GMOs significantly increase crop yields and are helping feed a growing world population. I think most of the world is willing to take the risk of a few genes getting loose for the benefit of keeping the world fed.
Actually, the two biggest benefits of GMOs should lead to their support by environmentalists; the fact that most environmentalists oppose GMOs, without knowing anything about the science in my experience, show their opposition is religious rather than rational. The two benefits are 1) because of their higher yields, less land need be cultivated, letting much go "back to nature", and 2) GMOs mostly need less cultivation, which means less fuels for tractors and less transportation for fertilizers, and less requirements for many pesticides.
That's all perfectly true until something wipes out your monoculture, then it is a bit of a problem.
Too many eggs in a single basket is always a dangerous strategy, it will work perfectly for a long time and then one day you lose all your eggs. That's only a matter of time.
Could you please point out examples where GMO crops have been wiped out because of monoculture? I have yet to see any examples and yet people continue to use that argument. (Serious question, I would love to see more info on this issue!)
That is exactly the problem, this will work until it fails. Score to date: 0.
But we do have examples of such crop failures due to monocultures in 'regular' agriculture. All we have with regards to a GMO problem is speculation and a hope that it will never happen.
The only instance that I'm familiar with that shows a little bit of what the risks are is a south african incident where farmers lost up to 80% of their GMO corn crops.
Hem... maybe I am mistaken but most gmos are not to increase yield, better taste or better nutritional qualities.
Usually, if we look only at the ones who are actually available on the market, is to enable the use of mass herbicide or resists specific pests. A lot of them look more motivated by marketing factors to create vendor lock-in.
I see GMOs in food as a temporary escape for monocultures. Ultimately I think we'll need to abandon this practice.
