In response to the letter Let us have cheaper rice, I say, can I put myself forward as a doomsayer?

This lovely cheap rice produced by the subsidised US farmers starts it's life in the radiation chambers of Monsanto. Monsanto is the US multi-billionaire giant which produces GM (genetically modified) crops.

The seeds from genetically modified crops are sterile with the result that farmers planting GM crops do not have a seed crop for the following year. So they have to go back to Monsanto every year for their seeds.

As with any 'addiction', the first few 'fixes' are cheap ... after that it starts to cost.

Example? Relatively impoverished Nigeria has been persuaded (read forced) to grow Monsanto's GM corn. So now, every year, Nigeria must buy more seeds from Monsanto. As I said, Nigeria is poor, but - surprise, surprise, Nigeria has black gold - oil reserves.

So Nigeria now pays for it's sterile seed by giving lots and lots of oil to the US. Cunning, eh? As a complete aside, Iraq has been forced to destroy all it's indigenous corn seeds and use American supplied GM stuff too.

But that is just a wee bit of the story.

The rather crude way that Monsanto modifies the seeds is by a blast of radioactive waves and particles. This has the side effect of producing in the seeds and the subsequent crop 'reactive proteins' or prions. Now remember that word 'prions'. Now, let me tell about Alzheimer's disease story.

Now Alzheimer's is apparently caused by a 'prion'. As is supposedly mad cow disease - these animals are fed on the lowest cost feeds, ie GM crops.

Is it wrong to add two and two to make four? Should we not be wary of the, as yet untested 'prions' from Monsanto's crops? And leaving aside the addictive dependence of buying seeds from Monsanto on an annual basis ( which is what is happening to many developing countries) are we not better off eating our own home-grown rice at a slightly higher cost?