Anti-GMO demonization of conventional agriculture has consequences

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The negative rhetoric surrounding GMOs, big ag and non-organic food production is due for a reckoning. At some point, many will have to wake up to the reality that their beliefs on food are less rational than they are ideological. And that, in some cases, these beliefs are slowing food production worldwide.

“The average consumer may believe that organic is better, but that same person wants his or her tomatoes to last on the counter for an entire week,” said Juan Sabater, a tomato farmer in California. “Yeah, we give our fruits a chlorine bath before they hit the market. Otherwise they won’t look fresh the next day.”

This same farmer tosses into the trash about one third of his harvest because those tomatoes don’t meet the aesthetic demands of the same consumer who has no problem deriding him for using the synthetic pesticides or bleach solutions that make a shelf-life possible.

“People think that just because something is organic, it’s better,” said Sabater. “I know of some very toxic organic pesticides. Ones that are very poisonous.”

Read full, original post: Ripe for a rethink: Why the anti-GMO crowd can’t have it both ways

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