tagged w/ Bt cotton
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When home-front battles over GMO labeling, beekeeping, and the Farm Bill get heated, we can sometimes lose sight of the fact that Big Ag’s influence extends far beyond our own borders. Micha Peled’s documentary Bitter Seeds is a stark reminder of that fact. The final film in Peled’s “globalization trilogy,” Bitter Seeds exposes the havoc Monsanto has wreaked on rural farming communities in India, and serves as a fierce rebuttal to the claim that genetically modified seeds can save the developing world.
The film follows a plucky 18-year-old girl named Manjusha, whose father was one of the quarter-million farmers who have committed suicide in India in the last 16 years. As Grist and others have reported, the motivations for these suicides follow a familiar pattern: Farmers become trapped in a cycle of debt trying to make a living growing Monsanto’s genetically engineered Bt cotton. They always live close to the edge, but one season’s ruined crop can dash hopes of ever paying back their loans, much less enabling their families to get ahead. Manjusha’s father, like many other suicide victims, killed himself by drinking the pesticide he spreads on his crops.
Why is Monsanto seen as responsible for these farmers’ desperation? The company began selling Bt cotton in India in 2004, after a U.S. challenge at the WTO forced India to adopt seed patenting, effectively allowing Monsanto to monopolize the market. Bt cotton seeds were — and still are — advertised heavily to illiterate Indian farmers, who have bought the company’s promises of high yields and the material wealth they bring. What the farmers didn’t know until it was too late is those seeds require an expensive regimen of pesticides, and must be fertilized and watered according to precise timetables. And since these farmers lack irrigation systems, and must instead depend on not-always-predictable rainfall, it’s incredibly difficult to control the success or failure of any year’s crops. As farmers bought the Bt cotton in droves, the conventional seed they’d been using — which needed only cow dung as fertilizer — disappeared in as little as one season.
Now, in communities like Manjusha’s, it’s virtually impossible to buy anything but Monsanto’s seed.Manjusha, the film’s protagonist, goes looking for answers after her father commits suicide.To pay for seeds, pesticides, and fertilizer, farmers must take out loans, but most banks refuse to deal with them, so instead they turn to moneylenders, who charge exorbitant interest rates. Many farmers have nothing to offer as collateral besides their land. If a crop fails and they can’t pay back the loans, they lose everything.
The film offers a glimmer of hope in Manjusha, an aspiring journalist in a world where farmers’ daughters aren’t exactly encouraged to pursue independent careers. Scenes of her first earnest attempts at reporting are intimate and touching (“I had other questions to ask, but I forgot”), and her commitment to telling the story of her family’s and her community’s struggle always shines through her nervousness. This appealing heroine makes a story of global manipulation more personal, and thus more devastating.
Piece by piece, Bitter Seeds lays out the bleak situation in India, using interviews with all players, from condescending seed sales reps and callous Monsanto execs, to activist Vandana Shiva, to farmers, their families, and village old-timers who remember when life as an Indian cotton farmer was not so bitter.
More at the linkWhen home-front battles over GMO labeling, beekeeping, and the Farm Bill get heated,... more
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The Deccan Development Society (DDS), is a two-decade old grassroots organisation working in about 75 villages with women's Sanghams (voluntary village level associations of the poor) in the Medak District of Andhra Pradesh. The 5000 women members of the Society represent the poorest of the poor in their village communities. Most of them are dalits ("untouchables"), the lowest group in the Indian social hierarchy.
COMMENT from PV Satheesh of the Deccan Development Society: Yesterday, as a part of the global anti GMO week observation over 500 women from the DDS communities from the mandals of Zaheerabad, Jharasangam, Raikode and Nyalkal took out a procession in Zaheerabad to protest against government inaction on the spread of Bt cotton in Medak, which they said is not only environmentally destroying the farmers but also is creating havoc with their economics. Farmers who are lured by the promise of Bt seed dealers of great returns are finding to their dismay that even 50% of the promised yields are not being realised.
Under these circumstances the women have demanded a total ban on the cultivation of Bt cotton in Medak District besides serious criminal cases against the Bt seed dealers.
The women took out in procession an effigy of a GMO DEMON and burnt it in front of the Tahsildar's office where they submitted their memorandum. Later they went to the District Collector, met him and submitted a copy of the memorandum.
Please see the full memorandum [English translation] below.
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Memorandum demanding a total ban on the cultivation of Bt cotton in Medak District Deccan Development Society
April 13 2012
www.ddsindia.com
We, members of the DDS Food Sovereignty Trust, representing over 5000 dalit women from small and marginal farming households present the following demands for your kind consideration:
Sir
Medak is a district devoid of irrigation facilities. This is the only district in AP that does not have any canal irrigation. It is in this context that we, traditional farmers of Medak have been for centuries following significant rainfed biodiverse farming system. However since the last two decades, because of the government’s promotional policies and pressure from markets, cultivation of irrigation dependent crops such as sugarcane, potato, ginger etc have seen a frightening growth in our district. This has a deep impact on the underground water sounding alarm bells for Medak District. Since the last few years even millet farmers who cultivate their degraded lands for food crops in our district are being trapped by the cotton industry by making false promises that they can make heavy profit by growing cotton.
The new entrant into this scene is Bt Cotton whose cultivation is growing at a terrifying rate in the district. Since the advent of this cotton, food crop cultivation is declining in Medak. This district has been famous for growing millets which can grow even in the least fertile lands without irrigation. These crops have traditionally protected the food and nutritional security of the population of Medak District, especially of the poor.
We the members of the Deccan Development Society have initiated several research studies since last 20 years on the food crops and the food and nutritional security they offer and have been able to discover several new truths. We would like to bring them to your kind notice.
1. Our studies done this year in the four mandals of Zaheerabad, Jharasangam, Raikode and Nyalkal has revealed that the yields from Bt cotton is around 500-800 kgs per acre under dryland conditions and 1000-1200 kgs per acre under irrigated conditions. As per current market rates, the farmers are able to earn between 17000 to 40000 per acre depending upon whether they are dryland farmers or irrigated farmers. As a result the dryland Bt Cotton farmers are earning a net income of 8-10,000 per acre.
2. This has come as a rude shock who were dreaming of great gains by farming Bt cotton. Cotton cultivation does not yield no benefit apart from the monetary income No fodder, no uncultivated greens nothing. Besides as scientists are pointing out, Bt cotton fields are suffering from soil toxicity year after year resulting in toxic soils and soil fatigue. As a result of this, crops such as chillies which used to be grown after cotton is harvested are wilting on the field. Besides, there are several instances of Bt Cotton itself wilting on the field.
