Neoluddites Launch Campaign Against Biotech Trees

Plantations of fast-growing trees occupying about
7
percent of the world’s forest area could supply humanity with
all the wood and paper products we need. In other words, shifting
to aboreal agriculture would spare land for natural forests to grow
where they would shelter biodiversity. Now some biotech companies
have created a variety of eucalyptus that is genetically enhanced
to resist
frost-damage. They have applied to the U.S. Department of
Agriculture seeking approval to grow them on plantations in
southeastern United States. As I
reported earlier:

Eucalyptus grows very fast and its wood is used to produce pulp
and paper. It produces about
17 tons of wood per acre per year and is harvested after seven
years. Natural hardwood forests produce about two tons of wood per
year and are harvested after 40 years of growth. In addition, the
biotech eucalyptus is engineered to produce no pollen or seeds so
that it cannot escape into the wild.

Naturally, Neoluddite environmentalists are against it. From the

STOP GE Trees campaign press release:

“We have tried to ban GE trees globally through various bodies
of the United Nations, and now groups are coordinating
internationally to stop any and all applications to legalize GE
trees,” stated Winfridus Overbeek, Brazil-based Coordinator of the
World Rainforest Movement and Steering Committee member for the
Campaign. “It’s crucial that these potentially disastrous trees not
be commercially released because the health and viability of entire
forest ecosystems and the communities who depend on them will be at
risk.”

Yes, the health and viability of entire forests are at risk; not
from planting biotech trees, but from this know-nothing
anti-technology campaign.

Disclosure: One of the members of the STOP GE Trees
neoluddite coalition, Global Justice Ecology Project, has already
denounced
me for my pro-biotech tree article, “Science,
Not Mysticism, Will Save the American Chestnut.”