The Insanity Of Human Genes In Rice

By James Donahue

Rice is a main food staple for the world. Millions of people rely on it for their daily meal and often, just to stay alive.

Now comes news that the State of California has granted permission for Ventria Biosciences, a Sacramento-based company, to grow experimental patches of a genetically modified pharmaceutical rice laced with human genes and antibiotics.

The disclosure has caused an uproar among organic food consumers, farmers and other people who understand the implications.

Because grain is a grass, any genetically modified variety of it has been found to quickly spread, through cross pollination, to other grasses in the area that appear to us as weeds, but are related to the cultivated grains.

Thus once the modified seed stock is introduced to the ground, it has the potential of spreading around the world.

That has happened in corn, canola and is believed to be occurring in wheat, where genetically modified varieties were introduced the same way . . . through experimental patches, and later as GMO variety seeds directly sold to farmers.

Vigorous efforts by the other nations of the world to block the GMO contaminated seeds from getting into their fields have been unsuccessful. The poisoning of pure seed stock is going on-checked now all over the world. All it takes is a single shipment of GMO seed to get accidentally mixed in with the pure stuff, and the entire batch is infected.

Is this not a diabolical plot by big seed companies in the United States to control seed stock everywhere? Many of the GMO seeds are designed to be hybrid. That means that a farmer can’t save his seed from one year's harvest for the next year's planting.

Where the seed is not hybrid, companies like Monsanto are insisting that their patent on the seed prohibits farmers from using home grown seeds for a second planting without paying for it a second time.

If there was ever a sacred grain that really belonged to the people, it is rice. To tamper with this basic food, turning it into a genetically modified poison, is among the most insidious of crimes. The masses living in Third World countries that rely on rice to stay alive are in no position to pay Monsanto, Ventra Biosciences, or anybody else for the grain they plant.

If these companies succeed in turning rice into a hybrid that will not grow a second year, and are laced with modified genes, they are condemning millions to a death by starvation.

Turning rice into a genetically modified pharmaceutical laced with antibiotics is even worse. It could mean that rice eaters that consume it　may be made immune to treatment by antibiotics to deadly disease when it strikes.

There are times I think that the lust for money is causing people to violate all morale standards. And then sometimes I think this may be a super plot by big corporate interests to set the world up for a super kill.