Food, Inc. Discussion Guide - TakePart

S t u d e n t H a n d o u tA R e v i e w o f S e e d s a n d P l a n t R e p r o d u c t i o nA seed is rather an amazing thing. If you examine a poppy seed or apple seed, itprobably doesn’t appear to be alive. It doesn’t respire or move, and it doesn’t seemto change. Yet, given moisture and the right conditions, a seed will germinate andmature into a plant.A seed is basically a baby plant or embryo enclosed in a protective coat with a supplyof food. This little packet of stored life is an innovation that allows all flowering plantsto reproduce across space and time. With seeds, a plant’s offspring can grow far awayfrom the parent plant, giving it a better chance to survive because it does not have tocompete with the parent for sunlight or water. Seeds also allow offspring to wait forthe right growing conditions, helping them avoid harsh winter, drought, fire, or otherdifficulties. Seeds can stay in this dormant state for a long time: One living seed wasrecently found to be 2,000 years old.Seeds are clearly important to flowering plants, but people also depend on them tolive. Almost all the fruits and vegetables we eat—from berries to broccoli—are grownfrom seeds. Besides allowing us to grow food, many seeds themselves also provide uswith important nutrients. Most human diets are based on grains (like wheat, rice, corn,and rye) and beans (like pinto beans, soybeans, and peas), which are all seeds. Peoplealso use seeds to make cooking oils, manufacture paint and other industrial chemicals,and produce biofuels.Each seed is the result of a plant flower being fertilized by pollen. Through a processknown as sexual reproduction, seeds develop after a plant’s male part (the pollen)joins with a plant’s female part (the ovule) to create a fertilized egg. Depending onthe type of plant, the pollen and ovule may be from the same or different flowers,or from the same or different plants. Some plant species require cross-pollinationbetween two separate plants and depend on wind or bees or other insects to transferthe pollen from one plant to the ovary of another.A seed’s cells contain the complete “blueprint” for the particular plant, and theydetermine how the plant will grow, look, and taste. Like all other living cells, seedcells include the genetic material that chemically directs the cell’s activities. This7 6F o o d , I n c . D I S C U S S I O N G U I D E© P a r t i c i p a n t M e d i a