In recent years, Mexican health regulators have been quietly rejecting imports of genetically modified corn seeds and related industry items.
Mexico is a major importer of genetically modified corn to the United States, accounting for about a quarter of U.S. corn exports, and more than 92 percent of the corn grown in the United States is genetically modified corn. Mexico's "ban" on genetically modified crops has caused great losses to the United States, with an annual economic loss of about five billion dollars and 30,000 jobs. The United States is naturally annoyed by Mexico's approach, threatening to use legal means to solve it if it does not change, because Mexico has joined the North American Free Trade Agreement.
In 2009, the Mexican government approved GM corn cultivation for the first time because GM corn is more resistant to drought and pests, increasing maize yields and meeting domestic demand, but at the same time stipulating that GM corn should only be grown in areas where there are no indigenous corn varieties.
Mexico's GM corn licensing order has raised concerns among some critics who say GM corn could contaminate native corn varieties and cause ecological damage.
"In the (genetically modified) soybean fields, bees become very aggressive, they do not return to the hive but die on the way back, the crop that applied glyphosate damages their internal organs, and we are concerned that not only the bees die, we cannot sell our honey, in Mexico there are about 45,000 beekeepers who collect about 56,000 tons of honey every year." Their main markets are the European Union, the United States and Canada. But EU Court of Justice judges have banned the sale of honey contaminated with unauthorized genetically modified pollen. ”
Pablo warned: "GMOs will contaminate all our species, then we will have to rely on the seeds of large companies." If we lose our native seeds, then we will have no seeds to plant. That's why we're asking the government to stop sowing GM corn and soybeans. ”
Critics like Pablo's fears are becoming a reality, and genetically modified corn has gradually replaced indigenous traditional corn varieties after being widely cultivated in Mexico, fundamentally changing the way corn is produced in Mexico, with serious impacts on farmers' cultivation methods and agroecology. Spraying glyphosate herbicides with GM maize puts local populations of ecological populations that carry valuable genetic information and unique characteristics at risk of contamination, altering and weakening their own genetic makeup, which are vital to the development of new varieties suitable for local growth.
It is increasingly recognized that the irreversible damage to biodiversity caused by the cultivation of GM maize in Mexico, where the corn originates, has been widely recognized, and protests have continued. Finally, Mexico quietly banned the cultivation of genetically modified corn in defiance of NAFTA.
Recently, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine introduced a law permanently banning the cultivation of genetically modified corn.
Recently, the media reported that the mainland launched the pilot of genetically modified corn and soybean industrialization scientific research experimental field in 2021, expanded the pilot to farmers in 2022, and further expanded the pilot scope to 20 counties in 5 provinces of Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Jilin, Sichuan and Yunnan in 2023, and arranged seed production in Gansu.
There are countless entangled things in this world, the right and wrong of GMO is particularly entangled, the planting and prohibition of genetically modified corn in Mexico is also the result of entanglement, reason eventually prevails, but this is not enough to wake up the world, there are still people who stubbornly want to take the road of Mexico again.