The CEO of the company, Ido Margalit, says that every single trait currently found in the traditional cannabis plant has now been patented.
The genetically modified food experiment has continued on without clear, common sense text based labeling for decades since it was first introduced without our consent in the mid-1990s, kicking off with the failed “FlavrSavr” tomato experiment.
Since then, GMOs have become commonplace in the American diet at a time where chronic diseases have become rampant in roughly 60 percent of the population.
While Monsanto, its parent company Bayer, and other GMO (genetically modified organism) producing companies have continued to insist that their products are “safe” due to controversially obtained government safety proclamations, a growing chorus of voices has raised safety concerns with these products, in large part because of their unnatural creation in a laboratory setting.
Most foods and plants have yet to be genetically modified, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be in the near future, as companies have an awful lot of money to gain simply by splicing the genes of various plants and slapping patents on them for the purposes of profiting, much like pharmaceutical companies do with drugs derived from natural plants.
Now, one of the most healing medicinal plants in the history of the world is in the process of being genetically modified, after it was announced that an Israeli company has secured the patent for medical cannabis seeds and is planning to move ahead with a technology that has been banned throughout Europe.
Israeli Company Secures Patent for Editing Medical Cannabis Seeds
According to a report from the website CTech, a technology news site by Calcalist, Israel’s leading financial daily, the company CanBreed has officially secured a patent for editing medical cannabis seeds, and plans to use it to create genetically modified cannabis using the controversial gene editing technology known as CRISPR.
Products using this technique are banned throughout the European Union, where the technology, which allows sciences to easily swap genes in a laboratory and essentially “play God” with our plants and food, was recently classified as a genetically modified organism.
The obtainment of the patent makes CanBreed the first company to hold a license for genetic editing technology in a cannabis product.
The new technology will allow the company to supply farmers with “cannabis varieties for improved agronomic traits,” the website said.
While the development is already being hailed as a winning proposition for the medical industry and the consumer, others caution that this technology has not been tested for long term safety, and also that genetically engineered crops have been a disaster in many ways, including the rapid growth of glyphosate-based pesticides in our food, air and water.
Concerns about the use of intellectual property also abound, as the company now owns patents on essentially all of the “traits” that have made cannabis one of the most potent healing plants in the world for centuries.
“We have patented all the traits in cannabis, like disease resistance,” said Ido Margalit, CanBreed’s CEO.
The company will be banned from selling its GMO cannabis seeds in Europe for the time being, but an arrival on U.S. shores is highly likely, the website intimated.
And as usual, the GMO cannabis will likely not be labeled, a major potential problem for anyone who hopes to get better through the prescribed use of this timeless healing plant.
“As long and it’s legal we will supply the seeds,” Margalit said according to the article.
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About Nick Meyer
