[aetherson]

That's not what the green revolution was. It was pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers.

While GMOs are not harmful and banning them is overall bad, they don't have nearly the same magnitude of impact on agricultural productivity as herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers.

[cyphar]

I completely disagree. Quite a lot of the work done during the Green Revolution was breeding plants that were more hardy and resilient to the environment. For instance, Norman Borlaug worked on strains of wheat that were resistant to stem rust (something that had caused starvation in Mexico several years earlier). Pesticides, herbicides, nor fertilisers help with stem rust. GMOs also allow the breeding of plants that have higher yield, which is something we need if we want to feed the world.

You also have things like Golden Rice, which help people who have vitamin A deficiencies and don't have access to vitamin A sources to be able to get vitamin A. Vitamin A deficiencies kill almost a million children under 5 each year especially in South-East Asia. It is only practical to solve this problem through GMOs. (Greenpeace also protested Golden Rice, meaning they protested against programs that can save tens of millions of children. Whether or not you hold that against them is up to you, but if they want to play the "blood on your hands" game I don't see why I shouldn't.)

To be clear; pesticides, herbicides, and fertilisers are very important to agriculture and many more people would be starving without them. But the same is true of GMOs -- they are more than just "not harmful"; they are necessary.

[kurthr]

Breeding (even hybridizing) plants is not considered GMO or all carrots, corn, and avocados would be considered the same. I'm a supporter of GMO, but directly modifying (or inserting) genes is different from selective breeding and even cloning. I don't particularly like breeding plants that are (more) tolerant of high doses of proprietary pesticides (insect=animal killers) or even herbicides, because like overusing anti-biotech at low doses for feed lot weight gain it is a recipe for eventual disaster.

[bluGill]

Yes GMO is different: unlike random chance we know exactly what genes we changed and what each does. Random chance seems to solve some problem and we never both to ask why or what the side effects might be.

[cyphar]

> Breeding (even hybridizing) plants is not considered GMO or all carrots, corn, and avocados would be considered the same.

It is a different technique, but the purpose is the same. [1] gives a good overview over why discriminating between the "more natural" genetic modification techniques and the "less natural" ones is not a reasonable middle-ground. Healthy skepticism around particular GMOs (meaning particular plants) is completely fine (and should be encouraged -- like all skepticism), but skepticism around all plants produced by a given group of techniques doesn't make much sense imo.

Regarding proprietary pesticides, there is a legitimate issue there (as there is with the patenting of biotech -- or patents in general) but it has been hijacked by anti-GMO protests making claims that farmers were sued because of cross-contamination from other farms and similarly false statements.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcbTVEr3_X4

[colah3]

Thanks for the feedback - I've updated my comment to express uncertainty.

As I understand it, a big part of the green revolution, especially initially, was Borlaug developing a strand of wheat that was resistant to many common diseases and had higher yields. This seems born out by a quick skim of his [wikipedia article](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug), although I'm sure nitrogen fertilizer, etc, also played large roles.

I don't have the time to do a deep dive right now, so I've just updated my previous comment to be uncertain.

[aetherson]

That's legit. I think that with further reading, the nuanced view is that it's both the high-yield strains of staple foods that Borlaug developed and the high-input farming style, in combination.

But my point is actually that modern GMO plants, the Monsanto ones that people are currently freaking out about, don't revolutionize yields. They improve them on the margin, but it's not another green revolution, at least so far.

[kickout]

Its mostly well accepted in plant breeding circles that the improvement in crop yields in North America in the last ~30-40 years can be 66% attributed to genetic progress (i.e higher yield, more disease/pest tolerance, better adaptation, etc.) and the remaining 33% can be attributed to agronomic factors (i.e earlier planting, better/more precise equipment, better soil/nutrient management, etc.)

[cbsmith]

Norman Borlaug would disagree with your characterization of the green revolution. Much of the Green Revolution involved the plant breeding.