demonizing for the last nine years.”
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It did take me a moment to connect the dots in Ryan’s logic at the end of his comment, although I do appreciate the irony of a Conservative cabinet minister complaining about being muzzled while it’s very difficult to get many of the Agriculture Canada scientists under his watch on record.
Stories about GMO technology often draw comments to our website. There are people who are dead set against any use of GMOs, and others who rely on the technology for their livelihood. So it’s not surprising the debate heats up at times.
In the same comment section of Pratt’s story, a commentator identified as Richard wrote this:
“The lack of vigilance around the precautionary principle has led us down the yellow brick road to a monoculture of thinking and practice….Anyone hitching their future to GM tech and one obsolete chemical are destined to become redundant in their own time…..it’s simple natural law…..Or as Einstein put it…” specialization leads to extinction.”
A commentator who identified herself as Amelia Jordan had this to say in response to Richard’s comment:
“There are 8 commercial GMO crops though, so encouraging a monoculture culture isn’t the reality with GM technology. If anything, GM tech allows us to vastly broaden the possibilities of crop development, even going so far as to help bring crops that were never successfully domesticated to our table. That increases sustainability and crop diversity, which is exactly what farmers are advocating for.”
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