3. Apart from these problems, we have learnt from Bt cotton farmers in Warangal as well as from newspapers that cattle which have grazed on Bt cotton refuse have died of toxicity. Women who have laboured on Bt farms are suffering from skin diseases and respiratory problems. Our sisters in DDS Community Media Trust who have done regular filming month on month for three years in Warangal, Nalgonda and Adilabad districts have brought to light these truths in their video films.
4. In contrast to this toxic Bt farming, millet farmers enjoy homes full of grains, cowsheds full of fodder, and all season uncultivated greens. This offers them food and nutritional security. They are also protecting soil, water and environmental health through their ecological practices such as non chemical farming.
5. This year we in DDS carried out INSIMP [Initiative for Nutritonal Security through Intensive Millet Promotion] on behalf of the Government of Andhra Pradesh by ecological growing millets in a biodiverse environment in over 2500 acres. The studies carried out on these farms are revealing that dryland farmers [without irrigation] have been able to earn a household income upto ₹15-20,000 per acre through these farming practice
In view of all the above, we are placing the following demands in front of the Medak District administration and the Government of Andhra Pradesh
1. Keeping in view the environment and water resources of Medak District, Government must immediately ban the cultivation of Bt Cotton in the district.
2. Many companies have carried out false propaganda that Bt cotton cultivation results in great profits. Government must initiate criminal proceedings against these companies and ban them from trading in Bt cotton.
3. Pending the above, Government of AP must enact a legislation that Bt cotton companies must give a written undertaking that their cultivation will result in minimum yield of a certain quantity of cotton. If farmers do not get these promised profits Government must file lawsuits against them and force them to compensate farmers losses.
4. Hundreds of thousands of farmers in the mandals of southern Medak, viz., Zaheerabad, Jharasangam, Raikode, Nyalkal, Manoor, Narayankhed etc. are engaged in organic farming. Bt cotton cultivation must be prohibited in these mandals immediately in view of the fact that Bt cotton will genetically pollute the crops on these organic farms.
5. Government must recognise traditional farmers as conservers of environment, water resources, and frontline soldiers in the fight against climate change. Such farmers must be honoured with an annual honorarium of ₹5000 per acre for their ecosystemic services.
6. When Government honours farmers during the Ugadi and Sankranti Puraskaras these ecological, biodiverse farmers must be honoured as Progressive Farmers.
We request you to kindly place these demands of ours in front of the Government of Andhra Pradesh and help Andhra Pradesh to come out of the agrarian crisis into which genetically engineered crops are bound to push this state.
On behalf of the DDS Food Sovereignty Trust
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=387551471278629&set=o.276951472985&type=1The Deccan Development Society (DDS), is a two-decade old grassroots organisation... more
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India's Bt cotton dream is going terribly wrong.
For the first time, farmer suicides, including those in 2011-12, have been linked to the declining performance of the much hyped genetically modified (GM) variety adopted by 90% of the country's cotton-growers since being allowed a decade ago.
Policymakers have hailed Bt cotton as a success story but a January 9 internal advisory, a copy of which is with HT, sent out to cotton-growing states by the agriculture ministry presents a grim scenario.
“Cotton farmers are in a deep crisis since shifting to Bt cotton. The spate of farmer suicides in 2011-12 has been particularly severe among Bt cotDREAM CROP OR A YARN?
`Bollgard Bt cotton' is a GM variety first developed by biotech firm Monsanto Monsanto commercialised the Bt cotton technology in 1996 in the US Mahyco (Maharashtra Hybrid Seed Company, India) entered into agreement with Monsanto to import the technology into India and commercial approval was given on April 5, 2002 ton farmers,“ says the advisory.
Bt cotton's success, it appears, lasted merely five years. Since then, yields have been falling and pest attacks going up. India's only GM crop has been genetically altered to destroy cottoneating pests.
For farmers, rising costs -in the form of pesticides -have not matched returns, pushing many to the brink, financially and otherwise. Simply put, Bt cotton is no more as profitable as it used to be.
“In fact cost of cotton cultivation has jumped...due to rising costs of pesticides. Total Bt cotton production in the last five years has reduced,“ says the advisory.
This could have larger implications for Asia's third-largest economy where rural prosperity has been a key driver of overall growth.
The note is based on observations from the Indian Council of Agricultural Sciences, which administers farm science, and the Central Cotton Research Institute, the country's top cotton research facility.
Yet, officials HT spoke to either denied or downplayed the advisory. Swapan Kumar Dutta, India's deputy director-general of crop science, said he had no knowledge of the note and that Bt cotton continued to drive India's cotton production.
He could neither “confirm nor deny“ that such a note had been sent, said Prabeer Kumar Basu, the agriculture secretary.
Of the nine cotton-growing states, Maharashtra has seen the largest number of farmer suicides. In the state's Vidarbha region, a cottongrowing belt comprising six districts, 209 farmers committed suicides in 2011 due to “agrarian causes“.
In February 2010, the environment ministry put an indefinite moratorium on Bt brinjal, India's first GM food crop, days after the country's biotech regulator cleared it for cultivation.
Among many reasons, the ministry said it was “necessary to review“ the performance of Bt cotton first.India's Bt cotton dream is going terribly wrong.
For the first time, farmer... more
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10 years of Bt Cotton – False Hype and Failed Promises Exposed
Coalition for a GM-Free India, March 21 2012
http://indiagminfo.org/?p=393
The false hype and failed promises of Bt cotton in India were exposed by the Coalition for GM-Free India with a special report released in a press conference here today. As the 10th anniversary of Bt cotton's regulatory approval in India approaches, the Coalition, using data from government institutions, highlighted that the hype around Bt cotton as revolutionizing the cotton production in India is clearly wrong.
Closer examination of the data from the last 10 years negates the two important claims of dramatic yield increase and significant fall in pesticide usage. The report clearly exposes the dark side of the Bt cotton story – stagnant yields, pest resistance, new pest and disease attacks, the need for high levels of expensive farm inputs and the spate of tragic farmer suicides in the cotton belt.
In the face of aggressive PR campaign by the biotechnology industry which is being uncritically accepted by the government and regulators, the Coalition said, "This is a wake-up call for the Government, Parliamentarians, policy-makers, farmer organizations and media to closely examine the crisis in the cotton belt and critically re-assess the 10 years of Bt cotton. The government should stop promoting Bt cotton and pro-actively advise farmers about its unsuitability and risks."
