If that sort of reaction greets the idea of plants that have had single genes for things such as herbicide resistance transferred into them, what will be the response to more heavily engineered plants and animals?

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High-tech advances in improving the resilience, yield and herbicide resistance of mainstay crops have generated significant results along with a set of widely-licensed gene patents that are used in most soybean and corn crops grown in the U.S. today.

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Such sterile fields will offer little or no food or shelter to wildlife, and there is already evidence that the genes for herbicide resistance can spread to wild relatives of crop plants, leaving us with weeds resistant to weedkiller.

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Finally, Pollack's disparaging assertion that "industry ... has been peddling the same two advantages--herbicide tolerance and insect resistance--for 10 years, " is puzzling.

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However to date, the only widely used traits developed by genetic modification are herbicide tolerance and Bt insect resistance.

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Several years ago a coalition of environmental groups joined with a handful of organic farmers to sue in federal court to halt the planting of genetically engineered sugar beets modified for resistance to the herbicide glyphosate (better known by its trade name, Roundup).

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