Harvest of Fear, Viewing Set

Dr Erwin
1. What did the Earth Liberation Front do to Catherine Ives’ biotechnology lab at
Michigan State? Why?

2. Could physical barriers or pesticides stop the Papaya Ring Spot Virus from
destroying Papaya trees? Who were the Gonsalves couple? What is a gene gun?
From where was the gene taken to make papaya plants resistant to the Ring Spot
Virus?

3. By splicing a gene from a firefly into a tobacco seed what did scientists hope to
produce?

4. Why was Monsanto interested in this area of biotechnology? Who were the
customers for this new technology?

5. What problem did Gerald Tumbleson have? What was his problem with
pesticides on his field? What was BT? What did Monsanto scientists do with it?

6. What crop is the world’s #1 user of pesticides?

7. Within a couple of years what had happened to the majority of soybean and cotton
and 1/3 of all corn planted in the US?

8. By 1996 how were grain handlers treating GM crops? What does GMO stand
for?

9. Were consumers aware of the development of GM crops? What was Jeremy

Rifkin interested in doing? When caused the GM debate actually to begin?

10. How did Europeans generally respond to the introduction of GM foods? Who
was receiving the benefits from the use of GM foods?

11. What were the terms of the ban Europeans placed on GM foods?

12. What percentage of Americans thought that they were eating GM foods?

13. Have GM foods been proven safe? How are risks minimized? How have GM
foods been tested? What does establishing ‘substantial equivalence’ between a
natural and a GM strain of plant allow you NOT to do?

14. Have human beings (prior to 1980) ever eaten the proteins we receive from GM
foods?

15. How long has the research and testing of GM foods been going on?

16. Why does the Union of Concerned Scientists believe that GM foods deserve
‘special scrutiny’? Are GM foods allowed to be labeled?
Harvest of Fear, Viewing Set
Dr Erwin

17. What was Starlink – who invented it? What was the difference between Starlink
and regular corn? Did the FDA approve it for human foods – for what use did
they approve it? Do most farmers separate genetically engineered corn from
regular corn?

18. When Friends of the Earth tested random foods did any of the foods with corn
ingredients have Cry9C, the potentially dangerous gene, in them? Which one? Is
the absence of evidence necessarily an absence of harm in the case of GM foods?

19. What did Aventis do with Starlink? Where else in the world was Starlink found?

20. Is our food natural even when it comes from traditionally bred strains? Can foods
and vegetables be considered genetically modified through traditional methods?

21. In what food are glyco-alkoloids found? Through traditional breeding methods is
it possible to produce toxic potatoes and celery?

22. What is one thing recombinant genetic modification technologies can do that can
not be done by traditional breeding methods? What are these life forms called?
What was one experiment of this sort proposed but not carried out?

23. Is it possible to patent genes and gene sequences? About how many companies
own the seeds of the food we depend upon? Who owned 28% of biotechnology
patents and had paid 7 billion dollars developing these strains?

24. What plant is found at the edge of most cornfields in the US? What did John
Losey discover happened to monarch catepillars when exposed to BT corn
pollen?