After Japan surrendered to the United States ending the Second World War, there were stories of Japanese soldiers tucked away in island hideouts that did not get the word the war was finished for the next several decades.

These men went on thinking the war was still raging, sometimes for years. Something similar is happening regarding the battle about biotechnology.

Judging from the volume of social media chatter and negative news media coverage, you would think the fate of biotechnology in food production hung in the balance. The reality is far different.

Those who oppose GMO products haven’t gotten the word: they lost.

I came to this conclusion while walking the halls of the 19-acre biotechnology research complex recently opened by Dow AgroSciences. Down each long hallway was state-of-the-art laboratories staffed with several hundred scientists from all across the globe, all working toward one goal: improving food production. While Dow AgroSciences never divulged the exact cost of the complex, I am sure it ran into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Would they have made this kind of investment if they thought there was a chance GMO foods would be banned?

Last year I visited a similar – but even larger – research complex at the Monsanto Co. in St. Louis. Here, too, there seemed to be no fear that the technology and products they were spending billions to develop would be outlawed by government regulators or environmental activists. The “chatter” class, as I call those who stir up negative publicity about all kinds of issues, like to flood the media, both social and journalistic, with accusations about companies like Monsanto and Dow.

While these efforts can have an impact on public opinion, the forces behind the adoption of biotechnology are far bigger and more powerful than public opinion.

Having enough food to feed the world, reducing disease and malnutrition, and improving the health and safety of the food we eat are all more important than what people are saying on Facebook.

This is why biotechnology is here to stay.

An irony I saw while touring the Dow facility was that some of the labs were not doing research on biotech crops but on how to improve natural processes, that is, to help a plant do something better than it naturally does. These products are not “GMO” products because they are the same plant doing what is has always done, only now doing it a bit letter.

The war of words about biotechnology will continue, but so will the research and adoption of biotechnology.

The feud about GMO labels on food products will become irrelevant when 90 percent of the products in a store have such a label. Voters in California may think twice about voting against biotech ballot initiatives when their store shelves are empty and their grocery bills double.

Biotechnology is too far advanced and offers too many benefits to mankind to stop its progress. Opponents will continue to make noise and throw up paper tigers as a show of resistance; but in the end, their efforts will not stop the green revolution.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers with questions or comments for Gary Truitt may write to him in care of this publication.