New GMO Rice for Higher Yield, Less Global Warming

[jeff47]

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/539536/new-gmo-rice-for-higher-yield-less-global-warming/

Not all climate-change mitigation involves changing human habits. In a paper in Nature on Wednesday, scientists unveiled a new genetically modified rice plant that reduces emissions of methane, a greenhouse gas 20 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. But the rice is at least 10 or 20 years from being available to farmers.

The new rice differs by only a single gene, borrowed from barley. The gene makes the rice produce less methane and yield 43 percent more grain per plant. “For three years of field trials it worked very well,” says Chuanxin Sun of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, senior author on the paper. It was especially effective during the summer, he says, when it cut methane emissions to 0.3 percent, compared to 10 percent of the control rice plants’ emissions. The new rice reduced emissions less dramatically in autumn, because of lower temperatures, but still cut methane emissions in half.

(...)

After larger-scale trials and more precise measurements of exact methane emissions and yield of the genetically modified rice, Sun says, the next step is to use traditional breeding to make a rice variety that’s “basically the same scientifically” as the genetically modified rice, including the same gene. “Right now of course it’s a GMO issue, and we cannot deliver this variety directly to farmers. We have to use traditional breeding methods and breed the new, society-acceptable variety for farmers.” This will take an additional five to 10 years.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

1. That's the kind of GM we need.

Not GM for the sole purpose of promoting a specific brand of pesticide or herbicide usage.

[jeff47]

2. It's the kind of GM we already have.

Another example is Golden Rice, which was developed to fight third-world malnutrition.

This particular plant is going to be delayed 10 years because of fear of "GMO".

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

3. I prefer longer term adoptions of GM. 10 years might be too short a window.

But better 10 than simply throwing it out there.

[jeff47]

4. It's not 10 years to test the GMO. It's 10 years to do exactly the same thing

with traditional breeding. Same plant, same genes. But it won't have the dreaded GMO label.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

5. Deleting this response, a quick reread shows differently. nt

[jeff47]

6. Actually, lots of people are forcing them to avoid the GMO label.

For example, all the countries that ban GMO crops.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

8. I just put up a different response, we must have been writing at the same time there. nt

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

7. Rereading it, why can't they 'deliver' it to farmers who don't care whether or not they grow GMO?

There are plenty of places in the world where GMO crops are legal.

[jeff47]

9. Where those places are located.

Off the top of my head, the places where GMO is legal are either not a good climate for rice, or they're poor so more expensive non-global-warming rice is not gonna sell well.

(I may be misremembering some non-poverty-stricken places where GMO is legal and rice grows well)

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

10. Ah, I've never tried growing rice.

So I'm not sure where all rice can be grown. (Although I've grown peanuts in Ohio, and I've got some cotton I'm going to give a try.)

I also didn't realize they were out more for profit. I assumed (stupid me) that they were just going to make the rice available to farmers, who could save it and replant, not that they intended it to be 'more expensive'. Given that it was meant to help address global warming, I naively assumed it was created by philanthoprists, not capitalists.

[jeff47]

11. Yep, the philanthropic rice (for the moment) is golden rice. (nt)

[JayhawkSD]

12. There's a rub.

A great many cgops have been selectively bred (otherwise known as "genetically modified&quot for things like highter yield, lower water needs, etc. All beneficial for farmers, right?

Except the the producers do not allow the farmers to keep part of the crop to use as seed for the following year's crop. They must buy seed every year from the producer, and that seed is very expensive. The procedure has been tested in court and has been upheld, all the way to the Supreme Court.

With crops that are not selectively bred, farmers never have to buy seed after the first year, because they simply retain part of each crop for use as sedd for the following year. But when the crop is patented by the producer of the seed they are not allowed to do that and can be sued for large penalties if they try.

[jeff47]

13. Um, no. That's actually false. At least in the US.

The SCOTUS invalidated patents on genomes, the mechanism by which companies were trying to force re-buying. Also "terminator seeds" that Monsanto created did not sell.

Now, some crops are re-bought every year. Like corn. But they do that because they are looking for a specific hybrid plant, and last year's seeds only have a 1-in-4 chance of being the right hybrid. But this is true for both GMO corn and non-GMO corn.

[Igel]

14. This isn't new.

If you buy a specific variety of chili, for example, to grow from seed you aren't supposed to keep the seeds that result. They may not breed true (they may not even be fertile). But they're patented and so the law at least used to say you can't reuse.

It's fine if it's not Monsanto. It's fine if it's GMO by traditional means. But as soon as it's Monsanto or lab-created GMO, it's completely different. Because Monsanto. But if Burpee has a new variety out ... That's okay.


It extends to things that do "breed" true. My wife likes roses. Some are bred for specific traits--color, growth habit, scent, whatever. To propagate them vegetatively--by means of cuttings or layering--is also prohibited. If I graft my Li and Lang jujubes, that's okay--they're old varieties. But there are newer varieties that, strictly speaking, I'm not allowed to graft under threat of prosecution.

I don't know about some of the blueberries I have. They were produced by state ag stations, and government bodies are often exempted from intellectual property laws because they're funded by the populace. (So the Feds can't copyright anything they produce.)

[progressoid]

15. Rec.