Natural and Genetically Modified Organisms

Since the mid 1990’s Americans have been enjoying larger, better tasting, and more nourishing produce. Farmers and ranchers have been able to produce higher yields of crop in less amount of time. Produce is also more resistant to disease and can grow in a large range of climates with different soils while requiring less water. So what has caused all of these great “food miracles” over the last 20 years? Did Mother Nature decide to give us a break? No, not quite. As a matter of fact, these foods aren’t natural at all. These “food miracles” are all the result of carefully designed scientific experiments where scientists alter the genetics of plants and animals to give them as many desired traits as possible. The result is a genetically modified organism, or GMO.

Humans have been trying to improve the quality and quantity of our produce since we learned how to plant a seed. Not until 1980, though, was it discovered that specific pieces of DNA could be transferred from one organism to another. (History of Genetically Modified Foods) From there, scientists have been trying to find more ways of selecting and delivering genes that help plants and animals deliver more than they would naturally be able to. In 1983, the first transgenic plant was created, a tobacco plants that was resistant to anti-biotics. In 1990 genetically modified cotton trees were produced. Tomatoes were the first commercially produced GMO in 1994. In 1995, Monsanto, a biotech company, introduced “Round-Up-Ready”, which was an herbicide resistant soybean. (History of Genetically Modified Foods)

It was not until 2000, that scientists discovered that GMOs would be able to yield higher nourishing foods. Since then GMO’s have exploded as a large source of ...

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...ing a secret from your consumer. Instead of keeping it a secret, prove to the consumer that your GMO isn’t harmful to them, but corporations have not been able to do that yet or else they probably would have. The United States and Canada are they only two countries in the world that do not label their GMOs. If 9 out of 10 Americans want to know if they ingesting GMOs, then it probably needs to happen.

There have been many benefits of GMOs from producing better tasting food to allowing plants to produce their own insecticides. However, the evidence is just not conclusive to determine if GMOs are safe enough for people to be consuming. We should also have the right to know what we are putting into our bodies. So the question is, does an apple a day really keep the doctor away? Well, if it is a genetically modified apple, the answer is, we simply don’t know yet.