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Date: | Wed, 26 Apr 1995 02:29:00 EST |
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> The US government has plunked billions into NASA over many decades. I
> recognize that this research was principally fueled by political and
> military considerations but, today we enjoy an enormous array of consumer
> goods whose origins came from publicly funded research (ps. lets not
> forget the Internet we are using right now, and the chips inside the very
> computers we use right now!).
>
> In the agricultural field, we can use the celebrated example of canola.
> The primary world producers of rapeseed were Poland and India. Then, in
> the seventies, Agriculture Canada unveiled this marvelous new crop called
> Canola after years of breeding. These studies were publicly funded and
> as such, Canadian farmers had ready access to this crop. Today, Canada
> is the largest canola seed and oil producer in the world, which has
> become a billion dollar industry. I question whether farmers
> collectively (and the numerous small prairie communities they live in)
> would have benefited equally when Canola would have been introduced
> initially by a multinational.
>
> In today's environment of government cutbacks, reductions in
> publicly-funded research is inevitable and also needed. The process will
> hopefully identify research priorities, but I for one believe public
> -funded research has its place and future.
>
> P. van Westendorp [log in to unmask]
> Provincial Apiculturist
I truley love moments like this - when truth gets in the way of opinion.
Here I sit with my conservative out look on government, prattling on
about how I don't want my tax dollars to be spent on areas that should
be left to the private sector. And then I hear myself reviewing the
statement made by someone last week about: ~when the current miticide
is no longer is effective and there isn't enough money to be made to recoupe
the R&D of the next generation, what justifies going any further.
So who takes the responsibility to serve the public good when there
is no first generation $ to be made?
The implicit is that my tax dollars should be spent here. But who has
the wisdom.
David Crawford
Pinole, Ca.
[log in to unmask]
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