tagged w/ Global Food Crisis
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In 2008, global food price spikes and four successive hurricanes battered the Caribbean island of Haiti, causing an estimated US$220 million in damage to food crops. Tens of thousands of farmers were left without a means of earning an income and the country without enough food to eat. This short video looks at a special IFAD-funded programme designed to kick-start the country’s food production quickly and the support needed to make Haiti food secure.In 2008, global food price spikes and four successive hurricanes battered the... more
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Looks like the letters, petitions, and protests will have to get louder on this from those of us who see the dangers of genetic modification. This I suppose would also mean he would oppose labelling of our food to disclose to consumers that they are eating test tube food as well as independent testing being disclosed on the safety of this fake food. This entire world will be polluted with Round Up glyphosate with farmers beholding to multi nationals for their own seeds that are not even theirs, and transgenic contamination will kill biodiversity in this world and agriculture as we have klnown it for centuries will be dead.
I surely hope Obama is not the same as Bush on ag policy. But if he is, he is going to hear it loud and clear from many about how genetic modification of our food is nothing more than a profit making scheme designed to once again subjugate the poor to the whims of the rich few. Very disappointing if you really believed his spiel about change. Even I thought he would at least have enough smarts to realize that there is enough to feed this world if the World Bank, IMF, WTO, and other NWO organizations in league with governments to hold back food to raise prices were taken out of the picture and farmers allowed to cultivate their own crops tradititonally and naturally.
I REFUSE TO LIVE IN A MONSANTO WORLD.Looks like the letters, petitions, and protests will have to get louder on this from... more
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There is increasing competition for water due to a combination of numerous environmental and political factors, including climate change, poor local planning and lack of adequate financial and material resources to bring running water to poor communities.
In rural Zimbabwe, lack of clean water has become a reality for many communities, in addition to other hardships, such as food shortages, insufficient health services and lack of sanitation.
Poor rains and government’s failure to provide adequate resources to reduce water scarcity -- including skilled water experts, fuel for field technicians to reach remote areas, drilling machines to make boreholes and water purification chemicals -- have worsened water woes.
After president Robert Mugabe embarked on a violent land reform programme, expropriating white-owned commercial farms in 2000, new farm owners have done little to maintain the infrastructure and facilities they inherited when taking over farms, including water systems and irrigation dams.
According to Justice for Agriculture (JAG), a unit set up by the Commercial Farmers of Zimbabwe (CFZ), an organisation that represents the legal interests of dispossessed farmers, wells have dried up throughout the country and no efforts have been made to drill more boreholes to provide water to both humans and livestock.
This is particularly significant since such infrastructure used to provide water for the surrounding communities as well as the farms.
Plumtree
For one rural community, buried deep in the tropical forests between two southern African countries, Zimbabwe and Botswana, the water plight has been particularly harsh when their main water source, a river running between the two countries, almost dried up.
In Plumtree, a poor, drought-prone rural community located about 160 kilometres southwest of Zimbabwe‚s second largest city, Bulawayo, a hostile fight has broken out between neighbouring communities around access to the few remaining water sources.
The Ramakgoebana River has become a major source of conflict for villagers from both sides of the border, Thabiso Mkwena, a 36-year-old man who lives in Tshitshi, near Plumtree, told IPS. "This is a dry area and we have to walk for many kilometres to the fast-drying river. This has led to disputes with villagers from the other side of the river who are accusing us of finishing the water," said Mkwena.
He said residents from the Botswana side of the river have claimed parts of the river as their own, threatening those from the Zimbabwean side with assault if they come to fetch water.
What has heightened tensions even further, Mkwena explained, is that out of desperation, villagers have started to bring their livestock to drink from the river too, as there is no alternative water source for animals.
"The Batswana say we must not bring our livestock here, but we cannot let our cattle die in this heat," Mkwena said.
Letting livestock drink from the same water source as humans has exposed locals to a number of water-borne diseases. Earlier this year, medical staff at the public hospital in Plumtree reported an outbreak of diarrhoea caused by contaminated drinking water.