The cotton farmers are in deep crisis after ten years of Bt cotton. The spate of farmer suicides in 2011-12 has been particularly severe among Bt cotton farmers. The extensive crop failure has exposed the false hype and advertising, often repeated by policymakers and regulators. In Andhra Pradesh, state government estimates show that out of 47 lakh acres planted with Bt cotton during Kharif 2011 season, the crop failed in 33.73 lakh acres (71% of the area). The state government reported that 20.46 lakh farmers suffered from cotton crop failure and lost Rs.3071.6 cr. In Maharasthra, the cotton crisis forced the government to take the unprecedented step of declaring Rs. 2000 cr. as compensation (the estimated loss is Rs.10,000 cr.). The cotton production estimates had to be downgraded despite the large expansion in cotton cultivation area.
Presenting some of the analysis, Kiran Vissa, co-convener of the Alliance for Sustainable and Holistic Agriculture (ASHA) said, "The real yield gains in the past decade (from 278 kg/ha to 470 kg/ha) happened from 2000-01 to 2004-05, i.e. when Bt cotton area reached only 5.6% of the total cotton area. From 2005-06 to 2011-12, when the Bt cotton area grew to exceed 90% of the total cotton area, there is no sustained yield gain – only going from 470 kg/ha to 481 kg/ha. It is the pre-Bt cotton yield gains that have proved to be stable, resulting from various factors including fresh land brought under cotton cultivation, expansion of irrigation and use of high-yielding hybrids." The report also refers to the statement of Dr. K.R. Kranthi, Director of Central Institute for Cotton Research(CICR), "The main issue that worries stakeholders is the stagnation of productivity at an average of 500 kg lint per ha for the past seven years. The gains have been stagnant and unaffected by the increase in area of Bt cotton from 5.6% in 2004 to 85% in 2010."
Regarding pest protection, scientific studies and the company statements show that the target pest bollworm has developed tolerance to Bt cotton, whereas secondary pests like mealy bugs and whiteflies which were hitherto unseen are causing major damage. At the farmer level, pesticide spraying quickly went back to pre-Bt levels after the first three years. Data from Directorate of Plant Protection for six major cotton-growing states shows that in Maharashtra with the largest Bt cotton cultivation area, there has been a steep increase in pesticide volume (3198 MT in 2005-06 to 4639 MT in 2009-10) whereas in four other states (Gujarat, M.P., Punjab, Karnataka) there is a marginal increase. The only decline is in A.P., possibly due to the successful campaign against pesticide use by the government’s Non-Pesticidal Management (NPM) program. At the national level, even in the peak expansion years of Bt cotton, the pesticide usage increased by 10%. This is despite the heavy increase in use of more powerful low-volume pesticides during the same period, which should have reduced the total volumes. This shows that Bt technology is a false solution to the pesticide problem – the NPM methods which eliminate pesticide usage completely have been successfully demonstrated in states like A.P. in large-scale government programs while the Bt technology with all its risks, at best reduces pesticide usage temporarily for a given target pest.
Official information shows that Bt cotton requires more inputs in terms of fertilizers and irrigation, and is particularly susceptible to rainfall shortage at peak bolling period. The costs of cultivation have gone up significantly after the introduction of Bt cotton, leading to increased risk and debt for small farmers. The Coalition’s report also criticizes the false and unethical advertising by the companies like Mahyco-Monsanto whose advertisements were pulled up by Advertising Standards Council of India, earlier this year.
NOTE: The new report is here:
http://indiagminfo.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Bt-Cotton-False-Hype-and-Failed-Promises-Final.pdf
More at the link
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_18y9F0sPOI/TdIEc4UA1GI/AAAAAAAABEA/xp8fIIcCwNU/s1600/BT-Cotton-CIRAD.jpg10 years of Bt Cotton – False Hype and Failed Promises Exposed
Coalition for a... more
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"Since 1995, a quarter of a million Indian farmers have committed suicide - the largest wave of recorded suicides in human history. Most of them were cotton farmers from Vidarbha in Maharashtra. Once known for its fine cotton, it is now called the 'graveyard of farmers'. The escalating cost of inputs like seed, fertiliser and pesticide has made farming unsustainable. In the summer, the lack of resources or institutional credit for sowing the fields drives poor farmers to end their lives. In the winter, the depressed rates of cotton become the proverbial last straw. While the state and the media label these deaths as suicide, the cotton fields of Vidarbha remain a mute witness to genocide."
Awards: Gold Award for Script at the IDPA Awards-2011
More at the link"Since 1995, a quarter of a million Indian farmers have committed suicide - the... more
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http://gmwatch.eu/latest-listing/1-news-items/13556-how-monsanto-tried-to-con-pakistan
NOTE: This is a big story in Pakistan and seems to reflect increasing scepticism in the media about the value of Bt cotton.
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Is Pakistan on the right path on Bt cotton?
Naufil Shahrukh
Weekly Pulse, December 16 2011
http://www.weeklypulse.org/details.aspx?contentID=1603&storylist=2
Cotton remains the second most significant crop in Pakistan after wheat and is the main foreign exchange earning cash crop for us. Our textile industry requires around 2-3 million bales annually to meet its production demands so we import it from India and other places as per requirements. To meet the deficit, the policy makers thought it is imperative that we increase the cotton crop yield and save foreign exchange. Currently we produce on an average between 12-14 million bales. Genetically modified or Bt Cotton was proposed as an option to explore.
A small U.S based, hi-tech or GM Seed and traits company (Monsanto) initially offered Bollgard-1 (BG-1) technology to Pakistan. It later turned out that the company’s patent for this purpose had expired and it was forced to accept this. In a letter written to the Punjab government, its (Monsanto's) Country Head acknowledged this fact. Prior to this, the government was ready to sign an agreement with Monsanto which would have resulted in payment of 'technology fees' to Monsanto worth billions of rupees! Once this information became public knowledge as a result of this letter, the Punjab government rightly called off negotiations in 2008 and ultimately did not sign the proposed agreement on 'BG-1 technology'. This saved the national and provincial exchequer significant money and adopting an outdated technology. Interestingly, Bollgard-1 cotton seeds were being grown in Pakistan since 2004-5 and seemed the bureaucrats negotiating with the US company were unaware of this.
In 2008, the same company came up with a new proposal that it will bring the upgraded Bollgard-2 cotton seed technology. The genetic modification in a cotton seed is that Bollgard-1 seed has a Cry-1AC gene introgressed in addition to its natural genetic make-up and it is effective against Pink, Spotted and American Bollworms or 'Sundee'. The toxin from this gene, tears apart the guts of the Bollworms. Bollgard-2 seed has a gene Cry-2AB in addition to Cry-1AC and is effective against Army Bollworms or 'Sundee' in addition to the previous three. So basically, the bollgard-2 is a minor up gradation to the original Bollgard-1 seed technology.
The company proposed that since Pakistan has weak 'Intellectual Property Rights' or IPRs therefore, it needed Government protection or 'Back-stop' to succeed in Pakistan as 'unscrupulous' elements could copy or replicate its Bollgard-2 technology. It signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the then Federal Ministry of Food & Agriculture in April, 2010 which envisaged that provincial governments of the Punjab and possibly Sindh should sign agreements with the company. In brief, the company would sell the Bollgard-2 seeds in the market however, in case people copied or replicated the technology or grew 'saved' seeds, a third party will be engaged which will conduct a survey to see how much seed was sold by the company in the market and the remaining quantity would be classified as 'unpaid' seed. The company indulges in similar practices in the US and Canada where it has sued scores of farmers for ‘saved seeds’.
Government was then to pay the company an amount of 21 U.S dollars per acre for the 'unpaid' acres as ‘compensation for losses’, royalty and ‘backstop’ agreements. Practically, it could mean that in Punjab, if such a survey 'proved' that 4 million acre worth of seed was sold by Monsanto and 2 million was 'unauthorized' or obtained/grown through other channels, Monsanto would be paid 21 U.S dollars per acre for those two million acres! This would mean a sum of US dollars 42000000/- will be paid to the company by the government every year. Nowhere in the world does such 'government backstop' guarantees or arrangement exists.
At this point in time in fact, even mandatory regulatory field trials were not complete when the MOU was signed in April, 2010. So there was no way to know, whether this technology would increase cotton yield in Pakistan or not! But some elements within Punjab bureaucracy, continuously tried to get the agreement signed for this technology between Monsanto and the Punjab Government.
In November, 2010, bureaucracy almost managed to get the Monsanto proposal approved by the Punjab Government. However, the Chief Minister Punjab came to know about the relevant issues and stepped in to prevent a hasty decision. It was learnt that Bollgard-1 and 2 technology is completely ineffective against Cotton Leaf Curl Virus (CLCuV), White Fly and Mealy Bugs. These pests are the main reason why Pakistan Cotton crop loses 2-3 million bales every year. Thus, while the company would have been selling the seeds and making money through Government ‘compensation’ and sovereign guarantees every year, the real problems were still there and the ‘latest technology’ would have cost the Punjab government between 30-70 million U.S dollars every year with no guarantees of yield increase. The regulatory trials by this company in 2010, proved its technology was ineffective against the main pests (CLCuV etc) in Pakistan.
More at the link
http://c1eatdrinkbettercom.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2010/07/Monsanto-BT-Cotton.jpghttp://gmwatch.eu/latest-listing/1-news-items/13556-how-monsanto-tried-to-con-pakistan... more
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http://news.sky.com/home/world-news/article/16112805
The record suicide rate among farmers in India continues to rise and is threatening the country's stability and future development, according to campaigners.
They are blaming the government's policies for the agrarian crisis and are demanding it takes urgent action.
More than a quarter of a million farmers have killed themselves in the last 16 years in what is the largest recorded wave of suicides in history.
Kishore Tiwari, a campaigner with the Vidharbha Jan Andolan Samiti in Maharashtra state in central India, says cotton farmers have been particularly badly affected.
Many of them have only just moved to growing cash crops - like cotton - in the last few years.
He says the farmers have taken on large debts to buy hybrid seeds, which are often unsuited to the harsh and temperamental Indian climate.
"They are sold these modern seeds and modern chemicals and have to take on large debts to buy them.
"The problem is they need a lot of water which is in short supply and then when the crop is poor and they have to repay the money lenders, they despair and commit suicide."
Mr Tiwari says the suicides are a symptom of a wider crisis in the countryside.
India's has one of the fastest growing economies in the world but its roots are in the countryside and much of it is being left behind.
In a country with aspirations, moving away from a life of subsistence is attractive but it can also be deadly.
Vandana Moohorle is now bringing up her children alone after her husband killed himself by drinking pesticide.
Like many farmers, he had been persuaded to use genetically modified seeds by the possibility of a better harvest. What he wasn't told was that they needed more rain than the region provided.
His wife blames the government and the large agricultural companies for exploiting the rural poor who dream of a better life.
"He was always tense" she said. "He had borrowed a lot of money for pesticides and fertilizers and now I will have to pay back his debts. Debt is the reason for all the suicides around here and it's the people in charge who are responsible for it."
Across rural India there is now widespread despair. The fields are also filling up with widows.
Activists say it is the other side of India's economic success story.
Beyond the headlines of fast growth, most of the country is still poor and is being left behind by a corrupt political class who are preoccupied with their own greed.
They point to the alarming suicide numbers to prove their point.
More than 60% of India's population still depends on the countryside for survival but with unfettered globalisation and little support from the government, the rural classes are badly exposed.
In the face of rising inflation and with no safety net, the ultimate act of desperation is often their only answer to the new world they live in.
It is a sobering fact but on average one farmer now commits suicide in India every 30 minutes.
And campaigners say the problem will only get worse without direct intervention from the government in the form of subsidies and agricultural educational programmes.http://news.sky.com/home/world-news/article/16112805
The record suicide rate among... more
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Wild cotton in Mexico has been contaminated with genetically modified material, posing a risk to biodiversity, experts say.
This worrying conclusion was reached by six scientists at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) and the National Commission for Knowledge and Use of Biodiversity (CONABIO) in a research study published this month in Molecular Ecology, an international journal.
In their article "Recent long-distance transgene flow into wild populations conforms to historical patterns of gene flow in cotton (Gossypium hirsutum) at its centre of origin", the experts showed that cotton genes and transgenes can be transferred between populations thousands of kilometres apart by seed dispersal.
They also found that varieties of Mexican wild cotton that harbour transgenes (genes from one species introduced artificially into another) undergo rapid evolution, with unpredictable consequences.
