Activists blame scientists, GMOs for dying iconic Italian olive trees, block GM solution
http://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2015/09/22/activists-blame-dying-iconic-italian-olive-trees-on-pro-gmo-plot-block-gm-solution/
The olive tree is one of Italy’s two national trees. Images are easily evoked of olive-oil infused cuisine, and rolling acres of sun-drenched orchards, striped with row after row of often century-old olive trees.
Now, in Southern Italy at least, at least one million of those iconic olive trees are dying. While scientists have worked on determining a cause, certain anti-GMO groups have pointed to genetic modification experiments and the Italian government has been investigating the scientists themselves as culprits.
Ironically, anti-GMO activists may have eliminated one promising solution to the Xylella outbreak just a year before it was discovered. Since 1982, scientists had been working on various ways to genetically engineer resistance to fungal and bacterial infections in olive trees, including growing test trees in Italy. In 2012, the Italian government ordered these new strains of trees destroyed, to comply with a law banning field research on genetically engineered plants.