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Article: BT CORN PRODUCER TAKES PROACTIVE APPROACH TO CONCERNS
- Article from:
- BT Catalyst
- Article date:
- March 1, 1997
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1997 North Carolina Biotechnology Center. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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In 1996, corn growers in the United States and Canada for the first time planted commercial quantities of transgenic Maximizer corn developed by Ciba Seeds (now Novartis). Maximizer hybrids contain a single gene from the common soil bacterium Bacillus thuringensis, or Bt, that gives the corn built-in protection against the European corn borer, a pest that has been difficult to control by conventional methods and costs U.S, corn growers up to $1 billion annually in yield losses.
Maximizer and its KnockOut technology have gained regulatory approval from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Food and Drug Administration following ...