Above from original link:
http://www.ipsnews.net/africa/nota.asp?idnews=44294 There is increasing competition for water due to a combination of numerous... more
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THERE is a frenzy among policy makers and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) fronting Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) to be elevated to the first priority in government's realm to addressing challenges to reduced agricultural productivity in the country.
The thinking is that with the numerous pests and diseases out breaks in the fisheries, livestock, forestry and crop sectors, products of genetic modification will do a wonder and correct the situation almost at once.
Their argument is that GMOs are superior, because they are developed with exact desired traits like milk and beef production in the livestock, but also diseases and pests resistance in crops, as opposed to other conventional means like hybrids.
For the last ten years, this school of thought is spending colossal sums of money in luxurious hotels toying with this idea, at the expense of a dwindling agricultural productivity.
Their actions and influence are overshadowing the Government's strategy and competitiveness to develop tangible interventions in the agro-sector. While I agree that GMOs are good, they are not necessarily superior. My submission is that while GMOs shall offer some help to farmers, it's being over glorified.
The short to midterm problem with the agro-sector currently is the inability of policy makers to focus attention where it is due. The bureaucrats, who hide in technicalities, often blow out GMOs as the immediate saviour, which I like to differ.
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Look at the banana bacterial wilt problem, which the country is grappling with. While the policy makers were still demanding for billions of shillings to address the problem through research, ordinary farmers were already carrying out "survival" farming practices. It has indeed come to be understood and accepted in scientific circles that with good agronomical skills like tendering to the plantation, mulching, cutting off the male bud to avoid bees visiting reduced the wilt prevalence in Mukono and other areas. These formed part of the survival practices.
Indeed, a GMO banana variety, as the researchers note would take the next about 10 years to materialise. The gene, which the scientists at Kawanda are researching, is only targeting one disease - the black sigatoka. This implies that other disease and climatic challenges, will still stay, requiring closer farmer-to extension officer interaction to better farming. Will the dwindling soil fertility, disappearing rangelands, pastures and bush fires also be addressed through genetic modifications? Certainly not.
My view is that farmers are ahead of scientists when it comes to planning for the direction of the sector - which is a dangerous precedent. But you wouldn't blame the farmers.
Look at the numerous league of new crops being indiscriminately introduced without clear policy planning like moringa, jatrophaa neem tree, aloe vera and silk warm.
A few profit driven multinatinationals often conspire to promote the crops, with a hope of a ready market. But in a few months, they disappear. While the immediate escape route for the so called technocrats is that Uganda is a liberalised market economy, my conviction is that the policy makers do not the right varieties introduction studies.
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Indeed GMOs cannot be our first line of defense. Poor policy development and execution is the bigger problem.
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THERE is a frenzy among policy makers and non-governmental organisations (NGOs)... more
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In my opinion the World Bank has precipitated much of this crisis.They have been giving loans to countries in the third world at exhorbitant rates that they cannot pay back. This only perpetuates the cycle of poverty and hunger and keeps them enslaved to the system. There must be a way to provide assistance to small rural farmers in developing countries to be able to have the tools necessary to grow natural food for their people without the intererence of all of these foreign markets and speculators causing the prices to also be out of the range of affordability for the people who need them the most.
Any conference regarding food or any crisis surrounding it must also include discussion of the global water crisis. You cannot grow food without water, and in many areas of the developing world especially in Asia and Africa water is a resource that is becoming harder and harder to come by due to mismanagement, waste, pollution, climate change, privitization, and population increases.There is also too much power concentrated with organizations like the World Bank and the corporations they are in collusion with. When you have a central bank controlling everything, it appears more people have nothing.
