BOULDER - Farmers will be allowed to grow genetically modified corn on county open space, the Boulder County commissioners decided Tuesday.

But bowing to public concerns, the commissioners agreed that neighboring growers of conventional crops can demand a 150-foot buffer zone around the genetically modified varieties.

"I don't want us, with Boulder County open space land, to be on the biotech cutting edge," said Commissioner Ron Stewart.

"There is an apprehension in the general populace about" genetically modified crops, he said.

The county owns 70,000 acres of open space, of which 25,000 acres are leased for agriculture.

In 2002, nine growers planted genetically modified corn on 560 acres. Almost all of it was livestock feed.

The rules adopted Tuesday were recommended by a task force, which began studying the issue in 2001.

Annette Brant, a member of the task force, told the commissioners she still prefers a ban on genetically modified crops. She fears the genetically altered corn will pollinate corn on neighboring land, creating hybrids that farmers don't want.

But task force member and University of Colorado biology professor Andrew Staehelin told the commissioners that modified corn is resistant to diseases that can also affect humans, such as carcinogenic funguses.

Staehelin said cross-pollinization won't hurt neighboring farmers.

"The world is not going to disintegrate because we're releasing these organisms," he said.

mindfully.org note: Please consider that if there is a 20 to 40 mile-per-hour wind, and if corn pollen can remain aloft for 1/2- hour to one hour, then that pollen will travel between 10 miles and 40 miles, making a 150-foot buffer zone absolutely meaningless. There might as well be no buffer zone. The effect is the same--the complete contamination of all corn in that region and the eventual spread of that contamination well beyond. A more meaningful buffer zone to be considered would start at 40 miles, but the best buffer zone is to not grow GMOs in the first place. Man has not now, nor ever will have the capability of playing God in the Garden.

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