Reader Comments on the
Letter to Secretary of
Agriculture Dan Glickman
THE FULL TEXT of the Letter to Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman, by Robert L. Forster, Professor of Plant Pathology
------------------------------
Byrd Curtis - 09:15am Jul 16, 1996 EDT (#1 of 2)
For Bob Forster:
Your letter to Secretary
Glickman is well done and most sensible. Lets hope it results in
some positive actions to alleviate the KB situation. Byrd
William Brown - 10:23pm Jul 16, 1996 EDT (#2 of 2)
Bob, thankyou. Many of us backed off pushing the same message. None of us want to hurt our own wheat industries. But as plant pathologists we do have a problem. In my first note to the Pacific Divison as it's current president, I attempted to address this problem. I am going to repeat my comments here in support of your thoughts and maybe serve as a call to do something other than talk!
"You do not have to be a small grain or smut worker to have an interest or opinion on Karnal bunt. The political, economic and ethical aspects of the Karnal bunt situation make it relevant to all plant pathologists. I urge you to tune in and see what is happening.
There is a valid question of where does APS as a professional organization of plant pathologists stand on this issue. Are we going to go farther than having a symposium? Are we by our silence condoning the quarantine and eradication approach being pursued by our government? What are our ethical responsibilities as plant pathologists if we disagree with the quarantine and eradication approaches underway?
One responder to the symposium stated that yes, he realized it was not going to work but if we changed our approach now we would loose our credibility! Is standing by and not saying anything protecting our credibility? Or have we by our inaction already compromised our credibility along with our science?
As I noted above, this symposium and the political, economic and ethical issues involved goes farther than just one disease in one crop. I would hope that all of you that feel you have a stake in our science tune in on the symposium ( when I last looked on July 6, only about 65 people had logged on), stand up and be counted.
We as a professional society broke significant ground when we became the first and to date, the only, society (agriculturally oriented professioanl society) to pass a resolution on a critical world wide issue (world population) . We have a scientific and ethical responsibility to not only address this issue (KB) but to take a stand.
© Copyright 1996 by the American Phytopathological Society