GMOs pose a major threat to non-GMO crops due to their modified resistances. These modified crops can weaken and destroy neighboring non-GMO crops, thus financially burdening many farmers and decreasing biodiversity within the food chain. 7. Supporting an Argument We Do It By Being Real. Chipotle was born of the radical belief that there is a connection between how food is raised and prepared, and how it tastes Gun Control Essay; Global Warming Essay; Racism Essays; Civil Rights Movement; Macbeth Essays; To Kill a Mockingbird; Romeo and Juliet Essay; GMO Essays; Illegal Immigration Essay; Gun Violence Essay; Police Brutality Essay; The Great Gatsby Essay; Child Abuse Essay; Into the Wild Essay; Fahrenheit Essay; Vietnam War Essay; Malcolm X Essays
Multiculturalism in Canada & Its Cultural Diversity – History Essay
When examining population ecology, a common story comes to mind. Imagine a habitat with endless resources, and no predation or competition. It sounds like this would be ideal for sustaining population. What could possibly go wrong? This type of environment is the perfect breeding ground for the overpopulation of any species.
If a population has enough food to sustain and thrive, exponential breeding will occur. For several generations this growth will not be a significant problem. Food becomes scarce, and individuals begin to compete for limited essay about gmo. Only the most fit of the individuals will survive, while the weak will die off due to disease and starvation. The population will plummet drastically, leaving only several individuals left. This cycle is related to the carrying capacity of a species, which is the size of the population that can be sustained indefinitely.
By exceeding this limit, the clock starts to tick until disaster strikes. Just as in the scenario above, the human population will continue to grow when resources allow. Genetically modifying crops became the solution to prolong human existence beyond our carrying capacity. Once the carrying capacity is reached, humans will outnumber the resources available and drastic changes in population will occur. To prevent a collapse in essay about gmo, humans are doing their best to provide enough food for all to survive by developing genetic modified crops.
It is established that genetically modified GM crops impact the environment, but are we willing to overlook that in order to save our own? GM crops are necessary to sustain life and increase the carrying capacity of the human population, so we can not foresee eliminating them, essay about gmo.
Therefore, our plan is to reduce the impact of GM products on the environment, rather than abolish genetic engineering completely. GM crops are becoming more and more prevalent in our everyday lives. In the past 30 years, new GM products are available on shelves in supermarkets worldwide.
The following paper will discuss the environmental impacts of GM crops and explain how our global society utilizes them in the food system. Negative impacts on the environment from GMOs are a big concern for scientists and the public. Negative essay about gmo on the environment include increased use of herbicides and pollution of aquatic ecosystems.
These fundamental issues will comprise the focus of this paper. Given the negative impacts and the essay about gmo for GMOs for food production, the only way to cope with this dichotomy is to decrease the environmental impact without eliminating modified crops. Preventing these impacts is improbable, but reduction of long term damage to affected ecosystems is plausible and should be attended to by conservationists and genetic engineers collaboratively.
There is no one solution to the problem, but there are several practical strategies to limit environmental damage due to GMOs. Managing weeds is one of the most tedious tasks essay about gmo farming.
Recognizing the struggles that farmers face with essay about gmo management, scientists developed genetically modified herbicide-tolerant HT crops so farmers can spray their fields with weed killers without affecting their crop yield, essay about gmo. In the past 30 years, developing herbicide tolerant crops such as corn, essay about gmo, soybean, and cotton has been the most notable advancement in crop essay about gmo history Bonny Most of the HT crops are tolerant to glyphosate, essay about gmo, a compound used in Roundup to kill many species of weeds that essay about gmo with crops.
Glyphosate-tolerant GT crops were first developed by Monsanto in Since GT crops were brought to market, glyphosate-based herbicides like Roundup dominated the market and GT soybean, corn, and cotton are the majority of cultivated varieties in global agriculture Bonny In the s and again inessay about gmo, Monsanto produced literature ensuring that weeds developing Essay about gmo was extremely unlikely and urged farmers to increase their use of GT crops and Roundup paired together Bonny essay about gmo GT crops were developed because they were thought to not only eliminate the burden of weed management for farmers, but also reduce the overall amount of herbicides sprayed.
