GMOs and the Bigger Picture
By Colin Todhunter
By Colin Todhunter
On 15 August, India will mark its 67th
anniversary of independence from Britain. It may seem strange to some
that a nation would publicly celebrate its independence while at the
same time it less publicly cedes it to outsiders. The gleaming façade of
flags and fly-pasts will belie the fact that national security and
independence do not depend on military might and patriotic speeches.
Eye-catching celebrations will take place in Delhi and much of the media
will mouth platitudes about the strength of the nation and its
independence. The reality is, however, an ongoing, concerted attempt to
undermine and destroy the very foundation and security of the country.
The bedrock of any society is
its agriculture. Without food there can be no life. Without food
security, there can be no genuine independence. A recent report by the
organisation GRAIN revealed that small farms produce most of the world’s
food and are more productively efficient than large farms [1].
Facilitated by an appropriate policy framework, small farmers could
easily feed the global population. But small farmers are currently
squeezed onto less than a quarter of the world’s farmland and the world
is fast losing farms and farmers through the concentration of land into
the hands big agribusiness and the rich and powerful. If nothing is done
to reverse this trend, the world will lose its capacity to feed itself.
By definition, peasant
agriculture prioritises food production for local and national markets
as well as for farmers’ own families. Corporations take over scarce
fertile land and prioritise non-food commodities or export crops for
profit and markets far away that cater for the needs of the affluent.
This process impoverishes local communities and brings about food
insecurity. GRAIN concludes that the concentration of fertile
agricultural land in fewer and fewer hands is directly related to the
increasing number of people going hungry every day.
The Oakland Institute in the US recently stated that the first years of the 21st century will be remembered for a global land rush of nearly unprecedented scale [2]. An estimated 500 million acres, an
area eight times the size of Britain, was reported bought or leased
across the developing world between 2000 and 2011, often at the expense
of local food security and land rights. This trend could eventually
result in the permanent shift of farm ownership from family businesses
to institutional investors and other consolidated corporate operations.
In India, small farms account for 92 percent of farms and occupy
around 40 percent of all agricultural land. They form the bedrock of
food production. However, there is a concerted effort to remove farmers
from the land. Hundreds of thousands of farmers have taken their lives
since 1997 and many more are experiencing economic distress or have left
farming as a result of debt, a shift to (GM) cash crops and economic
liberalisation [3].
Monsanto already controls the cotton industry in India and is
increasingly shaping agri-policy and the knowledge paradigm by funding
agricultural research in public universities and institutes. Its
practices and colonisation of institutions have led to it being called
the ‘contemporary East India Company’ [4], and regulatory bodies are now
severely compromised and riddled with conflicts of interest where
decision-making over GMOs are concerned [5].
In the meantime, Monsanto and the GM biotech sector forward the myth
that GM food is necessary to feed the world’s burgeoning population.
They are not. Aside from the review by GRAIN, the World Bank-funded
International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge and Science for
Development Report stated that smallholder, traditional farming (not
GMOs) can deliver food security in low-income countries through
sustainable agri-ecological systems [5].
The Standing Committee on
Agriculture in Parliament unequivocally concluded that GM seeds and
foods are dangerous to human, animal and environmental health and
directed the former Government of Manmohan Singh to ban GMOs [6].
Despite such evidence and the recommendations to put a hold on open
field GM trials by the Supreme Court-appointed Technical Expert
Committee, the push is on within official circles to give such trials
the green light.
Monsanto cannot be trusted
The GM biotech sector cannot be
trusted. As its largest player, Monsanto is responsible for knowingly
damaging people’s health and polluting the environment and is guilty of a
catalogue of decades-long deceptive, duplicitous and criminal practices
[7]. It has shown time and again its contempt for human life and the
environment and that profit overrides any notion of service to the
public, yet it continues to propagate the lie that it has humanity’s
best interests at heart because its so-called GMO ‘frontier technology’
can feed the hungry millions.
The sector attempts to control
the ‘science’ around its products by carrying out inadequate, secretive
studies of its own, placing restrictions on any independent research
into its products and censoring findings that indicate the deleterious
impacts of its products [8]. It has also faked data [9] and engages in
attacking scientists who reach conclusions not to its liking [10,11]. It
cannot demonstrate that yields are better, nutritional values are
improved, health is not damaged or that harm to the environment does not
occur with the adoption of GMOs. Independent studies and evidence, not
inadequate industry funded or back ones, have indicated yields are often
worse and herbicide use has increased [12,13,14], health is negatively
impacted [15,16], soil is damaged [17] and biodiversity is undermined
[18], among other things.
GRAIN found that around 56
percent of Russia’s agricultural output comes from family farms which
occupy less than 9 percent of arable land. Russia does not need or want
GM crops, which the Russian Prime Minister has described as amounting to
little more than a form of biological warfare weapon [19]. And here
lies the real heart of the matter. Former US Secretary of State Henry
Kissinger once said that if you control oil you control nations, but if
you control food you control people. GMOs are not needed to feed the
world. Science cannot justify their use. They are a weapon.
In India, there is a drive to
remove small/family farms, which are capable of ensuring the nation’s
food security, and eventually replace them with larger
biotech-controlled monoculture farms with GM crops for Western styled
processed-food supermarkets and export [20]. It is no surprise that the
likes of Syngenta, Monsanto and Walmart had a direct hand in drawing up
the Knowledge Initiative on Agriculture, which was in turn linked to the
US sanctioning the opening up of India’s nuclear power sector.
Despite India not being a
signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, US corporations are
now actively involved in helping India develop its civil nuclear
capabilities. Payback appears to come in the form of handing over the
control of India’s agricultural land and food system to the US via that
country’s biotech companies.
GMOs and the bigger picture
Russia is correct to conflate
bio-terror and GMOs. The oil-rich Rockefeller family set out to control
global agriculture via the petrochemical-dependent ‘green revolution’.
The destruction of traditional farmer-controlled agriculture was
actively supported by the US government and its Trojan horse agritech
corporations under the agenda set out by Kissinger. GMOs now represent
the ultimate stranglehold over food via ‘terminator’ seed technology,
seed patenting and intellectual property rights.
Moreover, the Rockefeller
Foundation and the Gates Foundation – which have teamed up with Monsanto
in Africa – have long-standing concerns about overpopulation in ‘third
world’ countries and how they could develop and threaten resources that
the West has used to enrich itself with [21]. In fact, Monsanto now own
the Epicyte gene, which causes sterility. What will be the ‘final
solution’ for the likes of 600 million in India or millions in Africa or
elsewhere who are to be removed from agriculture [22]? The eugenicists
are knocking at the door.
Despite compliant politicians
and officials in high places who seem hellbent on capitulating to
Monsanto and the US, many recognise the dangers associated with GMOs and
are working hard to resist their introduction. However, they are
attacked and accused of slowing down growth because of their resistance
to GMOs [23]. Certain activists and civil organisations are also accused
of working against the national interest by colluding with foreign
interests to undermine ‘development’. The hypocrisy is blindingly
obvious: the state itself has for a long time been colluding with
foreign interests to undermine the basis of traditional agriculture.
The political backing for GMOs
by the US State Department, the strategic position of the US GM biotech
sector in international trade agreements and the push to get GMOs into
India and to contaminate agriculture via open-field trials with the
compliance of key officials and official bodies does not bode well.
Independence is much more than military might, patriotic slogans and a
self-congratulatory media-induced frenzy on a designated day each year.
In terms of GMOs, Russia is aware of this. It is actively committed to
putting the GMO genie back in the bottle [24]. Why isn’t India?
“It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to the service of India and her people and to the still larger cause of humanity… The achievement we celebrate today is but a step, an opening of opportunity, to the greater triumphs and achievements that await us. Are we brave enough and wise enough to grasp this opportunity and accept the challenge of the future?… A new star rises, the star of freedom in the east, a new hope comes into being, a vision long cherished materialises. May the star never set and that hope never be betrayed!” Jawaharlal Nehru from his “tryst with destiny” speech at Parliament House in New Delhi in 1947.
Notes
[6]http://www.thepeoplesvoice.org/TPV3/Voices.php/2014/03/13/leaving-a-scorched-india?tempskin=basic
[12]http://naturalsociety.com/breaking-new-usda-report-proves-environmental-impact-gmo-questionable/
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario