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I grew up on a citrus farm and I can tell you CAT equipment makes Apple look like an open hardware platform. Parts where unavailable to non dealers they used pa
by kls 7y ago
I grew up on a citrus farm and I can tell you CAT equipment makes Apple look like an open hardware platform. Parts where unavailable to non dealers they used patents to stop aftermarket and where hostile to hardware hackers that fixed flaws in their design. This was all while they where mechanical. I cannot imagine what it is like owning a CAT machine now that they are computerized. I know my grandfather tended to stick to Massey Ferguson and Minneapolis Molean's for that reason. We only bought CAT and Deere equipment if it was a specialty piece that could not be duplicated with an all purpose tractor like a MF or MM. Which is really CAT's bread and butter. They like the machinery that no one else produces and locking you in to support. They caught onto this long before the automotive and electronics world ever did.
On seed stock it get's even worse, if you are next to a GM farm and get cross pollinated then your stock is tainted and you have to reseed again with clean seeds that will just get tainted in the next spawn.
We did not have this problem with citrus because it is not grown from a seed, all citrus is root-stocked and then hybrid to make sweet citrus. I know it is an issue for corn and grain farmers who do not want to grow GMO crops.
- magduf 7y ago>On seed stock it get's even worse, if you are next to a GM farm and get cross pollinated then your stock is tainted and you have to reseed again with clean seeds that will just get tainted in the next spawn. I see a simple solution here when some farmer gets stung by this: some company needs to make some really cheap GM seeds which exist only for the purpose of "accidentally" tainting the GM field next door, so that the owner of that field can get a dose of their own medicine.
- dec0dedab0de 7y agoThe GM Field wouldn't be collecting the seeds anyway.
- MikeTheGreat 7y ago> On seed stock it get's even worse, if you are next to a GM > farm and get cross pollinated then your stock is tainted and > you have to reseed again with clean seeds that > will just get tainted in the next spawn. Genuine question: If your neighbor's seeds spread into your farm why do you have to reseed? Are you trying to avoid the cross pollination or are you required to do this by something/someone else?
- dec0dedab0de 7y agoNot a farmer or a Lawyer, but if you collect seeds from the tainted plants then the new plant is too close to the Patented plant, and therefore illegal for you to grow on your own.
- kls 7y agoExactly there was a case of one farmer who did not buy GM stock all of the farms around him did, the genes crossed into his stock and he was sued for not buying the stock. GM buyers are not allowed to reseed it is IP theft according to law. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2001/03/30/farmer-liable-for-growing-biotech-crops/e4d32d97-a3d8-4ab7-9f69-d49bcc88198a/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2001/03/30/f...
- fragmede 7y agoThis is why GMOs are a bad idea. The science, in and of itself, is amazing stuff. Unfortunately the science doesn't exist in a vacuum and it's the business and legal structures (globally, not just in the US) surrounding it in which GMOs are problematic. Seeds are fundamental to almost all types of farms and the fact that there are "legal intricacies" surrounding the legality of growing food using seeds on your land is bananas! (Semi-relevantly, Cavendish Bananas are another plant that aren't grown from seeds, similar to citrus.)
- kulahan 7y agoThat doesn't mean GMOs are a bad idea, it means the legalese surrounding it is.
- fragmede 7y agoThat’s certainly a reasonable position to take. Unfortunately, there’s no way to escapable the legalese, so my opinion is they are practically bad. They’re not absolutely bad, but they are under our current regime.