This food crisis could be addressed much more effectively if there was more regulation regarding loaning these countries money in regards to the rates they are charged on top of the loan along with other stipulations that make their contracts hard to fulfill ( such as agreeing to loan money to lay water pipes on the stipulation that their water will be privitized.) How about forgiving all third world debt for a start? That in and of itself would free up funds that could then be used for sustainable development (solar and wind etc.) in these countries and allow people to gain access to small loans such as those provided by the Grameen Bank to start people in their own businesses. Making their own income not accountable to some World Bank that seeks to run their lives and tell them they must plant genetically modified foods to make their benefactors like Monsanto more profit would also ease much poverty in these areas and start people on the road not only to sustainability but life. Isn't that freedom?
I don't claim to be an expert on any of this nor to have the answers. I do know however, that the food and water crises we now find ourselves in the midst of is the most important thing in concert with the climate crisis that all ties in together that we now face in this century, and we need new answers as the old ways do not appear to be working any longer. It is simply unconscienable to me that with the billions upon billions of dollars we have in this world to spend on bailing out greedy bankers, wage illegal wars, and continue to support corrupted systems that actually perpetuate these crises, that we can't find some of those funds along with some compassion and political will to for once do the right thing. No child in any country should have to die because some pencil pusher in a government organization or a world leader a world away is holding back the food that child needs because of political or economic expedience.
Feed the people, and give them water. There is more than enough. What we need to do now is find that moral and political strength to do it and do it equitably. It shouldn't be hard if you have a heart and a conscience.
OK, getting down off my soap box now. ;-) In my opinion the World Bank has precipitated much of this crisis.They have been... more
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This is like 36 minutes long, but it's definitely worth watching...
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Some very powerful points here from the President of the General Assembly of the United Nations, made at the opening of the High-level Event on the Millennium Development Goals at the UN in New York. Remember that Monsanto has been at the very heart of the biofuels lobby.
Snip (Note: I will be skipping around... if you wish to read it all refer to the link. Thanks.)
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Opening remarks by H. E. M. Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann
President of the General Assembly at the High-level Event on the Millennium Development Goals 25 September 2008, United Nations, New York
7. Furthermore, unfair trade practices also delay development, as poor countries are shut out of markets and deprived of trade opportunities. The high tariffs that rich countries impose on poor countries' products amount to a "perverse tax" that deprives developing countries of funds for health care and education.
10. We have the technical and productive capacity to do this. It is incumbent on this Assembly to garner the strong sense of solidarity that will awaken the necessary political will to turn this crisis into an opportunity to transform a world system that denies the poor a right as basic as the right to food.
12. The developed countries' lavish agricultural subsidies have weakened agriculture in developing countries. At the same time, only a fraction of international aid is earmarked for improving agricultural productivity. Aid for agriculture has shrunk from 17 per cent of total development assistance, the high point reached in 1996, to 3 per cent today. Now some international donors are demanding an end to fertilizer subsidies. Faced with today's world food crisis we must speak out on behalf of our brothers and sisters and say "This is not right". It is not just to keep in place agricultural and energy policies that give rise to these kinds of distortions. Now is the time to help the poorest countries to boost their food prod agricultural products at the prices imposed on them and have undermined the ir ability to compete by heavily subsidizing the production and export of these products. Together these factors have shaped a food production system that puts private economic interests ahead of people's basic dietary needs.
14. The essential purpose of food, which is to nourish people , has been subordinated to the economic aims of a handful of multinational corporations that monopolize all aspects of food production, from seeds to major distribution chains, and they have been the prime beneficiaries of the world crisis. A look at the figures for 2007, when the world food crisis began, shows that corporations such as Monsanto and Cargill, which control the cereals market, saw their profits increase by 45 and 60 per cent, respectively; the leading chemical fertilizer companies such as Mosaic Corporation, a subsidiary of Cargill, doubled their profits in a single year.
15. At the same time , in response to the financial crisis, major hedge funds have shifted millions of dollars into agricultural products. These funds control 60 per cent of the supply of wheat and other basic grains. Most of these crops are purchased as "futures". In other words, speculators have been increasingly active in food-related financial markets.
17. Today, 3 billion 140 million people live on less than $2.50 a day. Of these, about 44 per cent survive on less than $1.25 a day, according to a new World Bank report issued on 2 September 2008. Every day, more than 30,000 people die of malnutrition, avoidable diseases and hunger. Some 85 per cent of them are children under the age of 5.
18. The top 10 per cent of the world's people possess 84 per cent of the world's wealth, while the rest are left with the remaining 16 per cent. Yet we have the technical and productive capacity to adequately feed the whole planet. It is a matter of reorienting our priorities. We must now muster the resolve to feed the world's hungry.
Some very powerful points here from the President of the General Assembly of the... more
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Corporate monopoly over our food systems is a food security disaster. And while in some places like India these disasters have already had an impact at a global level, they are a disaster in the making.
It is therefore unscientific, illogical and irresponsible for the Environmental Minister Mr Woolas to say that Prince Charles must provide "proof" that a disaster has happened.
I would imagine that he is aware of the environmental principle on which the UN Convention on Biological Diversity and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change rest.
The principle is called the Precautionary Principle. It is based on the recognition that when an activity or technology has the potential to cause harm, and there is no conclusive evidence to establish the harm that can be caused, then policy and decision making must err on the side of caution.
The Environment Minister also said "Government ministers have a responsibility to base policy on science and I do strongly believe that we have a moral responsibility to the developing world to ask the question: 'Can GM crops help'?
Minister, if you could travel with me through Vidarbha and see the tears in the eyes of farmers' widows, you would be compelled to ask the question:'Can GM crops harm'? That is your moral responsibility.
It is also your responsibility to sincerely base your decisions on real science, not pseudo science. Science based policy would recognise that an agriculture that conserves biodiversity also produces more food and nutrition per unit acre.
Science based policy would recognise that if farmers fall into debt, it is not an instrument for ending poverty, but a recipe for ending the lives of small farmers.
A science based policy would not blindly spread GM crops to Africa without assessing their role in India's agrarian crisis. A science based policy would not be based on unscientific principle of "substantial equivalence" which has prevented independent and serious testing of GM foods and crops.
That is why the Supreme Court of India has served notice on the Government of India to ask why a GMO moratorium should not be imposed till proper testing protocols and tests and facilities for biosafety are in place.
end of excerpt.
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Dr. Vandana Shiva is one of the most passionate and knowledgable scholars and environmental activists on the topic of GM foods, the global water crisis, Monsanto ( bio technology), sustainability, and environmental democracy. I trust her words and her judgement on this implicitly as I too have done the research. The world needs to listen to and read her words as she speaks truth about the monopoly taking form to control both our food and water in the guise of companies stating they are pushing GM organisms on us for our own benefit, when it is really for their own.
GM foods and the poisons sprayed on them that are in our water and food are not sustainable and will not save this world from a food crisis, but may well perpetuate it especially in areas of severe drought. We have all the conventional food we need to feed this world save political corruption (World Bank) and those in power looking to deny it to those who need it most to suit their own political, economic, and ideological agendas. I hold Dr. Shiva in the highest esteem and take her word on this based on her years of experience over anyone looking to defend the monstrous crime being perpetrated by these biocompanies on our environment and our health.Corporate monopoly over our food systems is a food security disaster. And while in... more
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Critically-acclaimed, award-winning Meatrix movie - The Meatrix II: Revolting
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For many Cubans, the global food crisis arrived two-decades ago. Facing an economic emergency, programs were initiated to increase production of fresh food throughout cities, and today their great success is being seen as possible model for populations facing hardship around the world. For many Cubans, the global food crisis arrived two-decades ago. Facing an economic... more
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Inside USA travels to Haiti to look at how the stories of politics, rice and the US are deeply interwoven.Inside USA travels to Haiti to look at how the stories of politics, rice and the US... more
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The global food crisis won't go away any time soon. Capitalism has the average consumer by the belly. Amid growing signs of famine and outrage, the entire chain of commodities and resources of the world are now being cornered by giant corporations. Farmland, water, fertilizer, seed, energy, and most of the basic necessities of life are falling under corporate control, providing increased wealth and power to the ruling elite while the rest of humanity struggles.