"The genetic diversity of wild populations is very high, and that of cultivated cotton is very low. Gene flow can reduce the differentiation between populations, but we have no idea what impact that might have," the head of the research project, Ana Wegier of UNAM's Ecology Institute and the National Institute of Forestry, Agriculture and Livestock Research (INIFAP) told IPS.
"What we are seeing is the effect on biodiversity of 15 years of growing transgenic crops under permits," she said.
In order to boost cotton cultivation, in decline because of the collapse of international prices and the growing dominance of synthetic fibres, in 1996 the Mexican government authorised experimental planting of genetically modified cotton, without paying heed to studies of its biological interactions in the country.
Since 2009, transgenic cotton has been grown on a commercial scale on an area of over 100,000 hectares, producing harvests of 500,000 tonnes, according to the Mexican agriculture ministry.
Cottonseed is used mainly for oil and meal for animal feed, and transport of animal feed products might explain how transgenic seeds arrived in wild cotton populations.
The six authors collected 336 plants from 36 populations between 2002 and 2008. They also analysed seeds from three Mexican locations, the U.S. states of Texas and Virginia, and from Argentina, Brazil, India and Egypt. Of the 270 samples analysed, 66 were positive for transgenes.
The scientists found that 1.4 percent of 5,985 permits to plant genetically modified cotton issued by the Mexican authorities between 1996 and the beginning of 2008 fell within the area of distribution of two wild cotton metapopulations, as collections of interacting populations of the same species are called.
A further 4.2 percent of the authorised transgenic crops were within a 300-km radius from three metapopulations. The remaining 94.4 percent were over 300 km away from all wild cotton metapopulations.
As has already happened with native maize, contamination of wild strains could occur with other transgenic crops, which are slowly spreading in this Latin American country.
This concern is shared by 16,000 beekeepers in the southeastern state of Yucatán, where U.S. agribusiness giant Monsanto has a pilot plantation of genetically modified soy covering 30,000 hectares.
Monsanto's soy has been genetically modified to confer resistance to an herbicide, glyphosate, which is sprayed on the crop to kill off non-resistant weeds.
"In the soyfields, the bees turn very aggressive and instead of returning to the hive, they die on the way back, as the glyphosate applied to the crops damages their intestines," the local coordinator of the National Union of Autonomous Regional Campesino Organisations, Pablo Duarte, told IPS.
"Our fear is that not only will the bees die, but we will not be able to sell our honey," he said.
In Mexico, some 45,000 beekeepers collect approximately 56,000 tons of honey a year. Their main market is the European Union, followed by the United States and Canada.
But the EU Court of Justice has already banned the sale of honey containing pollen contaminated by unauthorised transgenes.
The first plots of genetically modified soy were evaluated in 2008. Currently 60,000 hectares of Mexican soil are producing transgenic soy.
snip
Although seed migration out of fields of genetically modified crops may be low, the study warns that once a single or a few transgenic individuals are dispersed into particular wild populations, they produce pollen that may fertilise local wild plants.
"Since transgenes are inserted within the nuclear genome, they can be dispersed both via pollen or seed," the document says.
Genetically modified organisms "are going to contaminate all the varieties we have, and then we will have to depend on seeds from the big companies," Duarte warned.
"If we lose our native seeds, we won't have seeds to plant. That's why we are asking the government to stop the sowing of transgenic maize and soy," he said.Wild cotton in Mexico has been contaminated with genetically modified material, posing... more
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According to this article, the reality of Bt cotton in Burkina Faso in West Africa is far removed from the hyperbole. The cost of Bt cotton seed in Burkina Faso has quickly more than tripled in return for no increase in yields – exactly the opposite of the claims used to promote Bt cotton to Burkina Faso's farmers of massive increases in yield. These kinds of wildly misleading promotionals for Bt cotton are already familiar from India - see item 2 - and South Africa: http://gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/12693
EXTRACT: ...in 2003, a pro-GM propaganda campaign was launched. In all media and organised forums on the subject, we heard the fabulous promises of GMOs: four times higher yields, fourfold savings on inputs.
...The increase in the cost of the [Bt cotton] seed, from 1600 FCFA [24 Euros/34 USD] per hectare for conventional seeds last year to 54000 FCFA [82 Euros/115 USD] hectare for GM seeds this year, is not accompanied by increasing yield as was promised.
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1.Burkina Faso is a Trojan Horse for GMOs in Africa
Interview with Ousmane Tiendrébéogo, Secretary General of the National Union of Agropastoral Workers (Syntapa)
by Combat Monsanto
Journal of Alternatives, June 28 2011
Article in French: http://bit.ly/qSTmiR
[Unofficial English translation by Claire Robinson of GMWatch]
Ousmane Tiendrébéogo, Secretary General of the National Union of Workers of the Agro-Pastoral (Syntapa), and Burkina Faso cotton farmers' union activist for GMO-free Burkina Faso, has been in France for the past two weeks at the invitation of the Artisans of the Monde-Rhone Alps. Combat Monsanto took the opportunity to meet him and to examine the record of GMOs in Burkina Faso. The findings are alarming!
Combat Monsanto: Can you tell us a bit about yourself and Syntapa?
Ousmane Tiendrébéogo: I am a peasant cotton farmer in Burkina Faso and Secretary General of Syntapa. Syntapa was started in 2003, based on the observation that the National Union of Cotton Producers of Burkina Faso (UNPCB), the only organization bringing together producers, merely applied the policies of the government and completely forgot what should be its primary function – working for the interests of farmers. The Syntapa's mission is leading the fight for better compensation for farmers. In this context, Syntapa is fighting against GMOs (Bt cotton, biofortified sorghum) because, in addition to their adverse effects on health and the environment, they exacerbate the impoverishment of farmers.
CM: Can you expand on this? What does Syntapa claim with regard to GMOs?
OT: We are opposed to GMOs for several obvious reasons. The first reason is the catastrophic economic impact that the adoption of GMOs has had on farmers. The increase in the cost of the seed, from 1600 FCFA [24 Euros/34 USD] per hectare for conventional seeds last year to 54000 FCFA [82 Euros/115 USD] hectare for GM seeds this year, is not accompanied by increasing yield as was promised. Worse, the Bt cotton produces fewer seeds than the conventional variety, and is thus two times lighter in weight for the same output of fiber. Thus, peasant farmers, who are paid by the weight of their harvest, are the losers, whereas Sofitex [a state-controlled agro-industrial and commercial entity, involved in the entire cotton production cycle, including planting, ginning of seed cotton and export of cotton fiber] is the winner.
To take a concrete example: a truck full of conventional fiber weighed about 12 tons and generated 1.8 million FCFA [2748 euros] in revenue for the farmers. This same truck today, filled with the same amount of fiber, but from GM cotton, weighs 6 tons [50% less] and generates 900 000 FCFA [1374 euros, 50% less] for the farmers. This has caused significant financial losses for farmers during the first harvest of Bt cotton. Indebted farmers may have to sell their land, which will likely be bought by multinationals for monoculture export or biofuel.
Then we see an environmental impact: I saw farmers' herds of goats become seriously ill and die after GM cotton was planted in their fields. The authorities responded to this problem by ordering analyses of cotton leaves. But due to lack of funds and of independent testing bodies, the cotton samples were sent to Monsanto's own labs for testing.... Of course, the multinational, which sells Bt cotton, found nothing suspicious in the samples. We are not even sure that the analyses were even done.
Finally GMOs pose a safety problem: children have became ill through contact with the seeds and Sofitex itself advises pregnant women and children to stay away from GM seeds.
More at the link
http://en.sott.net/image/image/s3/73679/full/Nation_9_21_2009.jpgAccording to this article, the reality of Bt cotton in Burkina Faso in West Africa is... more
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql0mo-5jPbc&feature=player_embedded
A quarter of a million Indian farmers have committed suicide in the last 16 years—an average of one suicide every 30 minutes. The crisis has ballooned with economic liberalization that has removed agricultural subsidies and opened Indian agriculture to the global market. Small farmers are often trapped in a cycle of insurmountable debt, leading many to take their lives out of sheer desperation. We speak with Smita Narula of the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at New York University Law School, co-author of a new report on farmer suicides in India.
AMY GOODMAN: We turn to the issue of farmer suicides in India, where a quarter of a million farmers have committed suicide in the last 16 years. On average, that figure suggests one farmer commits suicide every 30 minutes.
Today, the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at NYU Law School will release a report called "Every Thirty Minutes: Farmer Suicides, Human Rights and the Agrarian Crisis in India."
The agricultural sector in India has become more vulnerable to global markets as a result of economic liberalization. Reforms in the country have included the removal of agricultural subsidies and the opening of Indian agriculture to the global market. These reforms have led to increased costs, while reducing yields and profits for many farmers.
As a result, small farmers are often trapped in a cycle of insurmountable debt, leading many to take their lives out of sheer desperation. The rate of suicide is highest among cotton farmers. Like other cash crops in India, the cotton industry is increasingly dominated by foreign multinational corporations that tend to promote genetically modified cottonseed and often control the cost, quality and availability of agricultural inputs.
To discuss this issue, we're joined by Smita Narula, faculty director of the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at NYU.
Welcome to Democracy Now!
SMITA NARULA: Good morning.
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about this report that you are just releasing today.
SMITA NARULA: Our major finding for this report is that all the issues that you just described are major human rights issues. And what we're faced with in India is a human rights crisis of epic proportions. The crisis affects the human rights of Indian farmers and their family members in extremely profound ways. We found that their rights to life, to water, food and adequate standard of living, and their right to an effective remedy, is extremely affected by this crisis. Additionally, the government has hard human rights legal obligations to respond to the crisis, but we've found that it has failed, by and large, to take any effective measures to address the suicides that are taking place.
AMY GOODMAN: I mean, this number is unbelievable. Thirty—every 30 minutes, an Indian farmer commits suicide?
SMITA NARULA: And that's been going on for years and years. And what these intense numbers don't reveal are two things. One is that the numbers themselves are failing to capture the enormity of the problem. In what we call a failure of information on the part of the Indian government, entire categories of farmers are completely left out of the purview of farm suicide statistics, because they don't formally own title to land. This includes women farmers, Dalit, or so-called lower caste farmers, as well as Adivasi, or tribal community farmers. In addition, the government's programs and the relief programs that they've offered fail to capture not only this broad category, but also fail to provide timely debt relief and compensation or address broader structural issues that are leading to these suicides in the country.
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about the issue of globalization and how it's affecting these farmers.
SMITA NARULA: Sure. So, basically, ultimately, the proximate cause for a number of these suicides is farmer indebtedness. What lies behind that indebtedness is two decades of market liberalization in India, which have resulted in two simultaneous processes. First, the government has withdrawn significantly from the agricultural sector. It has reduced subsidies. It has decreased access to rural credit. Irrigation is insufficient and doesn't reach most farmers who need it. And at the same time, it has encouraged a switch over to cash crop cultivation, of which cotton is one example.
Simultaneously, the market has been opened up to global competitors, which makes Indian farmers extremely vulnerable. And at the same time, foreign multinationals now dominate industries, such as the cotton industry, including dominating the key inputs that are needed for cotton. In the case of cotton, in particular, the genetically modified Bt cottonseed has been promoted so effectively in India that it now dominates the entire sector, and between its cost, quality and availability, has an enormous impact on farmer costs and profits and yields to the point that it's landing them in enormous debt. And many of them, ironically, are actually consuming the very pesticide that they went into debt to purchase, to kill themselves when they can't escape that cycle of debt.
AMY GOODMAN: They're consuming the pesticide.
SMITA NARULA: That's correct.
snip
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about genetically modified seeds and U.S. multinational corporations.
SMITA NARULA: So, genetically modified seeds. Bt cottonseed is the cottonseed input that dominates the cotton industry now. And what the genetic modification promises to do is to produce a toxin within the seed that kills a very common pest that affects the cotton crop in India. The Bt cottonseed, which is — has been marketed by Monsanto, among other multinationals, requires two resources that are already scarce for most Indian smallholder farmers. That's money and water. Bt cottonseeds cost anywhere from two times to 10 times as much as regular cottonseed, and they also require a great deal more water in order to yield successful crops. The farmers often go to private moneylenders, who charge exorbitant interest rates, to purchase the seeds, on the promises and based on aggressive marketing that they will bring greater financial security. But then, because 65 percent of cotton farms in India are rain-fed and don't have access to irrigation, the crops inevitably fail. And also, increasing drought has made that the case for many farmers. So they've gone into insurmountable debt to purchase the inputs. They don't have the yields. They repeat this cycle for a couple of seasons. And by the end of it, they're simply trapped in a cycle that they can't get out of, and they consume the very pesticide that they purchased, in order to kill themselves. And—http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql0mo-5jPbc&feature=player_embedded
A quarter... more
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These subsidies are nothing more than payola for supporting industrial fossil fuel intensive GMO agriculture. No wonder some of these farmers don't want to stop planting these crops for their GMO masters. Making over 200,000 a year in planting their crap and trashing the planet seems like a good trade off for them. Are you really a farmer then, or simply no better than a greedy selfish Goldman Sachs vampire?
And I am not as nice about this as the EWG when it comes to Congress. If you aren't a farmer who actually works the land you should not get one. Period.
Excerpt:
"This would be a good place to point out that just five crops – corn, cotton, rice wheat and soybeans – account for 90 percent of all farm subsidies. Sixty-two percent of American farmers do not receive any direct payments from the federal farm subsidy system, and that group includes most livestock producers and fruit and vegetable growers.
Among the members of the 112th Congress who collect payments from USDA are six Democrats and 17 Republicans. The disparity between the parties is even greater in terms of dollar amounts: $489,856 went to Democrats, but more than 10 times as much, $5,334,565, to Republicans.
One reason for the disproportionate number of Republican lawmakers benefiting from farm subsidy programs is the current scarcity of rural Democrats in Congress – casualties of the Tea Party wave that swept into office in November of 2010. (This was despite the Democrats’ decision to bow to the wishes of the subsidy lobby by passing a status quo 2008 farm bill in a misguided bid to hang on to those seats.)
Several new members of Congress who won with tea party support have been less than eager to talk about farm subsidies ever since the news broke last year that they, or their families, personally benefit from those very taxpayer dollars.
EWG doesn’t believe that the payments to lawmakers are improper or illegal. But the fact that so many more Republicans in Congress receive so much more in farm subsidies than their Democratic colleagues does highlight the GOP’s controversial decision to spare those programs from the budget ax – even as it slashes funding for so many others. Consider:
•In January, David Rogers of Politico, and Phillip Brasher at the Des Moines Register, reported that the Republican Study Committee proposed to eliminate the meager federal funding for an organic food growers’ program without even mentioning the the possibility of cutting spending for entitlements that send checks out to largest producers of corn, cotton and other commodity crops – regardless of need.
•Then last week (March 21), National Journal reported that the Republican-led House Agriculture Committee is backing cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program – previously known as food stamps – in the face of record enrollment levels triggered by high unemployment. But not even minimal reductions were proposed to the excessive payments to wealthy farms.
The GOP-led support for subsidies also comes at a time when big commodity farms clearly don’t need taxpayer funding.
The farm sector is white-hot, and has generally fared extremely well as recession gripped the rest of the economy. Farm income and prices for commodity crops are soaring. In 2008, $210,000 was the average household income of farms that received at least $30,000 in government payments that year. But according to the House Agriculture Committee and the Republic Study Committee, payments to those farms should stay in place while the record 43 million Americans enrolled in SNAP – millions of whom are unemployed for the first time – face slashes in the help they get to put food on the table.
It’s important to note that two of the Republican senators who collect subsidies – Charles Grassley of Iowa and Richard Lugar of Indiana – have been long-time leaders in the effort to reform federal farm programs. Both have fought to right the gross inequity of sending 74 percent of taxpayer-funded payments to the largest and wealthiest 10 percent of farm operations and landlords. The top-heavy support for the biggest operations puts smaller family farms at a serious disadvantage and works against a more diverse and resilient food production system that could stand up against wild swings in weather or global markets – and provide Americans with a healthier food supply.
Of course, Democratic members of Congress have historically been subsidy recipients too, notably former House Agriculture Committee Chairman Charles Stenholm of Texas and former Senate Agriculture Chairwoman Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas.
Nor is the phenomenon of lawmakers receiving farm subsidies limited to the federal level. Recent media reports have shown that direct payments are even more common in state legislatures in Wyoming, Wisconsin, Montana, Idaho and South Dakota.
At EWG, we believe that farmers deserve a reasonable safety net to protect against damage from drought, storms and fickle markets. But the American public’s investment portfolio in agriculture needs to change. It’s indefensible to provide subsidies to well-off farmers and landowners, especially in the face of a booming farm economy and a federal budget squeeze. Meanwhile, farmers seeking modest federal support to protect water, land and wildlife are being turned away for lack of funds.
We’re also committed advocates for government transparency, and it’s deeply disturbing that the public’s ability to see who gets what from the federal farm subsidy system has been curtailed by the Obama administration. Under the Bush administration, the rules allowed the public to see through shell corporations and paper entities to identify the part owners of subsidized farms and show where the money ended up. The transparency pertained to lawmakers as well. For this analysis EWG was forced to resort to harvesting data from members’ disclosure forms. That was an arduous but ultimately worthwhile task when advocating for greater accountability and transparency, and it didn’t use to be necessary.
Some Congress members (or their families) collecting federal farm subsidies are major players in the annual farm subsidy drama, others have only bit parts in terms of the amount of subsidies they receive. Overall, the distribution of subsidies among members of Congress reflects the highly distorted distribution of farm subsidies among farmers and landlords in the United States – between 1995 and 2009, 10 percent of subsidy recipients collected 74 percent of all subsidies.
The current salary for rank-and-file members of the House and Senate is $174,000 per year, and members enjoy robust health benefits. But whether major or bit players, members of Congress who receive farm subsidies are part of a system that cries out for reform and poses stark choices between helping wealthy landowners or doing right by struggling farm and urban families and the environment."
continuedThese subsidies are nothing more than payola for supporting industrial fossil fuel... more
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As more crops fail in India, the rate of suicides among farmers is climbing.
More than 17,368 Indian farmers killed themselves in 2009, the worst figure for farm suicides in six years, data from the National Crime Records Bureau indicate.
The suicides increased by 1,172 over the 2008 count of 16,196, bringing the total farm suicides since 1997 to 216,500.
"Poverty has assaulted rural India," journalist Palagummi Sainath, an expert on rural poverty in India, told Britain's The Independent newspaper. "Farmers who used to be able to send their children to college now can't send them to school."
Nearly all of the bereaved families of those who have committed suicide, he said, had problems with debts and land loss due to failing crops.
While the causes of poverty are complex, Sainath points to the long-term collapse of markets for farmers' produce. The price of cotton, for example, is 1-12th of the amount it was 30 years ago, in real terms. About half of the suicides are occurring in the four states of the country's Cotton Belt.
Vandana Shiva, a scientist-turned-activist, notes that the problem of farmer suicides started in 1997 when the Indian government removed cotton subsidies and genetically modified varieties of cotton were also introduced.
