Week 7: The Great Debate

The article was about seed company's rights to there "intellectual property". There cannot be complete and thorough tests on every aspect of the plant that their seed will produce without violation of the intellectual property. This is preventing producers from information that proves whether or not the technology in the seed/plant is paying off for the producer to buy it.

I think that the producers should have more knowledge about what they are actually buying. The producers are the ones doing all the work to make all the grain that the country uses. They should be the driving factor behind the seed market since they are the ones producing all of the grain. The producer should also be able to tell the seed company what kind of traits that would thrive better in the environment in which that producer lives. The seed companies do need to have some say in what is being produced as far as the technology in the seed in that making a couple hundred bags of seed for one farmer and another couple hundred bags of seed for a different farmer will start to add up in cost because there won't be a "bulk" production line. There needs to be a happy medium. But as we stand now the seed company has most of the control.

There could be changes for different areas like if the northern regions don't have an insect problem then that trait could be left out of the seed as well as if a southern state didn't have to deal with another certain insect. As of now the producer has to buy the all of the traits in the bag or none. Other traits such as height and performance in soil type need to be taken into effect. Most of the corn seed produced today is made for the corn belt (Nebraska and I0wa) places with rich black soil. There needs to be corn that can yield well in sandier soils, hotter temps, and drier weather.

I think researchers have the right idea on wanting to get the "truth" or real data out to the growers. I think it would be an opportunity for a producer to really get results in growing the crops.

There should be a full line of data that comes out with the variety showing all data like drought tolerance, yields in all corn growing areas, as well as anything else that could factor in when a producer is choosing a brand and variety. There should also be data that compares with other competitor brands, this would be somewhat hard to do with new varieties coming out all of the time.

I think that if there is an insect that is a problem year after year that biotechnology should be planted along with a refuge so we don't start to see BT resistance. An area with high populations of corn borer or corn ear-worm, I would think that GMO corn would pay. With less loss of grain to the insects I think that food security would increase some but I'm not sure that it completely solves the problem.

All in all there are two sides to the argument. I do think the seed companies should have a good amount of their opinion because they are investing a lot of money and time and technology into the seed. The producers also should have a good amount of say since they are the ones needing the seed to feed the rest of the country.