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Comment by hyperion2010 | Hacker News Reader

hyperion2010

One of the most rage inducing wikipedia articles you will ever read: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_rice. People who block this stuff are nothing less than murderers in my opinion.

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That's a bit hyperbolic when there are some reasonable concerns about golden rice. From the article you link:

> In 2008 WHO malnutrition expert Francesco Branca cited the lack of real-world studies and uncertainty about how many people will use golden rice, concluding "giving out supplements, fortifying existing foods with vitamin A, and teaching people to grow carrots or certain leafy vegetables are, for now, more promising ways to fight the problem"

Branca isn't some hippy idiot opposed to GMO for some stupid non-reason.

> In that respect, it is significant that vitamin A deficiency is rarely an isolated phenomenon, but usually coupled to a general lack of a balanced diet

So these children still need additional micronutrient fortification? Where are they getting iron, zinc and iodine?

http://whqlibdoc.who.int/bulletin/2000/Number%2010/78(10)new...

> Dr Jorgen Schlundt, Coordinator for the Food Safety Programme at the World Health Organization, commented: ‘‘Before genetically modified rice can be widely introduced, scientific evidence will need to be provided to assure that the rice is safe and nutritionally adequate, does not pose unacceptable risks to the environment, and will provide the human health benefits suggested.’’ He added: ‘‘WHO, along with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and the jointly sponsored FAO/WHO Codex Alimentarius Commission are developing the methods and criteria to be used for the international assessment and management of genetically modified foods, including requirements for the labelling of such foods and their products. WHO is studying possible human health hazards from the release of genetically modified organisms into the environment and, as a first step, the WHO Regional Office for Europe has organized a seminar on this topic for September 2000.’’

At the time (fifteen years ago) this was a calm rational statement made in the face of over 30 companies holding over 70 patents who were campaigning heavily to be able to sell this product to the developing world. After being challenged by WHO some of the patent owners gave reassurances such as free licensing for farmers making less than $10,000; and the ability to save and resow grain.

It doesn't sound particularly calm and rational to me. We already know that rice isn't nutritionally adequate (that's why it's usually combined with beans). Why should a new variety of rice need to be more nutritionally adequate than older varieties?

Because it's being sold as a solution to malnutrition. Part of that money will come from poor farmers and part of it will come from the budgets of aid organisations. But it's not a solution to malnutrition. It is a solution to only a single aspect of malnutrition, leaving the children affected with unknown but probably sufficient amounts of Vit A but still probably inadaquate amounts of iron, iodine, and zinc which need to be supplemented. Since you're supplementing iron zinc and iodine, and others, why not also supplement with a known dose of vit A instead of allowing companies to target poor people in the developing world. And, yes, poor people in the developing world do need protecting. The companies selling multivitamins as cures for AIDS, or Nestlé aggressively pushing formula milk, sometimes as better than breast milk, show that there are some companies who put profit above human lives.

http://irinnews.org/Report/73039/SOUTH-AFRICA-Quackery-hinde...

http://www.badscience.net/category/matthias-rath/

http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/nestle-baby-...

"We've got a new variety of rice. It solves a problem we have right now."

"We can't allow it to replace any of our normal rice crop, because it doesn't also solve several other problems."

There's no protection here.

It doesn't solve the problem. It partially solved a problem, but introduced significant risk.

It partially solves vitamin A deficiency, but we didn't know how well until better tests had been done.

It also carries risks.

* Monsanto were including terminator genes or prosecuting farmers for re-using seed that didn't have terminator genes. After intervention by orgs like WFP and WHO Monsanto agreed not to use terminator genes and agreed to allow farmers to collect and reuse seed. This one rice product has 70 patents from 30 different organisations. At the time the WHO and WFP were objecting the licencing situation was unclear.

* Vitamin A is toxic in overdose. So, if people are getting vitamin A from rice you need to re-formulate your micronutrient supplement products to lower the vitamin A content. That means you now have two versions (one with and one without vitamin A) (because the rice can't be used everywhere) which complicates the entire chain from manufacture to end user supply.

Do you reformulate your micronutrient supplement to compensate for your varied intake of Vitamin A/B/X/Y every day?

A quick read through the article seems to indicate that a lot of the opposition to it is due to the fact that it is a patented crop, and will no longer be grown by locals.

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