Preview

Genetically Modified Food Research Paper

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1696 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Genetically Modified Food Research Paper
The science behind genetically modified food has been around since the nineteen-seventies with a respectable safety record to support its production. The advances have helped saved millions of lives in places like India, Bangladesh, and Southeast Asia with the production of Golden Rice. There are no known risks of genetically modified food however there is speculation that is can cause autism and allergic reactions because of the genes added or altered. The most common genetically modified foods are corn, soybeans, and rice, unsurprisingly these have all been staple food items in third world counties. Scientists have declared that there are no known risks associated with the consumption of genetically altered foods, as well new adaptations …show more content…
They no longer have to rely on extensive international support to provide for the population as was necessary with vitamin supplements or imported goods that are heavily taxed. Public policy has in it the latent function of dependency that has caused nations to suffer far more that it has helped them. In 2007 around the world genetically modified food totaled 6.9 billion US dollars worth of production, that is money the governments are able to redirect towards adequate housing, public healthcare, or education. Farmers earning less than then thousand US dollars per year can acquire seeds free that will continue to yield annually, this is because genetically altered foods carry a humanitarian license. Growing genetically modified food is a far more sustainable strategy than repeated funding of supplements or constant imports since the seeds of most genetically modified crops are not sterile. Ninety-four percent of farmers in the Philippines support genetically modified food for it’s high yields and ask only that it is safe to eat. In North America we are concerned with trends, a recent one being the push for organic food and because of the wealth and privilege of this nation we are able to be picky, however the starving people of the world don’t care to be as demanding of their food production as long as there is food. With a population over 7.6 billion and only 37.7 percent of global hectors considered agricultural land the claims of Charles Benbrookn and Margaret Mellon that we have no food shortage is difficult to believe, let alone the seasonal change that causes many areas of the world to be unable to cultivate food for months at a time and the perishable nature of naturally selected crops. Sixty percent of corn grown in the United States of America is used to feed livestock, although that

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Powerful Essays

    Miss

    • 8881 Words
    • 29 Pages

    All genetically modified foods that have been approved are considered by the government to be as safe as their traditional counterparts and are generally unregulated (FDA website). However, there are several types of potential health effects that could result from the insertion of a novel gene into an organism. Health effects of primary concern to safety assessors are production of new allergens, increased toxicity, decreased nutrition, and antibiotic resistance (Bernstein et al., 2003). Food Allergy Food Allergy affects approximately 5% of children and 2% of adults in the U.S. and is a significant public health threat (Bakshi, 2003).…

    • 8881 Words
    • 29 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Have you ever heard about the term of genetically-modified foods (GM foods)? Or have you ever seen this kind of foods, like GM tomatoes, in the market? GM foods are the foods that contain the genes transferred from other plant or non-plant organisms. It might be the most controversial topic in the world now. In the article “The False Promise of GMOs”, Joe Pedretti wrote about the argument about the GM foods.…

    • 776 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Many opponents of genetically modified foods doubt the safety of those artificial foods. They are the products of people’s intelligence and creativeness, but compared to the eternal law of the nature, human knowledge is not always right. People make mistakes, and sometimes they do not notice about these mistakes until the problems arise. Though developers and manufacturers make sure that there are various advantages of consuming genetically modified foods, due to the potential genetic defects or problems in these foods, they may still damage humans' bodies and undermine the environment. Regarding their benefits such as variation of food choice and the decrease of the cost of food production, genetically modified foods do bring improvements to our…

    • 1154 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Monsanto Persuasive Essay

    • 1346 Words
    • 6 Pages

    In a world where the population is growing at an alarming pace, the agricultural biotech corporation Monsanto and its scientists are now trying to create solutions to feeding the people more abundantly. Many claim that the solution to end famine start and end with speeding up the process of growing food. Nearly 15 percent of United States households struggle to put food on the table and by growing food faster it may decrease this statistic. Genetically modified foods have been researched and put in to practical applications very fast throughout the world. This new technology to alter all things natural has put a monkey wrench in our food supply system. The frontrunners of Big Agriculture Monsanto, DuPont, and Syngenta are strong-minded that world 's populations continue to be ignorant…

    • 1346 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    Gmos Research Paper

    • 1221 Words
    • 5 Pages

    “We are what we eat.” Everyone has heard this famous quote or a variation of it, but what do we actually eat? Over the past years a new type of food called Genetically Modified Organism (GMO) has flooded the food market. This new type of food is designed to better resist the climate and to contain more vitamins and minerals for the consumer, yet the debate is still ongoing: are GMOs harmful or helpful? The following text will present both sides of the argument: the GMOs activists and the anti-GMOs activists’ views. Then I will explain why I support the GMOs activists.…

    • 1221 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nutrition is an essential factor in a healthy lifestyle, in developing countries people suffer from malnutrition. Genetically modified food has the ability to contain many vitamins and minerals that can be essential to the human body. If individuals from third world countries eat the GM foods they are also consuming vitamins and minerals. Rice is one of the main foods that these people have in their diets, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Institute of Plant Sciences have genetically modified rice into “golden” rice which contains vitamin A. This is an…

    • 852 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Desperate pleas for richer, better-off countries to utilize genetic engineering in diminishing famines are a result of thousands losing their lives daily and millions on the verge of starvation. By revising the genetic make-up of plant strains, biotechnology will be able notably lessen world hunger. Crops can be engineered to resist diseases, resulting in the quantity of yield succumbing to disease to decrease. In another case, cold-resistant crops are able to benefit countries enduring from winter the whole year round. (Union of Concerned Scientists…

