Hi Caroline. I tried to find pros and cons on that argument.
This article does present the history of the papaya crop in Hawaii:
http://www.foodproductdesign.c...
This is an early (2006) paper on some of the results of the introduction of GMO papaya seed in 1998.
http://www.hawaiiseed.org/reso...
One of the arguments in support of the GMO papaya seed is that it would allow the papaya virus to be contained, and then organically grown papayas could be grown elsewhere on the islands.
http://nwrage.org/content/wide...
In these articles you will see that the virus was attributed to use of monocroping techniques.
I am interested if permaculture techniques (essentially a return of original farming methods) can find solutions to the problems here. It would be a sad day if the bananas we buy at the store, are no longer the bananas that we have depended on for solid nutrition--and a dash of sweet that didn't need any refined sugar!