GT crops served the farmers well and reduced the amount of time and money spent on hand weeding. However, since the widespread adoption of glyphosate herbicides sprayed on GT crops, the weeds targeted by glyphosate-based herbicides started to develop a resistance to these herbicides Bonny The more glyphosate resistance GR develops in weed populations, the less effective glyphosate-based herbicides become Bonny When herbicides are continually sprayed, there is a high selective pressure on the weed populations.
Resistant populations arise from random mutations within individuals that happen to survive the herbicide treatments. When glyphosate is used at a higher frequency than other herbicides, the chance of mutant weed survival to glyphosate is more frequent Bonny In other words, the more you spray glyphosate, the more likely it is that the weeds will evolve to survive glyphosate treatment.
Due to the frequency of GT crops, glyphosate herbicides became the sole dominator of the market. As a result, there was an initial decrease in the frequency of general herbicide use. Glyphosate was at first considered a low-risk herbicide for both human consumption and environmental impact, essay about gmo, so this decrease was very well received by the public and scientific communities Bonny However, this decrease was closely followed by a plateau and then a steady increase in glyphosate applications.
It is believed that there essay about gmo a direct correlation between the decrease in availability of alternate herbicides and an increase in GR weeds, essay about gmo. Nearly half of the GR weeds found globally are essay about gmo on US soil, and burdening farmers with weeds that continued to compete with their crops even when drenching their fields with Roundup.
The graph below was produced by Bonny based on statistics found from USDA-NASS and from Heap This image displays several different herbicides applied to soybeans in the USA in relation to the development and growth of glyphosate-resistant weeds from The right axis is displaying the number of GR weeds, the left axis is displaying the number of herbicides, and the bottom axis is displaying time.
Bonny states that there was only one survey reporting herbicide usage from The increased use of herbicides from based on the numbers from the survey is expressed with the dotted line in the image.
The increased amount of spraying due to GR weeds leads to a higher amount of glyphosate found in our groundwater, surface water, soils, and precipitation Coupe et al. The glyphosate can pollute through runoff, pesticide-drift, and leaching through the ground. Research of Mexican water sources by Ruiz-Toledo, Castro, Rivero-Perez, Bello Mendoza and Essay about gmofound traces of glyphosate in all tested sources.
Sampling sites included irrigation essay about gmo, wells, and points along a river bank, providing diversity of water sources Ruiz-Toledo et al, essay about gmo. The tests found traces of glyphosate in all samples, including tests within natural protected areas Ruiz-Toledo et al.
The test results prove that glyphosate found its way into water sources through surface runoff, essay about gmo, leaching, pesticide-drift, or potentially other modes of transport, essay about gmo. Water quality problems arise when glyphosate absorbs into the soil essay about gmo the chemical leaches or is carried away by runoff, essay about gmo. The concentration of glyphosate in the water source is significantly influenced by the amount of precipitation within the given season, either rainy or dry Ruiz-Toledo et al.
During a rainy season, the concentration of glyphosate within a water source is diluted, but during a dry season concentrations rise dramatically creating unsafe water quality Ruiz-Toledo et al. Amounts of precipitation also determine how far polluted runoff can reach geographically speaking. These changes in precipitation levels cause glyphosate to travel far away from the intended application site. Daouk, Essay about gmo Alencastro, Pfeifer, Grandjean, and Chevre attribute rainfall to the transport of glyphosate when soils are composed of fine-textured layers on a significant slope.
However, Daouk et al. With this in mind, Ruiz-Toledo et al. Since GM crops are frequently paired with excessive glyphosate use, it is crucial that actions are taken to use glyphosate safely in large scale agriculture systems.
Glyphosate applications in close proximity to rivers is problematic to wildlife populations. A high amount of glyphosate is lethal to amphibians and other organisms.
Relyea suggests that Roundup, a compound designed to kill plants, can cause extremely high rates of mortality to amphibians that could lead to population declines in the natural environment as well as death in laboratory conditions, essay about gmo.
Other organisms besides amphibians are also affected, essay about gmo. Based on the negative impacts that GMOs inflict on the environment presented in this paper, essay about gmo, one might formulate the opinion that GMOs essay about gmo be discontinued or outlawed.
However, as predicted by human population growth specialists, the global human population is predicted to reach 9 billion by The question at the forefront of the century is: how are we, as a collective humanity, going to feed the population?
Therefore, engineering GM crops to grow in poor quality soils, fight virulent pathogens, and carry protection against pest damage are necessary to sustain the food demands of the rising populous.
Over the past 50 years, population grew substantially and the demand for efficient food production increased. GM crop development accelerated immensely in the past 30 years to try and sustain the global demands for food. This flood resistant gene enables more plants to survive floods, and more people are subsequently able to eat the plants.
Ronald, The food market is already reliant on GM crop production to essay about gmo the people alive right now, and the demand for GM crop production will only increase as the population grows in the future. Certain staple crops like cultivated papayas and bananas would be extinct due to noxious diseases if GM resistant varieties were not developed Ronald, Due to the prevalence of GMOs, steps should be taken by growers and plant scientists to ensure that the conservation of the ecosystem and the reduction of negative environmental impact is a top priority.
These strategies aiming to balance conservation and technology are a realistic solution instead of abolishing genetic engineering entirely. We propose implementing a plan to change the management practices of using herbicides. Although this plan would not completely reverse the negative impact that GM crops have on the environment, it will be a first step in slowing the total rate of detrimental effects in time.
Stacked herbicide tolerance refers to a crop that is engineered to have resistance to multiple herbicides simultaneously. The development of GM crops with stacked herbicide resistance could benefit large scale agriculture because it would allow farmers to spray their fields with multiple different herbicides instead of just glyphosate-based treatments, creating an herbicide management plan, essay about gmo.
Allowing for variation in herbicide applications would minimize mutant weed resistant populations from developing Bonny Tsui and Chu also suggest other alternatives to the original Roundup to use as herbicides. Using Roundup Bioactive instead of the original Roundup will also hopefully reduce the lethality that this herbicide has on other organisms. GM crops are necessary to feed the population and will continue to exist, but they can be dangerous to the environment if they are not properly controlled.
Changing the management practices of using herbicides will reduce the detrimental effects that many GM crops have on the environment, essay about gmo, while simultaneously allowing humans to enjoy their benefits, essay about gmo.
Battaglin, W. Glyphosate and its degradation product AMPA occur frequently and widely in US soils, essay about gmo, surface water, groundwater, and precipitation. Journal of the American Water Resources Association, 50 2 — Bonny, S. Genetically modified herbicide-tolerant crops, weeds, and herbicides: Overview and impact.
English GMO Essay
, time: 7:31Genetically Modified Food, Essay/Paper Sample
Gun Control Essay; Global Warming Essay; Racism Essays; Civil Rights Movement; Macbeth Essays; To Kill a Mockingbird; Romeo and Juliet Essay; GMO Essays; Illegal Immigration Essay; Gun Violence Essay; Police Brutality Essay; The Great Gatsby Essay; Child Abuse Essay; Into the Wild Essay; Fahrenheit Essay; Vietnam War Essay; Malcolm X Essays Canada is one the most successful multicultural societies in the world. It is protected against the xenophobic discourse that is blooming around the blogger.comans are defined as the citizens of a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural society since historically most of themhave been immigrants from various parts of the blogger.com country proudly holds the banner of multiculturalism to exhibit its Feb 24, · I am doing an essay on argumentative issues in regards to the medical field, so this helped a lot. League of Ledgends on August 21, This is a great website for people practising writing. -_-Dianna Mendez on March 03, There are a few I would love to read about, very interesting topics. Thank you for the ideas
No comments:
Post a Comment