>> are you saying cane is also subject to GM?
Sorry, NO. I just couldn't remember which it was that IS commercially used, when I typed the prior post. Sugar beets only.
I see that field trials have been conducted (70 in the the USA alone).
"Commercial utilisation of GM sugar cane is possible in the near future in the USA and Brazil."
BTW, the USA doesn't seem to produce much of the global crop. This Europe-focused site thinks that more than half of the world sugarcane crop is lost due to weeds and "pests".
"By far the largest sugar cane cultivating country is Brazil, followed by India, China and Thailand. Losses due to pests and weeds are estimated at more than half of the actual yield."
P.S. In my opinion, granulated sugar is so chemically pure that it's hard to imagine anything new from the GE plant making it into the sugar. The health risk from sugar is the sugar itself!
But again, planting out hundreds of square miles of a cloned mono-crop with artificially inserted genes from bacteria may have long term environmental impacts beyond those of conventionally bred monocrops. Pure speculation at this point, unless you count wind-blown pollen (and monopolistic economic harm). I figure it is a tradeoff between RoundUp overspray or overuse, and over-spray or overuse of much worse herbicides.
