Rational Agriculture

The Canadian-based ETC group (Erosion, Technology and Concentration) is among the more radical of the environmental NGOs, being suspicious of all new technologies, at least when coming from the private sector. Their latest press release (see link) really takes the biscuit. According to this, the Canadian government is secretly trying to foist so-called "Terminator" technology on an unsuspecting world.

This technology, more accurately called GURT (Genetic Use Restriction Technology) was first developed as a concept by the USDA as a theoretical way to avoid the spread of GM traits by making seed unviable without special treatment. This approach can, of course, also be used to protect proprietary technology, by ensuring that farmers have to buy seed of the protected varieties each year. This is nothing new: hybrid seed doesn't breed true, and nearly all the maize grown in the developed world is from seed purchased from the breeder each year.

All the Canadian government seems to be suggesting is that, at the UN meeting being held now in Bangkok, its delegation push for a reversal of the current activist-inspired moratorium on GURT use to allow for trials of a technology which has not yet even been proven to work. The moral seems to be that sensible, open-minded approaches will not be allowed unless they happen to suit the agenda of unaccountable NGOs, claiming (usually falsely) to represent a much wider constituency. Such is life...