Commodity scarcity in India was recently reflected in the need to distribute fertilizer from the police station in Hingoli. Now police have to control the lines that form outside of dealer outlets, because the dealers won't open for business otherwise. Without this intervention there would be no fertilizer for the planting that must take place before the rain comes. In Akola and Nanded, police involvement is also needed. Agriculture officers have fled their work places to escape angry farmers. In Karnataka, a farmer was shot dead during protests, while farmers stormed meetings and set up road blocks in other districts.
Despite the success of the genetically engineered Bt cotton crops, the trend in India is now back to soybeans because they cost less to grow and need less fertilizer than cotton.
And it's not just fertilizer that is scarce. Seeds are also in short supply which is being blamed on agitation that has interfered with freight train traffic. However, the shortfall in seeds is 60 percent, a level more indicative of corporate intervention to drive up prices than the actions of powerless farmers.
As farmers fume, the Wall Street Journal heralds the whopping 42 percent jump in the fiscal third quarter profits of huge agriculture giant Archer-Daniels Midland. This increase includes a sevenfold rise in new income in units that store, transport and grade grains such as wheat, corn and soybeans.
The soaring profits of fertilizer maker Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan are reflected in the parabolic movement of its stock price from a yearly low of $70.35 to its current price of $238.22 per share. Shares of fertilizer and animal feed producer Mosaic Corp. have risen from a yearly low of $32.50 to a current price of $159.38.
Similar windfall profits are reported by GMO seed and herbicide king Monsanto whose last quarterly earnings surged by 45%.
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Click on the link for the full article and to access the in-text links.The global food crisis won't go away any time soon. Capitalism has the average... more
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'The Coalition For GM-Free India', representing farmers' unions and civil society organisations today sought scrapping of the National Biotechnology Regulatory Bill-2008 pleading that 'its provisions are unscientific, undemocratic and amenable to reduce Indians as 'guinea pigs' for the promotion of Genetically Modified (GM) crops and GM foods.'
The Bill envisages setting up a National Biotechnology Regulatory Authority (NBRA) for ensuring a 'single widow' provision for speedy clearance of GM organisms and products. Such fast clearance mechanism is being put in place to facilitate the approval and propogation in India of GM organisms and products being developed by Monsanto and multinational companies, said a communique issued by the farmer leaders and experts from civil societies network after a-day-long deliberations here.
Being hurriedly pushed through, the Bill fixes a deadline for public feedback on July 30 to circumvent any worthwhile discussion organised in public domain by scientific community or arranged by the Department of Biotechnology (DGT), which has mooted the Bill, said Dr Devinder Sharma, a noted food and trade policy analyst.
''The proposed mechanism is an express clearing house for fast track approvals in favour of the biotech industry, at the expense of health and environment requisites,'' he added.
The NBRA proposals have been drawn up by the wrong people for the wrong reasons with the wrong perspectives, said Mr Yudhvir Singh, a leader of the Bharatiya Kisan Union. And the proposed Authority , he said, ''Denies and violates constitutional rights of the states on their agriculture and citizens rights to remain GM-free.'' This also creates a hurdle to progressive decisions made by the states including Kerala on implementating organic farming policies to protect farmers interests and imposes GM crops everywhere, Mr Singh said.
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Firstly, I just want to state that in response to the thread I posted this past weekend regarding paid shills or others voting these threads down to hide them... if there are, you lose. I am not going to be intimidated to stop reporting on this important issue for our very survival. What is being done in India as well as around the world by these biotech companies regarding GM crops is a travesty of Democracy and morality. I will not leave this or any site, especially current.com that gives me the chance to have this information dessiminated to people to hopefully effect change. Vote it down if you wish, but the information and truth of it will remain the same as will my resolve to report this information regardless.
