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MC Farm Bureau members receive lecture on GMOs

PSU?professor: GMO foods have not caused anyone sickness or disease

McVEYTOWN — Tuesday night included plenty of information for some Mifflin County Farm Bureau members.

The county association held its annual spring meeting at the Penn Valley Christian Retreat in McVeytown, where it was treated to a lecture about the genetically modified organisms members farm and raise.

Troy Ott, an agriculture professor at Penn State University, gave a presentation, which began with him explaining that humans have always changed animals and plants.

“We have the breeds and sizes of dogs, horses, pigs, etc. because of modification,” Ott, who is an animal reproductive expert, said. “When we started we didn’t know what we were doing, but we knew what we wanted.”

Ott stressed that GMO foods have had no documented cases of causing sickness or disease in anyone.

“The industry stresses safety, everything is geared toward safety,” he said. “Each GMO before being put on the market, is evaluated for risk and benefits.”

He said for farmers and society, the major changes include: reduction in pesticides being used; increase in yield from crops and animals; and an increase in farmers’ earnings and overall income.

Ott said in the case of plants, some have been modified to get rid of the poisons they naturally developed at one point.

Over the past several years, Ott said scientists have learned how to find precise points of genes in a DNA strand and can now change just those portions of the DNA.

“Scientists just don’t do this,” he said. “Plants do this naturally.”

He said all scientists have done, is watch what plants do on their own and reproduce that on a larger scale.

“By watching plants, we have discovered things that benefit humans,” Ott said. “We have learned how to help fix diseases, like blood diseases.”

Ott said animal modifications have also benefited the human race.

“We are projected to add 3 billion people to the world,” he said. “We as farmers, and race, have to find a way to feed 3 billion more people in just 30 to 35 years.”

In some ways, animal and plant modification has already shown it can produce larger animals. One example of this, Ott said, was for the AquaAdvantage salmon. He said by adding one extra salmon gene to this type of salmon, it grows bigger and faster than normal salmon.

“This could take a strain off of our wildlife fisheries, that are over fished,” he said. “The only difference? AquaAdvantage salmon have one extra salmon gene, that is it.”

This is also the case in some plants that have genes being added to help make them flood and drought resistant.

“Increasing a plant’s resistance to drought and flood, could help in countries that experience more of those things,” Ott said. “That could help in third world countries to make the living conditions better.”

Ott also said it could help with the safety of farmers in some cases. An example he gave was adding or changing the gene in cows to eliminate horns, which would make it safer for the farmer but also for the animal.

After Ott gave his presentation, Tim Goss, president of Mifflin County Farm Bureau, spoke about membership. He said the county has 425 members, but has not yet reached their goal of membership for the year. However, he said the number of members is strong.

Others from the county and state organization were given a chance to speak as well.

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