In plants, GM is used to enhance productivity by making crops more resistant to herbicides and pests, thereby increasing the yield of the crops. A chance mutant grape with no seeds was bred to produce seedless grapes now available in our shops and supermarkets. For example, humans have always selected cows with the highest milk yield and bred from these to produce herds with good milk production. Pro-GM campaigners argue that humans have been вЂgenetically modifyingвЂ™ organisms for thousands of years, albeit without knowledge that the favourable traits they were selecting for were determined by genes. Rather, it is the conscious selection for desirable traits. Selective breeding is a form of genetic modification which doesnвЂ™t involve the addition of any foreign genetic material (DNA) into the organism. The difference between GM and selective breeding. This plant expresses the new gene in all its cells. In plants, a gene is injected into a single cell that is grown from a seed into a plant. In animals, a gene is inserted into an embryo, modifying the genome to manufacture the product of this new gene. This produces a transgenic organism, one that expresses a foreign gene. It is the insertion of a gene into an organism, altering the genetic makeup. GM provides a way of expressing desirable characteristics in an organism that otherwise would not display them. This article will provide an outline of GM, its uses in medicine and agriculture, and will help explain the issues surrounding the GM debate in New Zealand. What are the environmental risks of GM crops? Is it ethical to exploit animals for human benefit? Opponents believe that GM will damage the clean, green image of New Zealand as well as damage the economy, and there are numerous ethical issues to consider. It underlies the concept of transgenics, in which an organism is modified to incorporate new genes that lead to new characteristics, such as the production of proteins for human health, or the expression of a gene for herbicide resistance in plants, to name just two applications. Genetic modification (GM) is the alteration of the genome of a plant or animal by the addition of new genetic material.

How to selectively breed plants