Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

“Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

worldsensorium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 371 posts

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#31

Post by badcppdev »

epistasis wrote: post #14

Cool and all, but there's not a single mention of "hybrid" on the entire page, which means that this is not targeted at the majority of, say, US agriculture. The general public does not understand agriculture well, and I've noticed that this misunderstanding is stronger among those that have huge huge concerns about seeds and GMOs. Hybridization is a huge benefit, one of the primary reasons to use seeds from somebody…

Hybridisation sounds like a bug not a feature. You get a benefit but with quite an extreme tradeoff.

To be clear I understand that hybrids are current best practice. But the hybrid practice seem antithetical to open source agriculture.

BTW would you say that seed producers have no motivation to develop non-hybrids that will perform as well as hybrids?

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#32

Post by bitshiftfaced »

a_bonobo wrote: post #15
boomboomsubban wrote: post #3

Do plants engineered to not produce plantable seeds have some kind of advantage, or is it purely so the seed producers can continue selling the seeds? I remember when I first heard of roundup ready crops as a child, that aspect of it completely baffled me both in why and how they would make plants not replantable.

There are no plants engineered to not produce plantable seeds. There's a long-standing moratorium on terminator genes that is generally observed. The reason why you have to rebuy your seeds from the companies is because of hybrid vigor: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterosis It's still not 100% understand how this actually happens (heaps models and results exist), but when you cross two reasonably distantly related…

I never knew about this. That's interesting. So then hybrid vigor is the reason farmers don't grow their own seeds, which contradicts the article. Obviously the OSS people would know this, so then the purpose must be more about encouraging plant diversity and allowing more companies to sell these varieties to farmers.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#33

Post by pfdietz »

cnity wrote: post #28
tptacek wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, he got sued by the patent holding company for using those seeds and then spraying them with Roundup , which would have killed off his crop had they not been the patented seeds. This is true of all the cases of people being sued for cultivating "Roundup-Ready" crops: the story they want to tell is that they were sued for cultivating seeds that accidentally wound up on their fields, but the facts established at tri…

God forbid the farmers benefit for free in some way from the unpredictable and uncontrollable pollination of a plant genetically engineered to be a highly successful cultivar. I'm not attacking you here, but the logic decided by the courts may be lawful but it is not moral (in my opinion). It's as if a noisy neighbour hosts a late night party and you happen to enjoy the music. The neighbour notices and decides to cha…

That patents genes spread lightly onto his field didn't give him a "get out of patent free card" to then concentrate those genes by spraying the field with herbicide. The courts properly understood that intent and actions matter here. The farmer was in the wrong and justice was done.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#34

Post by mschuster91 »

tptacek wrote: post #22
luoc wrote: post #20

I remember, there was a case where a farmer grew patented plants on his field. They spread to his neighbours field who then got sued by the patent holding company for not licensing that plant. My memory is a bit fuzzy here but you get the idea. Now, how about reversing that? Think of a GPL-like licensed plant that makes all derived plants also inheriting that license. Legally poisoning the binary distribution format…

No, he got sued by the patent holding company for using those seeds and then spraying them with Roundup , which would have killed off his crop had they not been the patented seeds. This is true of all the cases of people being sued for cultivating "Roundup-Ready" crops: the story they want to tell is that they were sued for cultivating seeds that accidentally wound up on their fields, but the facts established at tri…

So what? I should be able to do whatever the fuck I want on my field as long as I don't use pesticides or processing that has been banned by law, without anyone being allowed to sue me for that.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#35

Post by pfdietz »

mschuster91 wrote: post #34
tptacek wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, he got sued by the patent holding company for using those seeds and then spraying them with Roundup , which would have killed off his crop had they not been the patented seeds. This is true of all the cases of people being sued for cultivating "Roundup-Ready" crops: the story they want to tell is that they were sued for cultivating seeds that accidentally wound up on their fields, but the facts established at tri…

So what? I should be able to do whatever the fuck I want on my field as long as I don't use pesticides or processing that has been banned by law, without anyone being allowed to sue me for that.

