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Comment by tozeur | Hacker News Reader

Are there any downsides to this that were perhaps left out of the article?

The downside of free trade agreements is well studied: while overall it's a net positive for the economies involved, there are some individual losers.

I think the parent means things like, draconian copyright rules, ISDS (investor-state dispute settlement), subversion of customer protection rules (e.g. selling GMO meat in EU), etc.

In addition, Japan and EU are obviously similarly (very highly) developed countries, so "free trade" between them is very close to "fair trade" as well, as opposed to e.g. free trade between EU and China would be (EU companies would skirt EU labour and environmental laws by producing stuff in China and freely importing into the EU).

Banning GMO meat doesn't protect consumers. It's just unscientific pandering to special interest groups.

You probably meant to write allowing GMOs is pandering to special interest groups?

https://qz.com/1524049/monsanto-is-at-the-center-of-a-plagia...

It's benefiting the special interest of GMO companies at the expense of the special interests of stupid people who are irrationally scared of them.

GMOs, together with massive animal agriculture are a black swan in the making. Let's modify the organisms, create billions of them, have them as a testing ground for bacteria and viruses, let the bacteria and viruses evolve to eventually kill the resistant individuals, then after it happens we need 10 more years until more than a thousand billion individuals produce a human targeting strain.

There is absolutely no scientific way anyone can measure the risk without the effect of time.

Not to mention that my story is only one outcome out of many downsides and it's already happening with antibiotics abuse in animal ag.

The avian flu is a good past example. The disease sparked from a population of animals we raise the most. Hundreds of billions of chickens were Petri dishes for the ultimate strain of mammal killers. Intuitively these kinds of situations are inevitable.

How is raising GMO animals more risky? Or do you think the EU should mandate farming boars instead of pigs?

If you genetically modify animals to have a stronger immune system there's going to be a natural pressure for stronger bacteria.

Just like giving animals antibiotics to spur their growth is riskier than not.

Animals have been genetically modifying themselves to have stronger immune systems for millions of years. Are you proposing to halt evolution through natural selection?

I am not. I am saying that evolution is time tested on a huge scale, GMO can never be.

By using GMOs one is definitely going to get black swans.

I don't understand how people don't get that... Like, half of the concern about global warming/climate change isn't warming per se - it might be a good thing if we'd be able to grow food in Siberia - but change - the unforeseen, unpredictable consequences of throwing a complex chaotic system out of a balance it's maintained for millions of years. Now exactly the same applies to GMOs, but all of a sudden the "scientific community" reaches the opposite consensus.

Other techniques can produce genetic changes just as large as direct genetic modification. For example, irradiation, interspecies hybridization, and selective breeding. So your "black swan" argument is invalid.

Which of those techniques can implant virus/bacterial gene into plant DNA?

It’s like saying “nuclear bomb could happen randomly in the universe” like yeah, it could (and there are actually examples of natural reactors), but what are the odds, versus human engineering?!

Banning hormone-treated beef and chlorine washed chicken would protect customers from shitty food though.

Those issues are separate from GMOs.

Biggest loser will be the domestic Japanese Camembert industry[1], as according to a Reddit poster[2] Japan only has 4 cheeses (Sandwich cheese, cheese that melts (とろけるチーズ), parmesan cheese (for pasta) and camembert).

But that could turn around as consumers discover new cheeses and then incorporate cheese into their diet more.

One thing I recall about Japan, specifically Tokyo, was how many French patisseries there were, so it would seem to me there's a huge untapped market for French Cheese and Wine to accompany.

[1] https://whatjapanthinks.com/2017/10/05/camembert-is-japans-f...

[2] https://www.reddit.com/r/japan/comments/1xwk51/is_it_true_th...

I used to get my supplies from Fermier [1]. Excellent but quite expensive.

[1] https://www.fermier.co.jp/c/shop_atago.php

A number of industries have their tariffs suppression spread over X years to give people the opportunity to get used to the competition (I know it's 7 years for automotive and 10 years for shoes).

Well, if you are not a member state of the EU or Japan it will be harder to sell your products, if EU or Japan can import them cheaper from their partners. But next to that: Probably not.

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