Photos courtesy of Boulder County Parks and Open Space
Boulder County Parks & Open Space official Robert Alexander with two ears of non-GMO corn. The fact that pollen from a blue corn plant pollinated some of the kernels of an ear from a yellow corn plant informed how officials determined the minimum buffer distance between growers of GMO and non-GMO corn, says Alexander.
In 2000, public officials in Boulder County, Colo., were faced with calls from organic farmers, environmentalists, and others to ban genetically modified (GM) crops. GM opponents worried that pollen drifting from transgenic corn fields could "contaminate" their organic cousins.
County commissioners weren't comfortable with an outright ban, but they decided to appoint a panel that would draw up a "good neighbor" policy to help organic and GM growers peacefully coexist on the county's large stretch of public land. Scientists at Colorado State University conducted a pollen drift ...