    • 1316 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Genetically modified (GM) foods, introduced to the American Public in 1996, involves taking the genes of the DNA of one plant or animal and transferring them to another species creating a new organism. Justification for this scientific manipulation revealed promises to eliminate world hunger, make plants resistant to pests and disease, and produce healthier foods. Agribusiness giants, like Monsanto, Bayer, and Syngenta include some of the companies first to bring products to the market. The Federal Drug Administration (FDA) took the stance, that it is the food producer responsible for assuring food safety. Companies producing GM foods ultimately regulate themselves. These companies kept their research secret and not available for public scrutiny. Insufficient data illustrate the need for ongoing exploration by independent scientists to deem the products safe for human consumption. Jeffrey M. Smith discussed these issues in his book, Genetic Roulette: The Documented Health Risks of Geneically Engineered Foods.…

    • 496 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Gmo Persuasive Essay

    • 2205 Words
    • 9 Pages

    American agriculture is the world’s leader in production and also seems to be the envy of other countries. The reason why is because U.S. agri-business consistently produces more food on less land and at cheaper cost than the farmers of any other nation. When famine loomed in Mexico and southern Asia in the mid-20th century, agricultural crop researchers saved the day. Scientists at Mexico 's International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center and the Philippines 's International Rice Research Institute came up with new, high-yielding varieties of wheat and rice that raised harvests and kept starvation at bay.(Dimick) Today as the population grows we need to look at new research again. This type of research may need to come in the form of genetically modified food production. The impact of GM food production will affect the world’s food supply.…

    • 2205 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    It’s been said that humans are what they eat. The relationship humans have with food is unappreciated. Food is the fuel that keeps humans going, gives them the energy needed to be creative and productive; it is the building block of society, after all, it wasn’t until the Neolithic Era, when humans figured out a way to domesticate plants and animals, that any form of organized society formed. Even during the previous hunter-gatherer foraging era, humans were very connected to the food they ate; understanding where it came and having an idea of how it came to be was crucial to knowing what was vital to survive. In this time, food sources like grains, fruits, and vegetables were naturally abundant, whole. Humans could choose between many different types of nutritious food because there were thousands of varieties of species. Unfortunately, as populations grew and more civilized societies formed, various farming techniques were created, and a vast majority of these species became extinct to make way for the harvesting of a select few (Pringle). In the industrial era, societies around the world, especially western ones, emphasized the importance of technological advancements. With this pursuit of technology, nature became something to control rather than live with; an attempt at making life simpler, better. Breaching the gap between nature and technology is optimization. It is this obsession with optimization that most accurately characterizes contemporary America. Undoubtedly, it comes with great costs. As it turns out, optimization is a business, and a profitable one. Thus, the costs and effects of optimization are often hidden from the public by industrial leaders in an effort to maintain profits. They control the businesses they run and protect themselves by dumping millions of dollars into politics. Today, it seems that the gap between nature and technology has been breached with the propagation of genetically modified organisms (GMOs). The aliens that now fill…

    • 4564 Words
    • 19 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    All over the world, there are a lot of people who do not know what the term genetically modified foods means. In fact, genetically modified food means crops that contain genetic material that has been changed artificially so as to produce the desired properties. In addition, a fierce debate has been prevailing over the benefits and dangers of genetically modified foods. A number of scientists think that genetically modified foods are safe, contain more nutritional value, and are cheaper to produce (Dreifu, 2008). However, opposing experts in the field of genetics differ with these lines of thoughts and argue that genetically modified foods are a danger to organisms in our ecosystem. For instance, they argue that continued production of genetically modified food might result in harmful effects on consumers and the natural environment. For this reason, I agree that genetically modified foods have negative effects on human beings and destroy the environment.…

    • 746 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    While technology is responsible for some of the most innovative and ingenious inventions of our time, not all technologies contribute positively to society. Genetically Modified Foods are an example of a negative use of technology. Due to insufficient scientific data concerning the safety of these products, and the possible catastrophic consequences resulting from their development, they should be highly monitored by government agencies and immediately banned to protect the public at large…

    • 1781 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    To some, “Genetically Modified” is synonymous with “dangerous” and “unnatural” to others Genetically Modified Organisms can mean the difference between eating or starving, and can mean saving thousands of dollars in crop losses. GMO’s can help farmers grow more food on less land and can help farmers in the developing world grow a sustenance crop to support and feed their families. Those who view GMO’s as a danger to themselves and their children usually don’t fully understand what goes into creating GMO’s, what they are, or what a positive impact they can, and already have made on the planet and its people. Genetically Modified Organisms are not the unsafe, untested science experiments some are led to believe they are. GMO’s are useful tools for farmers, thoroughly tested before their release. They can be used not only to improve yields, but as agents in conservation. GMO’s are the future of food, their benefits to conservation, land productivity and on people…

    • 1300 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Genetically Altered Foods

    • 546 Words
    • 3 Pages

    so therefore it doesn 't take much on their part to convince the regulators that…

    • 546 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Despite the recent surge in media coverage regarding genetically modified foods (GM foods) many Americans are unaware of what these foods are, or the possible benefits and dangers associated with them. Sometimes referred to as agricultural biotechnology; genetic modifying means that the DNA of food has been altered in some way at a cellular level. Scientists have learned that by inserting the genetic information from one organism into another they can create food crops that grow larger, stay fresh longer and are equipped with their own pesticides. GM foods have been a common part of the national diet since the early 90s. As with many scientific advances; e.g., using chemo therapy to treat cancer, or underwater oil drilling, there have been unexpected, negative side effects.…

    • 1739 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays