Golden Rice Issue

Golden Rice is genetically modified rice that contains beta carotene to provide vitamin A in areas where vitamin A is not as substantial. Golden Rice was created to battle Vitamin A defficiency in areas that are devastated by poverty, look at the image below to see the areas. One of the major downside from the lack of Vitamin A is blindness.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_A_deficiency

However, organizations or people have argued that golden rice is not the right method to battle the lack of Vitamin A. They argue that they should diversify the crop selection, companies will take the control of crop production away from farmers, and that adults and children have to consume large portions of golden rice in order to fulfill their need for Vitamin A.
My thoughts on this is that it has the possibility of doing good and helping countries that are in need, however I support the search for more natural methods to battle vitamin A deficiency.

Do you believe that golden rice is the right method to battle vitamin A deficiency in areas that are in poverty?

http://online.sfsu.edu/rone/GEessays/goldenricehoax.html
http://www.agbioforum.org/v10n3/v10n3a04-unnevehr.htm
http://www.organicconsumers.org/patent/vitaminAhoax.cfm

Why just rice ? In regions where green folage or any type of forest wouldnt it be better to diversefy the crops through gene modfication yet do it in a way where companies would not have a monopoly or make it hard for people in these countries to precure food ?

[size=12]I like the idea of trying to solve a hunger problem and find a source or nutrients for people in poverty but they should try and find more natural resources.[/h]

But what would be a Viable source of nutrituion that was also natural plus could grow in these regions of the world and provide all or most of the needes of the people in these regions.

Brown rice is more nutritious than white rice. However, there is a squick factor with brown rice. People will refuse to buy brown rice, for the same reason they won't buy and eat a 2 headed chicken. Seriously, ask any asian on this board if they prefer white rice to brown rice for every day meals.

As a result, nearly all rice is well milled into whiteness. The percentage of brown rice that makes it to markets is probably less than 1% of white rice. Brown rice usually ends up being eaten by the health food enthusiasts rather than the general population.

Yellow rice? FUCK THAT.

You will have to spend billions upon billions of dollars to re-educate the couple of billion of people that eat rice to accept yellow rice for the next two generations. That sort of money would probably be better spent to find OTHER ways of relieving hunger than lining the pockets of GMO corporations.

Heck, I'm not even sure health food enthusiasts will touch yellow rice with a 10 foot pole. They're usually the ones that decry genetic modified food, after all.

It doesn't help that the amount of vitamin A in this rice is miniscule. If I read it right, its around 1 to 2% of the daily recommended amounts.

So, spend trillions of dollars in convincing people to eat rice that isn't that effective in the first place vs spending the same amount of money on other food? The latter is obviously the better choice.

I'm all for genetic engineered food, but this is just completely misunderstands the people who eat rice in the first place. If they could make this as white as normal rice (impossible, because it is vitamin A that causes the yellow coloring in the first place, the same reason why carrots are yellow/orange), MAYBE. But then it smacks into the problem of sterile GMOs -- farmers can't reseed these, and it is illegal to try to do so due to patents. THAT DOES NOT HELP POOR COUNTRIES.

This could be used for a short-term solution, but finding a more natural way to solve this would offer better solution.

Again, it takes time to diversify crops and things you said earlier, so, a country could use that method and meanwhile, until the project is done and ready to go, they can use golden rice.

"Even if golden rice is successfully developed, many question whether it is
an efficient use of scarce public funds. An educational project in
Bangladesh begun in 1993 by the UN¹s Food and Agriculture Organization
has helped landless families develop home gardens with vitamin A-rich crops
such as beans and pumpkins. This successful program grew to involve at least
three million people by 1998. A public education campaign in Thailand that
utilized radio, posters and street theater taught farmers the advantages of
growing the ivy gourd, another good source of vitamin A. A project in the
Jiangsu province of China has helped spawn a huge increase in
rice/aquaculture systems, which resulted in 10-15% increases in rice yields
and, more importantly, 750 kg of fish per hectare of rice paddy. The fish
also helped reduce the incidence of malaria by consuming mosquito larvae."
http://www.organicconsumers.org/patent/vitaminAhoax.cfm

I believe that genetically modified food like golden rice is the exact correct thing to do when we are battling malnutrition across the world.

The problem is that people in general have a problem with genetically modified food. The reason for this is in part because one of the most notorious companies that produces said food is Monsanto.

Monsanto is a pretty evil company that does some pretty evil shit. They'll patent seeds and force farmers to buy from them if the farmers are going to produce a product similar to their own. IF the farmers don't buy the seeds, Monsanto will place a crop near theirs, and when wind cross pollinates, they send investigators into the area to see if the farmer's seeds developed their own patented seeds' characteristics. If so, Monsanto sues the fuck out of the farmers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto#Seeds

http://www.triplepundit.com/2012/02/farmers-sue-monsanto-gmo-patents/

However, unfair business practices aside, the fact of the matter is that GMO crops are perfectly safe, and as evil as Monsanto is, it's simply not good business to push products that do harm to their customers.

Any good business that wants to STAY in business...wants return customers. So why would any company produce things, know they're not safe, and sell them anyway? It can't be for money, because it would cause them to lose money when they make their customers sick. Pretty much the only reason that can be thought of for something that stupid is, "They do it because they're evil."

No, they're not maliciously evil, they're just greedy fucks.

The point is: As bad a flack as Monsanto and GMO food gets, GMO foods themselves are not only safe, have been produced for years upon years, to the point where you probably eat their products without even knowing it, but they're possibly the best solution to any malnutrition problem.

Glad im american. [Insert enough acceptable words to post this.]

It's not enough words to warrant posting here, though. If you don't have at least something essay-length and contributing to post, then don't bother posting at all.

Are we giving them the rice or teaching them how to grow it and giving them the seeds? Are they paying for it? Isn't all food some what genetically modified in nature anyways ie hybridation. Meh their choice to eat it or not.

They have to buy the rice from the organization that manufactures it so they can grow it.

Then why should they pay for seed to grow something if the WHO would send them vitamins and other meds for free if we're not willing to give it freely. I'm not sure, but you can give the shit freely and they can reap and store the seed for the next harvest and so on right. I never grew or learn rice growing 101.

Didn't they try this with southeast Asian countries with a flood water resistant strain of rice , but it tastes like rotten shit?

These are GMO plants. They don't generate seeds. They were designed so that farmers will always have to buy new seeds.