Crops & Food
We eat to live. Humans use approximately 11% of Earth’s land for the cultivation of crops for food, but also for clothing, medicine and biofuels. Globally, major crops include sugarcane, pumpkin, maize (corn), wheat, rice, cassava, soybeans, hay, potatoes and cotton.
Below is the complete archive of related articles sorted by date.
India’s food regulator proposes mandatory GMO labeling
Seeking to introduce GMO labelling for the first time in India, the country’s food regulator has proposed all packaged food products containing genetically modified ...
GMO crop pioneer Robb Fraley to leave Monsanto after Bayer takeover
It’s the end of an era at Monsanto Co. after executives including the seed giant’s scientific leader Robb Fraley announced ...
Viewpoint: Legal certainty, public support needed to unlock biotech’s potential in Europe
A new age is dawning in Europe, one that offers an opportunity to fully realize the power of biotechnology to ...
Ugandan farmers struggling with cassava viruses await GMO solution
Cassava is a major staple food for millions of people in the tropical regions of the world. In Uganda it ...
Talking Biotech: Non-agricultural debt—not GMOs—to blame for Indian farmer suicides
Environmental scientist Vaishnavi Tripuraneni: Marriage loans and health care—not seed costs—are the main drivers of debt for smallholder farmers in ...
Viewpoint: Food companies’ non-GMO advertising has a human cost
In keeping with our era of ideological boycotts, I will no longer be purchasing Kind bars. Or Barilla pasta. Or Triscuit crackers. Or Del Monte diced tomatoes. Or Nutro dog ...
Most UK millennials unconcerned about eating GMO foods, poll finds
The advent of genetically modified crops caused a scandal in the 1990s. But the younger generation is largely relaxed about ...
India’s Supreme Court denies Monsanto’s request to stay order rescinding GMO Bt cotton patent ahead of appeal
The Supreme Court on Monday [May 7] refused to stay the order of the Delhi high court holding that plant ...
Viewpoint: ‘Precision plant breeding’ better describes crop biotechnology than misused ‘GMO’ term
[I]n agriculture we continue to use terms such as GMO, GE, GM, transgenic, CRISPR, TALEN, genome/gene editing and biotech crops ...
Viewpoint: North American scientists, IARC officials conspired to misrepresent glyphosate health risks
On March 20, 2015, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) announced that it had classified glyphosate, the active substance ...
Monsanto appeals court ruling stripping its rights to GMO Bt cotton patent in India
Monsanto Co has appealed to India’s Supreme Court against a ruling by the Delhi High Court which decreed [in April] ...
Which GMO foods are available at US grocery stores?
While GMOs typically make a disproportionate splash in the media, the reality is that there are very few different types ...
Plants monitor underground signals and react to neighbors’ stresses, study finds
Plants are more sensitive than they might seem. Although they stay in one spot, they are monitoring and reacting to ...
Viewpoint: Why organic farming activists oppose New Breeding Techniques (NBTs)
There was a brief moment in 2015 where organic farming researchers were having an open discussion on adopting certain innovative ...
USDA releases GMO food labeling proposal—suggests using ‘bioengineered’ instead of ‘genetically modified’
USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service has issued a proposed rule to implement the landmark legislation requiring some form of disclosure of ...
‘Ecomodern Eating’: Why agricultural productivity and innovation are key to sustainable food and farming
Sunday, April 22nd, marked nearly 50 years since millions of people gathered for the first Earth Day. Their celebration raised awareness ...
6 promising genetically engineered animals stuck in regulatory purgatory
You’ve probably heard the news that genetically engineered (GE) Atlantic salmon is on the way. ... Here are six other genetically ...
Viewpoint: 8 things Vandana Shiva needs to know about US farmers and GMOs
In mid-April, famous anti-GMO activist Vandana Shiva was paid nearly $20K by my hometown university to speak on campus. While I can appreciate her ...
How scientists are using CRISPR to make foods that directly benefit consumers
Scientists are now using a pioneering technology called CRISPR to edit a plant’s own genes, ushering in a host of ...
Podcast: Geneticist Pamela Ronald on how GMO misinformation could hurt world’s poor
If you’ve heard that GMOs are bad, I want to introduce you to Pamela Ronald. A plant geneticist, Pamela co-authored ...
Is monoculture a bad thing? It’s time to revise simplistic ideological narrative
Biotech critics frequently claim that conventional agriculture and GMOs promote monoculture farming, which is harmful to biodiversity. A closer look ...
Identification of 10,000 new rice genes could speed up crop breeding
A new study published in the Nature journal opens the possibility to accelerate rice breeding to achieve food security for some of ...
Indian university’s insect-resistant GMO Bt cotton ready for field trials
A Bt cotton variety developed by the Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) is ready for trials. It took the university ten ...
Genetic engineering has ‘enormous potential’ to solve environmental problems in Africa, scientists say
[S]cientists and government officials, in a series of exclusive interviews with the Alliance for Science, opined that biotechnology is one ...
How scientists use meta-analysis to try to make sense of contradictory findings on neonicotinoids and bees
The EU has announced a near-total ban on three insecticides that we now know are harmful to bees and other pollinators. And yet for ...
Can governments, public keep up with gene-editing revolution in agriculture?
A mushroom that doesn't brown. White flour with as much fiber as whole-wheat flour. Corn that can fend off northern ...
How CRISPR gene editing could unlock resistance to destructive citrus greening disease
Researchers at the University of California, Riverside have made an important step in understanding the molecular mechanism of huanglongbing (HLB), ...
Viewpoint: David Suzuki’s views on GMOs ‘well outside the scientific mainstream’
Mr. Suzuki is known by most as a twinkly-eyed old sage with a harmless message about living in tune with ...
