[Saya]

Originally Posted by Raptor

Sorry I may not have been clear, I wasn't disputing water or fertiliser, just pesticide. The hybrids are supposed to require less of that. And yeah, they seem to be a trade off of reproductive ability and high price against yield.

Supposed to, and yet they come previously treated with it, so they don't even have a choice if they want thiram or not, despite the fact they might not have the safetly equipment for it, and Monsanto sells pesticides, its in their best interest that the seeds aren't that robust.

You'd need to know how much pesticide the Monsanto seeds require, and compare that to how much pesticide is currently used in Haiti to arrive at that conclusion. Depending on the seed and local pests, the hybrid seeds might need less treating than the standard ones.

It doesn't actually say that there, it provides a value for the mass/area of pesticides in Haiti, but not any value to compare it to:



I wouldn't be surprised if you were correct though, if they don't have much money it would make sense that they use less fertiliser.

Sorry, read the chart wrong, but in comparison to Canada:

http://earthtrends.wri.org/pdf_libra...gr_cou_124.pdf

Canada on average uses 633 kg of pesticides per ha of cropland, compared to Haiti's 23, and 60% of our food is GMO.

I don't know at what point water becomes unsuitable for agriculture, but it can be dirtier than drinking water and still be safe right? But still, seems like a more legitimate concern than the pesticides to me.

When there's a sewage problem, its a problem for crops as well. Gray water can be used for crops, but the problem is that with the sewage leakage into the water, it increases contamination of e.coli, salmonella, and other unpleasantness that we get from fecal contamination and its how cholera is spreading. Usually when our tomatoes get salmonella or e.coli its because fecal matter contaminated the water that it absorbed while growing.

I anticipate a "But we use manure for fertilizer" question, but commercial feces fertilizers are usually treated to kill the bacteria.