USDA-APHIS Announcement

The USDA is asking for public comments as it goes about updating its Biotechnology regulations.

https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aphis/ourfocus/biotechnology/sa_brs_vpm/340-peis

Biotechnology, or more importantly, the way in which we have utilized it to date has been consistently short sighted, self serving, and the powerful tools created to help in agriculture wind up being destructive to farming practices by the proliferation of herbicide tolerant weeds and insecticide tolerant bugs, and massive changes in cropping systems. During the course of the past 20 years, the landscape of farming in the United States has radically changed.

http://www.ers.usda.gov/amber-waves/2014-march/adoption-of-genetically-engineered-crops-by-us-farmers-has-increased-steadily-for-over-15-years.aspx#.Vr4OAPIrLIW

Once again, USDA data will show us just a few of the effects.

http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/1832877/err184.pdf

Others can be cited relatively to the broad adoption of a Corn/Soybean crop rotation that recently started…once again…in the past 20 years. And with the advent of being able to process massive volumes of data, we are now being able to piece together the effects of such cropping rotations.

http://www.sustainablecorn.org/About-Project/Index.html

http://www.agcensus.usda.gov/Publications/2012/Online_Resources/Highlights/Farm_Demographics/#how_many

https://profitablegrowthservices.wordpress.com/2015/08/02/the-food-chain-5/

In the interim the issue of Intellectual Property and just who owns the newly created Biotech creation is another decision that can have far reaching impact.

http://aglaw.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-surrender-of-seed-sovereignty_3.html

And as in this excerpt from Wiki on Utility Patents, we see that there can be loop holes in the how biomedical products are allowed to enter the market place:

“As a result of the new technologies and new fields from which patent applications come, the United States Supreme Court has fashioned a higher bar of utility, known as specific utility.[15]In one case, the Court found that a steroid still in development was not useful in the sense used in the patent law, because it had no defined use at the time of the application.[15]“A patent is not a hunting license,” the Court stated.[15]It is “not a reward for the search, but compensation for [the search’s] successful conclusion.”[15]This standard for utility cannot be met until a “specific benefit exists in currently available form.”[15]In In re Brana, United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has ruled that utility requirement for biomedical invention does not require formal approval by the Food and Drug Administration.[19]“

The area of Food, Farming, and Biotechnology is complicated. It holds captive the very thing each and everyone of us needs everyday….food. And while the tools can be very beneficial, the way in which we administer and interpret the rights of the developer, user and consumer must not get lost in the labyrinth of the USDA, APHIS, FDA, and EPA. All of these government departments have pieces of the process for this relatively new development in agriculture.

https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aphis/ourfocus/biotechnology?1dmy&urile=wcm%3apath%3a%2Faphis_content_library%2Fsa_our_focus%2Fsa_biotechnology%2Fsa_news%2Fct_news

https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aphis/ourfocus/biotechnology/sa_brs_vpm/ct_1_brs_vpm_home

https://www.aphis.usda.gov/biotechnology/petitions_table_pending.shtml

http://www.fda.gov/Food/FoodScienceResearch/GEPlants/default.htm

http://www.epa.gov/agriculture

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-monsanto-herbicide-weeds-idUSKBN0MR2JT20150331

And the business ramifications can be massive to the farmer, supplier, and consumer:

And companies must react to the events to stay competitive:

http://www.delawareonline.com/story/news/2016/02/02/dow-ceo-liveris-step-down-after-dupont-merger/79692632/

http://www.syngenta.com/global/corporate/SiteCollectionDocuments/pdf/presentations/investor/20160203-chemchina-offer.pdf

As we move forward in the development of such tools there must be a way to preserve the health and well being of the consumer, protect fair competition, and also protect the intellectual property of the developer. This, being the United States of America, was founded on a Constitution that protected the citizenry as well as the rights of the individual through limited government and government intervention.

http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2009/09/the-meaning-of-the-constitution

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

May we use wisdom to preserve the above words and apply them to such regulations.

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