Monsanto is an evil company that is preying upon developing countries as well as our own to shove these GM seeds down the throats of farmers already living in poverty. They will continue to deny them their Democratic right to liberty and our right to proper disclosure all in the name of profit at the expense of our global environment. It is companies like Monsanto that are raising food prices in collusion with the World Bank and WTO to push these seeds as well as privitizing water supplies, and it is companies like Monsanto that must be fought by informed consumers.
We have the right to know what is in our food, where our water comes from, and the right to say NO to any attempt to force these fake toxic foods upon us. If there is any way I and others here can effect that change, then I am going to continue to do it.
Thanks to all who responded in the other thread and also to the staff who explained the situation. Hopefully we will see a resolution. Current has a chance to be a true vanguard network for the people. I am grateful to have the chance to be a part of that.'The Coalition For GM-Free India', representing farmers' unions and civil society... more
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The huge and growing burden of contamination of non-GE crops by genetically engineered variants is highlighted today, as Greenpeace and GeneWatch publish “The GM contamination register report”, which provides a detailed overview of the significant contamination events from around the world(1) in 2006.
The report shows that GE contamination reached record levels in 2006 with a total of twenty-four major incidents reported. The complete online register (www.gmcontaminationregister.org) (2) details 142 cases of unintended release, illegal planting and harmful agricultural impacts of GE crops, recorded from around the world in the last decade.
The launch of the report coincides with an international meeting of legal and technical experts in Montreal, who are considering whether companies manufacturing GE seeds should be liable for the economic and environmental damage caused when these varieties contaminate non-GE crops. Greenpeace and GeneWatch UK are calling on the negotiators to put in place a binding international regime to enforce this liability.
“As our report has shown, there is an urgent need for a strong liability treaty,” said Doreen Stabinsky of Greenpeace International. “2006 has been the worst year yet for GE contamination. A strong treaty would make sure that companies profiting from the technology are made to pay for the economic and environmental damage caused by their products. Without liability protection, it is small farmers around the world who will pay the price.”
GE maize is one of the most problematic crops, according to the report. GE maize was involved in nearly one-third of all contamination incidents over the last decade, with four incidents of maize seed contamination (in four different countries) reported in 2006. Contamination of maize seed is a serious problem for both farmers and consumers around the world, but particularly in areas where traditional varieties are still grown. Even though Mexico – the birthplace of maize – does not currently allow field trials or commercial farming of GE maize, traditional varieties of maize have been contaminated. Brazil – also a centre of diversity for maize and home of many valuable indigenous varieties – is also identified as being at high risk.
Becky Price from GeneWatch UK said, “Contamination from genetically engineered crops is a growing problem that countries must take seriously in order to protect farmers’ and consumers’ choice to grow and eat GE-free food. By linking contamination to economic penalties for biotechnology companies, we stand a much higher chance of protecting the world’s food and seed supplies for future generations.”
The huge and growing burden of contamination of non-GE crops by genetically engineered... more
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In reality, this strategy is using the misery of millions to push an unpopular, ineffective and potentially disastrous technology upon the world's farmers and food consumers. As Bill Freese of the Washington-based Center for Food Safety told me, at present GM technology is totally inappropriate for African farmers. "GM techonology has been developed for big farmers in industrialized countries, and therefore we've seen most GM crops grown in the U.S." Freese explained. Round-up ready products have been developed for application on large arable farms, to save labor, a consideration that "is not relevant to small farmers in developing countries" who are more interested in effective farming techniques and the ability to market their crop than saving labor on small plots.
So far, crops grown in African soils and climates have not been genetically modified successfully. GM varieties of the sweet potato have been heavily promoted in the past, and then found to be a failure. A similar fate is befalling Bt Cotton, a Monsanto mainstay that was adopted in large numbers by Indian farmers, lured by the promise of high yields and lower labor. But a few seasons later, state governments in Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh are suing for compensation for farmers who have seen no benefits from Monsanto's seeds.
Farmers adopting GM crops in the U.S. have also seen their orders for pesticide rising, as weeds have developed resistance to Round-up - increasing the health risks associated with using Round-up Ready seeds and consuming the food that results. Some farmers have moved from Round-up to more potent brews such as Atrazine, a nerve agent banned in the EU, and 2,4-D which is linked to cancer and is acutely toxic to humans.
In fact, Freese told me that GM crops have proved to be "the definition of unsustainable agriculture," encouraging "massive reliance on a single chemical to contain weeds" and ensuring reliance on oil to power agricultural machinery and to produce the pesticides that it interacts with. What Freese calls "off the shelf technology" – agro-ecological principles such as intercropping to protect against insect pests and weeds - which is tailored around local biodiversity and knowledge of ecological processes, could boost yields and strengthen biodiversity without the attendant risks and failures associated with GMOs.
Yet GMOs are seeing a renaissance in the public eye as a result of this food crisis, and the Rome FAO summit gave them a springboard. The EU, U.S. and Monsanto have since run with the ball, but they have found very little interest from the governments and peoples of developing nations to join them. That is probably because GM as an agricultural technology has proven itself a failure. It is receiving support from governments in the developed world because it holds out the potential for almost limitless profits. For small farmers in the developing world, and for many farmers in the U.S. too, its promise has all too often proven to be nothing more than a sleekly packaged lie.
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Small farmers will continue to be swamped by heavily subsidized American and European crops, fall prey to land grabs to service the biofuel industry and become indentured to biotech corporations as the global seed supply becomes ever more consolidated. Biodiversity will continue to suffer assault from pesticides, stray genetic information, monoculture plantations and the search of poor peasants for firewood and food. Carbon emissions from grain shipment, farm equipment and deforestation will not abate. The recipe is, in short, one for catastrophe.
In reality, this strategy is using the misery of millions to push an unpopular,... more
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Swiss farmers have warned that the current round of negotiations at the World Trade Organization (WTO) will spell the end to many family-run smallholdings.
A declaration by farmers' representatives from various countries was published in the Swiss city of Geneva as negotiations continued on achieving a global trade agreement.
The Swiss Farmers Association said moves towards further liberalisation were failing to solve the global food crisis and were worsening environmental problems.
The declaration said only major exporting countries, including the United States, Brazil and Australia, stood to benefit from the proposals to reduce customs tariffs.
The farmers' representatives called on the WTO to respect the right of every country to produce food for its own population.
The week-long talks are seen as the last chance to save the seven-year-old Doha round of trade talks before November's US presidential elections.Swiss farmers have warned that the current round of negotiations at the World Trade... more
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After soaring food prices led to deadly riots in April, the U.S. and the U.N. promised millions of dollars in aid to poor families, as well as help for farmers to break Haiti's dependence on imported food.
But three months later, The Associated Press has learnt that only a fraction of a key U.S. food pledge — less than 2 percent as of early July — has been distributed.
Even those who oversee the food aid programs say they are stopgap measures while programs to create jobs and help Haitian farmers to increase production are more critical to ending the country's chronic hunger once and for all.
But right now, aid workers say, the poorest families need immediate help, and little of the emergency food promised has reached them. Most of what has reached Haiti is stuck in port. Nearly all the rest is still inside warehouses — victim of high fuel prices, bad roads and a weak national government. After soaring food prices led to deadly riots in April, the U.S. and the U.N. promised... more
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Global food shortages have placed the Middle East and North Africa in a quandary, as they are forced to choose between growing more crops to feed an expanding population or preserving their already scant supply of water.
For decades nations in this region have drained aquifers, sucked the salt from seawater and diverted the mighty Nile to make the deserts bloom. But those projects were so costly and used so much water that it remained far more practical to import food than to produce it. Today, some countries import 90 percent or more of their staples.
Now, the worldwide food crisis is making many countries in this politically volatile region rethink that math.