He did something that only made sense if it were deliberate and intentional violation of the patent. Intent matters.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#36

Post by imtringued »

a_bonobo wrote: post #15
boomboomsubban wrote: post #3

Do plants engineered to not produce plantable seeds have some kind of advantage, or is it purely so the seed producers can continue selling the seeds? I remember when I first heard of roundup ready crops as a child, that aspect of it completely baffled me both in why and how they would make plants not replantable.

There are no plants engineered to not produce plantable seeds. There's a long-standing moratorium on terminator genes that is generally observed. The reason why you have to rebuy your seeds from the companies is because of hybrid vigor: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterosis It's still not 100% understand how this actually happens (heaps models and results exist), but when you cross two reasonably distantly related…

What's nefarious is being coerced to take on foreign debt to buy these seeds and then watching the country fall apart because the food is for domestic consumption and not for export, which means there will be a trade deficit as the seed exporter is not obliged to import products from your country (which violates Say‘s Law that so many people seem to hang onto). So your only option is to send all the bright people in your country to the seed exporting country so they can earn domestic currency so that your country can afford basic food production.

You can then chalk all of this up to corruption and incompetence and government mismanagement even though it is quite literally just a trade deficit that could be solved by having the other country import your products. This is why Keynes suggested his Bancor system, because it gets two countries to fix their trade imbalances instead of pointing fingers and starting a blame game that helps nobody.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#37

Post by ed25519FUUU »

Article really lacks specifics. The reason so much of the USA grows “patented” seeds is because they’re created specifically to be sprayed with herbicide and not die. There’s no alternative to to patented seeds without making fundamental changes to agriculture practices.

Hybrid seeds are also different than open-pollinated in that the children do not grow true to parent. Even if we removed the patents, they wouldn’t be valuable without a way to create them again (using two specific parents).

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#38

Post by randomdata »

mschuster91 wrote: post #34
tptacek wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, he got sued by the patent holding company for using those seeds and then spraying them with Roundup , which would have killed off his crop had they not been the patented seeds. This is true of all the cases of people being sued for cultivating "Roundup-Ready" crops: the story they want to tell is that they were sued for cultivating seeds that accidentally wound up on their fields, but the facts established at tri…

So what? I should be able to do whatever the fuck I want on my field as long as I don't use pesticides or processing that has been banned by law, without anyone being allowed to sue me for that.

As a farmer with experience growing roundup-ready crops: In order to obtain roundup-ready seeds you have to sign a contract with the vender. In said agreement, you agree to not do such things.

If you want to do whatever you want with your field, don't enter into contractual agreements where you agree to follow certain rules.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#39

Post by pfdietz »

bitshiftfaced wrote: post #32
a_bonobo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are no plants engineered to not produce plantable seeds. There's a long-standing moratorium on terminator genes that is generally observed. The reason why you have to rebuy your seeds from the companies is because of hybrid vigor: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterosis It's still not 100% understand how this actually happens (heaps models and results exist), but when you cross two reasonably distantly related…

I never knew about this. That's interesting. So then hybrid vigor is the reason farmers don't grow their own seeds, which contradicts the article. Obviously the OSS people would know this, so then the purpose must be more about encouraging plant diversity and allowing more companies to sell these varieties to farmers.

Hybrid vigor is also why eugenic nightmares are misconstructed. If some nefarious dictator wanted genetic supersoldiers, he'd breed them by hybridizing sickly inbred strains, and then prohibiting the supersoldiers from themselves reproducing.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#40

Post by adamc »

ed25519FUUU wrote: post #37

Article really lacks specifics. The reason so much of the USA grows “patented” seeds is because they’re created specifically to be sprayed with herbicide and not die. There’s no alternative to to patented seeds without making fundamental changes to agriculture practices. Hybrid seeds are also different than open-pollinated in that the children do not grow true to parent. Even if we removed the patents, they wouldn’t…

Certainly there are alternatives. The Congress could make it impossible to patent seeds or other organisms. They haven't, for reasons involving philosophy, money, and perhaps the deep corruption Citizens United has spawned. They probably won't. But alternatives do exist.
Post reply on HN