Monsanto executives say most of the original claims - including those that said even farmers who used conventional seeds were harmed by biotechnology crops - have been dismissed.

Five years ago, Europe placed a moratorium on approving biotechnology crops.

There are limits to the usefulness of the new technique, because it is not yet highly efficient, and measures beyond gene transfer are required in making biotechnology crops.

That first biotechnology crop, the 1994 Flavr Savr tomato, had a consumer-friendly trait: delayed rotting.

But many say that biotechnology crops are so pervasive that it would be prohibitively expensive, and in some cases, nearly impossible, to eliminate them entirely.

Over the last few years, biotechnology crops have come to dominate the food industry.

As a result, the Grocery Manufacturers of America estimates that about 70 percent of grocery-store food may have been made with biotechnology crops.

Some of the world's largest food producers have already shaken things up by saying they will not use biotechnology crops this year.

"There's an elevator in Nebraska looking for non-G.M. They want 98 percent purity, and they won't get it," he said, because biotechnology crops are everywhere.

But he predicts that opposition to biotechnology crops will eventually disappear.