Collegiate Times

The environmental movement has left an undeniable impact on our world and shows no signs of slowing down.

With growing political clout that reaches as far up as the White House, environmentalism has become a powerful force, and in the past decades it has brought many positive changes. It has made people more aware of how they impact the planet and how their actions will shape the future for the next generation.

Environmentalism has also helped push technology to become more efficient and clean. However, there is one area where the environmental movement has faltered and has led to many deaths all over the world. That area is food.

The past 100 years have been special for our civilization. Technology and invention have given mankind an abundance of food the likes of which we've never enjoyed before. Most of the industrialized world doesn't have to worry about famine and malnutrition. Getting food is as easy as a trip to the local grocery store. We owe this abundance to many advances, but the two that have contributed most are genetically modified crops and the use of petrochemical fertilizers and pesticides. Yet, even as these advances give us so much food, they are demonized by segments of the environmental movement.

Tampering with genetics in food is nothing new. Human beings have been breeding crops and animals for millennia. The difference today is that with biotechnology it is possible, in theory, to cross all natural barriers and put genes in organisms that wouldn't otherwise be viable. This advancement allows scientists to make any number of genetic modifications, and this is what has got environmentalists up in arms.

Genetically modified crops have gained a reputation as being unnatural and unsafe despite exhaustive testing and refinement.

Some go so far as to call them "Frankenfoods" and claim they're harmful products of big corporations who just pass these products off to the public to make a quick buck.

This, of course, is a gross exaggeration. These products are rigorously tested by the FDA, EPA and USDA and have a solid success rate.

It is estimated that nearly 70 percent of the food we consume has some element of genetically modified food in it, so there's a good chance we've all eaten some. It hasn't killed us yet, but the environmentalists aren't convinced. In an effort to get away from the so-called evils of genetically modified food, many environmentalists encourage organic gardening methods.

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