Genetically Modified Food Town Hall Meeting Report
About 14 concerned governors, scientists and farmers from across Canada debated the development genetically modified food Thursday afternoon at a town hall meeting organized by UBC EOSC department. Though the crowd gathered at UBC farm was small, the concerns raised were varied, ranging from worries about the health effects on human beings and the mass starvation faced by us when the GMO is abandoned.

GMOs are said to be the answer to world overpopulation and over-consumption. Nowadays, the population growth has exceeded the food that can be produced by earth. The change of DNA sequences of crops can efficiently increase the yield and quality of them. Genetically modified foods satisfy our increasing consumption to some extent. Without this biotechnology, mass starvation would likely become a reality. Moreover, crops can be genetically modified to resist diseases and further increases the yield.

The con side of the panel, however, has different opinion on GMOs. With all the benefits of genetically modified food, some uncertainties and risks cannot be neglected. The biotechnology is quite complicated that it is not well understand by the society and its long term effects on human body remains a mystery. GMOs has already been blamed for some unexpected short term health effects.

All of us agree that further research and investigation is necessary to ensure that it is safe to be consumed.

BLOG : https://blogs.ubc.ca/jessicanz/

A genetically modified organism (GMO) or genetically engineered organism is an organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques. (Wikipedia)

Genetically modified organism. (2012, March 19). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 18:29, March 21, 2012, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Genetically_modified_organism&oldid=482727235

News 1: BASF to Stop Selling Genetically Modified Products in Europe

BASF, the German chemical group has stopped selling genetically modified products including its Amflora potatoin Europe because of the lack of acceptance for this technology by many Europeans. The shut down of marketing this potato will result in great financial loss and many of related jobs will be cut in Europe from the company’s plant science unit. Even so, the company claimed that it would continue marketing its products in the rest of the world. The decision to discontinue selling genetically modified crop by BASF indicates the difficulties for the biotechnology industries in Europe, said Carel du Marchie Sarvaas, a director at EuropaBio, an industry group.

James Kanter (2012, January 12). BASF to Stop Selling Genetically Modified Products in Europe. The New York Times Retrieved from: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/17/business/global/17ihtgmo17.html?_r=1&ref=geneticallymodifiedfood#

Q1: What effect will GM crops have on the people of the world’s poorest countries?

News 2: Backing for GM food has halved since the 1990s with one in three Brits now opposed to it

A poll commissioned by one of Britain’s scientific bodies found that the public support for GM food has halved since the mid-1990s. Nowadays only 27% of Britons support the genetically modified food while it was about 75% 16 years ago. However, of the rest of 73% people, only about one-third of them fall into opposition and a majority of them suggesting that the genetically modified food is no longer of concern to them. Professor Joyce Tait, a social scientist who studies the impact of scientific advances, said there had been a move towards the middle ground, with answers often being categorized as ‘don’t know’. This, she said, could be interpreted as GM becoming less contentious.

Fiona Macrae. (2012, March 9). Backing for GM food has halved since the 1990s with one in three Brits now opposed to it. The Daily Mail Retrieved from: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2112427/Backing-GM-food-halved-1990s-Brits-opposed-it.html

Q2: What do you think of the attitude of the politicians of the Britain in this respect?
Genetically modified organism. (2012, March 19). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 18:29, March 21, 2012, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Genetically_modified_organism&oldid=482727235

The data of current and annual air quality and emissions inventory at different locations in the Lower Fraser Valley are available to the public on this website.

There are only 4 air monitoring stations in the city of Toronto, serving 2.61 million people and covering an area of about 630 km². Therefore each station serves 6.5 million people and represents 156.5 km².

The data on air quality of downtown Toronto station can be found on the website of Ontario. The average annual air quality is good in downtown Toronto according to the Air Quality Index (AQI) Categories. Summer season however, has more moderate air quality days which attributes to fine particles and ozone. On May 31 2011, the overall air quality is moderate. The air was still good during the early morning, but it became worse during the noon with the fine particulate matter level of PM2.5. Fine particulate matter in Ontario is largely made up of aerosols, elemental and organic carbon and soil. Ozone is a major component of the air pollutants of Toronto. High levels typically occur from May to September, between noon and early evening.

Reference：

(Ontario Ministry of the Environment, 2011) http://www.airqualityontario.com/reports/aqisearch.php?stationid=31103&show_day=0&start_year=2011&submitter=Get+AQI+Readings

I changed the vertical axis to the employment rate of population age 15 and older while keeping the horizontal axis as income per person and observed the distribution pattern of countries in year 2007. One of the surprising patterns I have noticed is that the employment rate of poorer developing countries like those in Africa is actually very high as most of them are sitting on the right upper portion of the graph. It is not the case that poorer countries has low employment rate, it is quite the opposite.

The cause of this paradox lies in the large population and unbalanced industrial structure of these developing countries. “The economy grew an annualized 1.4 percent in the third quarter as manufacturing and mining contracted, threatening the government’s goal to create 5 million jobs by 2020.” (Martinez 2012) factories and retailers are adding more jobs as the manufacturing boost. However, as the jobs that have been created are mainly lower level manual labors like mining and manufacturing, they are still earning little. In addition, though the economy of African countries is boosting through these years, per capita income is not able to increase significantly when we take the large population into account.

My ecological footprint is 8.3 global hectares, which means 4.6 planet earths we’d need if everyone lived like me. The shelter part of consumption has the biggest impact on my personal footprint follows by the services. I changed some of my answers to reflect someone who is less sustainability-conscious than me by increasing the consumption of packaged food and the usage of cars. These reactions yielded a 9.7 global hectares footprint. The reason of this significant footprint increase lies in the energy cost and CO2 emission while transporting packaged food and commuting by cars. One way that I could do to directly reduce my footprint is to ride public transit, carpool, ride a bike or walk to school instead of driving,

Even though broader aspects of nature conservation are frequently mentioned, little attention is given to forest-specific nature conservation. Creation of reserved and protected forests, however, is one of the important strategies to mitigate climate change today. In India, many important policies and rules governing the protection and conservation of forests are made to reduce indiscriminate diversion of forest land for non-forestry purposes since as early as 1894.

This conservation-based forest policy has prevented the loss of forest, which contributes to stabilize carbon stocks in forests, and reduce carbon dioxide emissions. “With this approach India can claim to be maintaining the baseline stocks (8.79 gtC), as well as the increment (0.96 gtC).”( Rawat 2008) Evidence showing that the forest conservation method is working is that in the year 2000, total India per capita CO₂ of equivalent emissions were roughly 10 times less than those of developed countries like USA and Germany and about half of those of developing countries.

Conservation of forest is making a positive contribution to stabilize global climate change and to promoting sustainable development. Forest management, however, could not contribute to a full but half of a wedge. A second half-wedge would be created by reforesting or afforesting in tropic or temperate zone and nonforested land.

About 14 concerned governors, scientists and farmers from acrossCanadadebated the development of biofuels Thursday afternoon at a town hall meeting organized by UBC EOSC department. Though the crowd gathered in City Council chambers was small, the concerns raised were varied, ranging from worries about biofuel transportation to its possible impacts on food prices.

The BC government opened the meeting by claiming that biofuel is an environmentally friendly substitute of fossil fuels because it reduces the emission of CO₂ and air pollutants. Also, the increasing demand of feedstock for biofuels provides new opportunities for farmers which could in turn benefit the domestic agriculture. Two scientists added that the development of biofuels helps us to meet energy needs and lower the sky-high oil price.

The con side of the panel fought back by foregrounding one of their major concerns with the globe food prices: biofuel industry may bring up food prices as crops were converted to biofuels instead of being consumed. Scientists from the other side, however, saw a different picture. They stated that agriculture by-products, food wastes and other organic materials like seaweed are recently being investigated to replace food crops as new biomass feedstock, thus the globe food price would not see a biofuel driven increase.