The population of the region has more than quadrupled since 1950, to 364 million, and is expected to reach nearly 600 million by 2050. By that time, the amount of fresh water available for each person, already scarce, will be cut in half, and declining resources could inflame political tensions further.
"The countries of the region are caught between the hammer of rising food prices and the anvil of steadily declining water availability per capita," Alan Richards, a professor of economics and environmental studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, said via e-mail. "There is no simple solution."Global food shortages have placed the Middle East and North Africa in a quandary, as... more
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Once oil passed $140 a barrel, even the most rabidly right-wing media hosts had to prove their populist cred by devoting a portion of every show to bashing Big Oil. Some have gone so far as to invite me on for a friendly chat about an insidious new phenomenon: "disaster capitalism." It usually goes well - until it doesn't.
For instance, "independent conservative" radio host Jerry Doyle and I were having a perfectly amiable conversation about sleazy insurance companies and inept politicians when this happened: "I think I have a quick way to bring the prices down," Doyle announced. "We've invested $650 billion to liberate a nation of 25 million people. Shouldn't we just demand that they give us oil? There should be tankers after tankers backed up like a traffic jam getting into the Lincoln Tunnel, the Stinkin' Lincoln, at rush hour with thank-you notes from the Iraqi government ... Why don't we just take the oil? We've invested it liberating a country. I can have the problem solved of gas prices coming down in ten days, not ten years."
There were a couple of problems with Doyle's plan, of course. The first was that he was describing the biggest stickup in world history. The second, that he was too late: "We" are already heisting Iraq's oil, or at least are on the cusp of doing so.
It's been ten months since the publication of my book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, in which I argue that today's preferred method of reshaping the world in the interest of multinational corporations is to systematically exploit the state of fear and disorientation that accompanies moments of great shock and crisis. With the globe being rocked by multiple shocks, this seems like a good time to see how and where the strategy is being applied.
And the disaster capitalists have been busy -- from private firefighters already on the scene in Northern California's wildfires, to land grabs in cyclone-hit Burma, to the housing bill making its way through Congress. The bill contains little in the way of affordable housing, shifts the burden of mortgage default to taxpayers and makes sure that the banks that made bad loans get some payouts. No wonder it is known in the hallways of Congress as "The Credit Suisse Plan," after one of the banks that generously proposed it.
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Those conspiring behind closed doors are not Democrats or Republicans to me. They aren't even real Americans. They are globalist elitist Fascists who use misery and tragedy to profit and to subjugate the weak and poor. That is not how a Democratic society built upon liberty and equality exists. I have thought for quite some time that the climate crisis was not being addressed properly because those in power want it to get worse so they can push their genetically modified seeds, milk, and other franken products on farmers...so they can take our water to commoditize it... so they can invade the Arctic to get its resources.... and so they can use war and environmental devastation to continue their march to global domination while weakening civil rights.
For in a truly Democratic society, pre-emptive war would not be waged against countries that had not attacked us. Climate change would be addressed properly as the urgent crisis it is for our survival. All people would have an equal voice in this process. Media conglomerates would not be owned by the governments and those associated with governments pumping out only what they want us to hear and other distractionary bs in lieu of telling truth and educating the populace. But that isn't what we have. What we have is global Fascism subtle as it may be, and if the people do not stand up to this now we will lose it all.Once oil passed $140 a barrel, even the most rabidly right-wing media hosts had to... more
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A United Nations summit on the global food crisis called on Tuesday for trade barriers to be reduced and food export bans scrapped to help stop the spread of hunger that threatens nearly one billion people.
"Nothing is more degrading than hunger, especially when man-made," U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the Rome summit, where the United States and Brazil defended biofuel production from charges that it pushes up world food prices.
The head of the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), hosting the summit, said wealthy nations spent billions of dollars on farm subsidies, excess food consumption and arms.
Humanitarian agencies estimate soaring food prices could push as many as 100 million more people into hunger. About 850 million are already going hungry.
A United Nations summit on the global food crisis called on Tuesday for trade barriers... more
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