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Politics : World Affairs Discussion -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: GUSTAVE JAEGER who wrote (2074)	9/28/2002 11:39:20 AM
From: Elmer Flugum	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 3959

As I understand it, France's nuclear industry is the Government! As for European agriculture, don't they have to compete with American corporate welfare farmers? One group seems to drive the other. len

To: GUSTAVE JAEGER who wrote (2074)	10/7/2002 3:40:39 PM
From: Elmer Flugum	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3959

Agricultural Biotech: agbioworld.com "A second controversial aspect of GMOs is concerned with ownership and access to the new products and processes. Since most of GMO research is being carried out by the private sector, which patents its inventions, agricultural policy makers must face up to potentially serious problems. How long, and under what terms, should patents be granted for bio-engineered products? Moreover, patents are traditional granted for "inventions" rather than the mere 'discovery' of a function or characteristic. Under what conditions should patents be applied to life forms, and for what period of time? How will resource-poor farmers of the world, for example, be able to gain access to the products of biotechnology research? Developing country governments must establish a regulatory framework to guide the testing and use of genetically modified crops. These rules and regulations should be reasonable in terms of risk aversion and cost effective to implement. Let's not tie science's hands through excessively restrictive regulations. Since much of the biotechnology research is underway in the private sector, the issue of intellectual property rights must be addressed, and accorded adequate safeguards by national governments. The high cost of biotechnology research is leading to a rapid consolidation in the ownership of agricultural life science companies. Is this desirable? I don't think so. To help safeguard against undue concentration of ownership of plant and animal genetic resources, I believe that it is also important for governments to fund significant public sector programs of biotechnology research as well. Such publicly funded research is not only important as a complement and balance to private sector proprietary research, but it is also needed to ensure the proper training of new generations of scientists, both for private and public sector research institutions. " That is a BIG issue....I am glad he brought it up. Otherwise, the article was very informative. Makes a case for ending the processing of so much of our foods and sticking with the raw product and for a vegeatarian lifestyle... Thanks, len