首页
登录
职称英语
For farmers hoping for a healthy harvest, the best place to turn for help the
For farmers hoping for a healthy harvest, the best place to turn for help the
游客
2025-04-26
29
管理
问题
For farmers hoping for a healthy harvest, the best place to turn for help these days is the Monsanto Corp. One of the world’s leading biotechnology companies and lately a pioneer in genetically engineered seeds--Monsanto has been incorporating flashy traits like herbicide and pest resistance into everything from canola to corn. But such super crops don’t come cheap. Farmers pay a premium for Monsanto seeds, and to make sure they keep paying, the company requires them to sign an agreement promising not to plant seeds their crops produce. If farmers want the same bountiful harvest next year, they must return to the company for a new load of seeds.
While this arrangement makes sense for Monsanto, it works only if farmers honor it--something that’s difficult to police in the U. S. and almost impossible in the developing world. Now, however, Monsanto hopes to enforce biologically what it cannot enforce contractually. With the help of clever genes currently in development, future Monsanto crops may be designed with a new feature in mind: sterility (不育). No sooner will the company’s plants mature than the seeds they carry, will lose the ability to reproduce.
From Monsanto’s point of view, the set of new genes--which others have nicknamed Terminator--is a perfectly legitimate way to protect their intellectual-property rights. Not everybody agrees.
Let the new science take hold, opponents ware darkly, and farmers could find themselves coming to Monsanto, seed cup in hand, paying whatever the company demands before they can plant that season’s crop. Worse still, some doomsday stories suggest, pollen (花粉)from Terminator plants could drift with the wind like a toxic cloud, cross with ordinary crops or wild plants, and spread from species to species until flora all around the world had been suddenly and irreversibly sterilized.
No serious scientist thinks anything so disastrous will come to pass. For Monsanto, however, with a technology in its pocket and a fight on its hands, the situation is about as grim as it can get- at least in terms of public relations. "From a marketing perspective, it’s pathological (病态的).
This is a question of who controls the seeds of life." [br] Before Terminator, farmers ______.
选项
A、are required to buy new load of seeds every year
B、axe often caught by the police replanting the seeds
C、can replant the seeds under the permission from Monsanto
D、obey the agreements signed with Monsanto
答案
B
解析
在Monsanto发明新品种Terminator之前,第二段提到it works only if farmers honor it—something that’s difficult to police in the U.S.,表明农民们并未按照协议重新购买种子,而是留原来植物的种子,这使得美国警察很苦恼。
转载请注明原文地址:http://tihaiku.com/zcyy/4054309.html
相关试题推荐
Healthyguiltisawarningsignalthateithersomethingdangerousisaboutto
Healthyguiltisawarningsignalthateithersomethingdangerousisaboutto
Healthyguiltisawarningsignalthateithersomethingdangerousisaboutto
Healthyguiltisawarningsignalthateithersomethingdangerousisaboutto
Healthyguiltisawarningsignalthateithersomethingdangerousisaboutto
Healthyguiltisawarningsignalthateithersomethingdangerousisaboutto
Healthyguiltisawarningsignalthateithersomethingdangerousisaboutto
Forfarmershopingforahealthyharvest,thebestplacetoturnforhelpthe
Forfarmershopingforahealthyharvest,thebestplacetoturnforhelpthe
Forfarmershopingforahealthyharvest,thebestplacetoturnforhelpthe
随机试题
ThecasualtiesfortherivalMuslimmilitiaswere[br][originaltext]Tank
Someparentsareonlyconcerned______theirchildren’sgradesinstudies.A、ofB、a
FormanyyearsafterheformedhisTheoryofRelativity,AlbertEinsteinvis
[originaltext]Wouldyouliketohaveacupofcoffee?[/originaltext][originalt
Travelers【T1】______intotwocategories:thosewhomakelistsandthosewhod
流动性风险是一类比较特别的风险,下列属于流动性风险管控手段的有()。A.现
直接写药物正名,或炒制时即付炒炭的是A.知母 B.艾叶 C.百部 D.香附
良心在护理行为过程中能起到A.选择作用 B.评价作用 C.否定作用 D.监
按《岩土工程勘察规范》(GB50021—2001)(2009年版),在评价水和
()是以财务报表中的某一总体指标为100%,计算其各组成部分占总体指标的百分
最新回复
(
0
)