Advantages and Disadvantages of GMO Food
Genetically modified foods are everywhere. These are the things eaten that are thought to be all natural. These organisms are beneficial and detrimental to society. They are a very controversial thing within the world. These plants have cured illnesses but make people nervous because of what they can become. While all-natural plants are wholesome and nutritional, they can’t do some of the things GMO’s can do but there are some things that GMO’s do that make people wary of using the GMO.
Genetically modified organisms also known as GMO’s were created with technology called gene manipulation. these genes were then placed directly into the plants to either yield more or to become impervious to pesticides and bugs that would eat them. in the early 1990s, Celgene, Inc. developed the world’s first genetically modified food, a strain of tomato they named Flavor Save. Flavor Save was engineered to suppress the polygalacturonate gene, to impede the vegetable’s softening process after ripening.
The company was able to use these tomatoes to reduce the overall costs of processing tomato products like tomato paste and tomato sauce, letting Celgene introduce lower-cost canned tomato products to supermarkets in the Western U.S. and the United Kingdom.
Jeremy Bentham is was the man that created utilitarianism believes actions are right to the degree that they tend to promote the greatest good for the greatest number of people. so, when looking at it from his angle GMO’s promote lots of good but still have their downsides.
To have GMO’s help tons of people and have a great turn out to have few people that react bad or have their own problems with it is the chance that is willing to be took
Genetically modified organisms can and are doing a lot of good in the world. These plants can produce more and can taste better than their parent all-natural plants. These plants are made to alleviate hunger and famine. By yielding more crops genetically modified rice, especially, which has been coined because it has a very high content of vitamins. It is very beneficial to countries that have known nutritional deficiencies. Not only have they been made to have a higher content of vitamins they’ve been made to withstand droughts, to yield more crop with less money, they are immune to pesticides and won’t be favorable to pest such as beetles that like to feed on them. For instance, there are plants that were made to kill the insects that ate them.
These plants seem to have a whole lot of upside but there are some very disturbing things about GMO’s that are not talked about. These plants don’t have extensive research on them so a plant that is harmful to bugs might also be harmful to humans. Genetic modification is unnatural and doesn’t fit in the context of natural ways like crossing the plants for bringing out the best in them. Since these plants aren’t backed by lots of research outcomes can be very unpredictable. “One of the most despicable aspects of the meeting was the unfounded claim ‘that GMOs started from the time of Adam and Eve in the Biblical Garden of Eden.’ This argument, popularized by Monsanto, sets out to deliberately confuse conventional breeding of crops with genetic engineering, which involves splicing genes and transferring genetic material from one species to another in a laboratory(para 4)”. Furthermore, these plants are still considered natural so they don’t have to be labeled in stores so people wouldn’t know they are eating a genetically modified organism.
Genetically modified organisms are making leaps and bounds in the science and real world such as genetically enhanced rice aka Golden rice this genetically modified organism was made to be able to contain vitamin A because of the deficiencies in Asian countries. These people in the lower income Asian countries main diet was rice due to being poor. Natural rice is a carbohydrate, used as an energy source, and is not a good source of vitamins and minerals unlike quinoa or wheat. VAD, which effects mainly children and pregnant women, is the broad term for which the rice’s properties have helped cure. This vitamin a deficiency leads to dry eye which can lead to blindness and a weakened immune system. Since this rice has been made and distributed millions of pregnant women and children have been helped and are able to lead healthier lives due to a genetically modified organism. “This altered material is very big in agriculture it is highly promoted as the modified crop seeds have the special traits such as resistance to pests, herbicides and increased nutrition value. Now, the above facts seem good, more than that, they seem fantastic! I mean, isn’t that what we need in Africa? We are a continent known for poverty, conflict and food insecurity”.
Although Golden Rice is doing an outstanding job within the lower income Asian region, there is still not enough research for genetically modified organisms. There needs to be further research to these organisms because without them being labeled. People don’t know what they are eating. Furthermore, just because golden rice has Reduced the effect of VAD it is only increasing vitamin A. People need a balanced diet of all vitamins because if they don’t this can lead into in which these people can overdose on vitamin a because so much of it is in their systems. This can happen because the rice is one of the only foods they must consume. Along with GMO’s being able to help alleviate vitamin deficiencies they also can be grown faster, with less water and resistant against pesticides. Cash crops such as corn, potatoes, and rice are the main plants being experimented and altered. Scientists have found how to make these crops better by genetically modifying them to help farmers and consumers by making a better product that gets to the table faster. These crops have been designed to be drought resistant, this means they are still able to grow with very small amounts of water in areas where it’s very scarce such as in Africa and Asia. The plants have been given the ability to fend off predators on its own. These plants have been engineered to be poisonous to pests that like to eat them, and they are not bothered by pesticides anymore, so these chemicals won’t ruin the crops.
When scientists start working on plants to make them have certain properties they didn’t have before their experiment they’ve made a whole new plant. The new plant no longer can be called natural. These plants can be labeled in stores as organic and all-natural as if they weren’t created in a lab by humans. If these ‘all-natural’ plants can kill bugs that try and eat them Furthermore the fact that the plant can kill pest that eat it could lead to a superior race of bugs that are not affected by anything.
Genetically modified organisms are good and bad with the abilities to cure aliments but at the same time they still need tons of research to be sure they cannot hurt humans in the long run as well as being labeled as all natural has to stop. These GMO’s are helping tons of people which is good just more regulation and hard backed science needs to be put behind this dilemma of society. This problem of society is on a balanced-out scale and while it stays there everything will be ok.