Another problem posed by biofuel industry, according to the con side engineers, was the cost of energy of transporting biofuels. They proposed that more renewable feedstock for biofuels and more efficient alternative energy sources were needed to release today’s energy crises.

Finally, the panel urged us to manage the amount of energy we use throughout our entire home and reduce the energy consumption to save the environment.

News 1: New Study: Biofuel From Seaweed – It’s All About The Microbes

http://earthfix.kuow.org/energy/article/new-study-biofuel-from-seaweed-its-all-about-the-m/

Seaweed is believed to be an ideal feedstock for biofuel for it grows faster and produces more biomass than corn. More importantly, it doesn’t compete with other food crops for water or farmland. Microbes are crucial in breaking down seaweed to make fuel like ethanol. A new research published in the journal Science claims that engineered microbes which can convert the sugars in seaweed into biofuel in a single step was developed by a team of researchers in Berkeley, California. These microbes could make the seaweed biofuels industry possible. Right now the company has started a pilot project to produce a few thousand gallons of ethanol from its Chile seaweed farm this year, hoping to bring seaweed biofuel to market within the next four years.

News 2: Edinburgh start-up to make whisky biofuel

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-16701335

A new company called Edinburgh Napier University’s Celtic Renewables Ltd has been formed in Edinburgh to produce biobutanol and other biofuels made from whisky by-products on an industrial scale. The main feedstocks for this fuel generating process are the two main by-products of whisky production – ‘pot ale’ and ‘draff’. The company suggested that biobutanol is user-friendly and provides more power output than the traditional bioethanol, making it desirable to be used as a direct substitute for fossil-derived fuel. The founder of Celtic Renewables considers the whisky industry to be a ripe resource for developing biobutanol while other entrepreneurs rank this program as an innovative, beneficial and environmentally friendly one.

In “GAO Confirms: Anthony Watts Is Right, UN Temperature Data Rigged To Show Warming”, Tom Harris, a Canadian executive director of International Climate Science Coalition, claims that the USHCN globe temperature data is unreliable and thus the warming trend is rigged. This statement concurs with Anthony Watts’ report on the authenticity of the U.S. surface temperature record. Anthony Watts is a American meteorologist, editor of the blog, Watts Up With That? and also a climate change skeptic.

Tom Harries made his statement base on the findings of The U.S. Government Accountability Office. The GAO found that 41% of the weather stations are placed too close to heat sources that humanly increases up the temperature measurements. This evidence is not convincing because surface temperature records collected by weather stations are far from the only indicator of globe warming. Sea level rise, increased melting rate of ice, weather balloon measurements and other evidences also account for the measured warming trend.

This article contains a fallacy: Hasty Generalization. One can not conclude the warming trend is untrue just base on surface temperature records and without taking other indicators in to consideration.

In David Orr’s speech, six new principles were proposed to replace six myths about modern education.

There is significant overlap between principle two, six and the Basic Scholarly Skills ENVR 200 expects us to learn. Both principle two and six suggests that mastering learning method is as important as course material itself. “Subject matter is simply the tool.” (Orr 1991) This idea is also being put forward by the Basic Scholarly Skills by asking us to “improve ‘our’ own process of learning”.
In addition, principle one says “all education is environmental education ” (Orr 1991). This principle carries the same idea as our Basic Scholarly Skills does. The course goal document requires us to actively seek, evaluate and differentiate information collected from a variety of media sources. One can not master a single subject without acquiring information from other fields.
Group work skills demands also desire to create an environment in which we can gather wisdom and learn from others.

However, there is not overlap between principle three, four and our course learning goal. Both principle three and four bring up that knowledge should be well applied to the real world and one cannot truly know the knowledge well before understanding the effects on real world. Our course learning goal does not clearly demonstrate the significance of applying what we have learned to real people and communities but focuses more on how to communicate environmental issues and knowledge coherently and effectively.