Good Old Monsanto

No one will be shocked to learn that the new type of genetic manipulation [RNA interference], generally described as “gene silencing,” is being advanced on several fronts by Monsanto. One of the targets of the technology is the varroa mite a pest which attacks bees. The mite is being implicated by some chemical companies, wishing to protect the pesticides they market, as the cause of colony collapse among bees. Monsanto’s push to use gene silencing to control the mites seems calculated to play into this thinking.

The National Honey Bee Advisory Board, in comments submitted to the EPA ahaead of the meeting, wrote, “To attempt to use this technology at this current stage of understanding would be more naïve than our use of DDT in the 1950s.” DDT wiped out untold numbers of hives when it was first used in the U.S. before the connection between the pesticides and the harm it was doing to hives (and later, to birds) was recognized.

Monsanto is also seeking regulatory approval for RNAi technology to combat the corn borer worm.

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Why is this new genetic modification of corn necessary? Because the root worm has developed a tolerance to genetically modified, Bt corn.

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A similar modification was done with wheat in the hopes of making low-carbohydrate, low sugar producing products from wheat flour that was originally genetically modified. Once the wheat has been consumed, the RNA modification is adopted into the human body and “silences” the body’s glycogen pathway. This can lead to glycogen storage disease IV, a liver disease that causing slow wasting away in adults, and death to children born with the disease often by the age of five. [...] You can read more about the genetically modified wheat and RN1 technology here.

  Planet Natural

Another reason Monsanto needs to come up with something to replace Bt corn is the latest reporting on its damaging effects to humans.