"Every suicide can be linked to Monsanto," Shiva told The Independent, saying that the biotech firm's modified Bt Cotton caused crop failure and poverty because it requires the use of pesticide and fertilizers.
India's increasingly erratic climate is taking a toll on Indian farmers as well.
In the past, farmers could prepare for droughts when they came every four years or so. Rajasthan, in northwestern India, only emerged from a 10-year drought this summer. And monsoons, which used to arrive once a year, have failed three times in the last 10 years across much of the country.
M.S. Swaminathan, chairman of the National Commission on Farmers, has called for a restructuring of the country's policies to help agriculture, saying the sector is entering a state of serious crisis, The Hindu newspaper reports.
Noting that 45 percent farmers in a national survey said they want to quit farming, Swaminathan said farming has become nonviable.
"Unless we revitalize farming and make our farmers enthusiastic, it is difficult to feed 1 billion people and 1 billion farm animals. It is going to be a difficult period."As more crops fail in India, the rate of suicides among farmers is climbing.
More... more
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This is insidious. There is absolutely no need for GM rice in India. There are hundreds of natural varieties of rice in India. This is simply a move to once again place farmers in predicaments with expensive patented seed that will bring monoculture to India. This is the reality of globalization regarding food.This is insidious. There is absolutely no need for GM rice in India. There are... more
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Farmers all over Vidarbha in eastern Maharashtra will stage candle-light protests on the eve of US President Barack Obama's visit Friday, seeking to draw his attention to the plight of agriculture sector in the region, an official said.
The US policy of providing huge subsidies to cotton farmers in America has triggered over 216,000 farmland suicides in India, Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti (VJAS) chief Kishor Tiwari said in a statement here Thursday.
He said that farmland widows would light a candle in all the affected villages in Vidarbha and they would make attempts to send a group of widows to Mumbai to protest Obama's visit.
'After permission was granted to commercially cultivate American Bt. Cotton, the lush green Vidarbha cotton fields became dying fields, claiming lives of more than 10,000 farmers -- who opted for this (Bt. Cotton) seed,' Tiwari said.
He said the NGO wants to inform the US president how the claims that Bt. Cotton brought genetic revolution in agriculture are a hoax and lead to distress for over three-fourths of farmers using it and an average of three suicides per day.
Tiwari pointed out that while the whole country gets ready to celebrate Diwali Friday, six farmers committed suicide in the past two days -- taking the toll to 645 in 2010Farmers all over Vidarbha in eastern Maharashtra will stage candle-light protests on... more
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This stunning European documentary available for the first time in the US reveals the consequences of GMOs worldwide from BT cotton, BT canola, GM pigs, to GM salmon, which threatens natural species in the wild. It shows how unnecessary and profit driven this technology is, and how it is interfering in the natural processes of this planet.
When you play master of the universe without respect for the nature you are interfering in, the end result cannot be good.This stunning European documentary available for the first time in the US reveals the... more
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EXTRACTS: ...in the year 2009-10 farmers cultivating cotton through organic practices earned 200% more net income than farmers who grew Genetically Engineered cotton [Bt cotton].
Bt cotton farmers... use 26 different pesticides, including pesticides targeting pests that the GE cotton is supposed to control, ... also lose financially due to their higher input costs.
In the region of Andhra Pradesh... the Bt cotton farmers incurred 65% higher debt...
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Organic farming gives Indian farmers greater financial security
http://greenpeace.in/safefood/news-blog/organic-farming-gives-indian-farmers-greater-financial-security/
Hyderabad, 15th June, 2010: A Greenpeace report released today said the monetary benefits of organic cotton farming are much greater than using the Genetically Engineered variety that makes farmers more vulnerable to financial collapse due to high debts and increased costs of cultivation.
The report titled "Picking Cotton – The choice between organic and genetically-engineered cotton for farmers in South India" shows that in the year 2009-10 farmers cultivating cotton through organic practices earned 200% more net income than farmers who grew Genetically Engineered cotton [Bt cotton].
The Greenpeace report is a comparative analysis of two methods of agriculture among cotton farmers in Andhra Pradesh. It not only shows the economic benefit of ecological farming (in this case organic) but also that Genetically Engineered (GE) cotton, despite using many toxic pesticides, still has greater crop loss to pests.
"Our study illustrates how farmers growing GE cotton face high debts and high costs of cultivation, becoming more vulnerable to financial collapses”, said Dr Reyes Tirado, Scientist, Greenpeace International, who authored the report.
Bt cotton1 farmers not only use 26 different pesticides, including pesticides targeting pests that the GE cotton is supposed to control, but also lose financially due to their higher input costs.
In the region of Andhra Pradesh the cost of cultivation is much higher for Bt cotton farmers. The Bt cotton farmers incurred 65% higher debt –accumulated during 2008/09 and 2009/10– than the non-Bt organic cotton farmers.
The farmer distress in the state had lead to the central government announcing a 5 year relief package for farmers amounting to 20,000 crores in the year 2008.
"It is preposterous that on the one hand government dolls out thousands of crores in the name of bringing relief to farmers while on the other they permit and promote Bt cotton cultivation and ensure that the farmer can never escape the debt treadmill.” said Dr G.V Ramanjaneyalu, Executive Director of Centre for Sustainable Agriculture who was present at the report release.
The controversies around Bt cotton have finally forced the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee, the agency responsible for the commercial release of GE crops in the country, to do a review of its performance since 2002, the year it was released.
"Bt cotton has only benefitted the multinational seed giants like Monsanto who has earned 1580 crore Rupees as royalty from its patented Bt cotton seed since its release" [1] said Rajesh Krishnan, sustainable agriculture campaigner with Greenpeace India. He concluded that "Cotton farming that uses ecological practices and avoids genetically engineered seeds and agrochemicals is the most beneficial for Indian farmers."EXTRACTS: ...in the year 2009-10 farmers cultivating cotton through organic practices... more
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In this monthly Monsanto Roundup courtesy of the Sustainable Agriculture Group on Current, we cover Bt cotton failure and pests, U.S. corporate shilling at Codex and strong arm tactical language against GMO critics at national biotech conference in Chicago, and a big stand planned against Monsanto by Haitian farmers for this Friday, World Environment Day. Plus some activism we can all do to stand up with Haitian farmers and farmers globally against this concerted attempt to take away our food sovereignty.
Monsanto out of our food!In this monthly Monsanto Roundup courtesy of the Sustainable Agriculture Group on... more
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A documentary on GM crops, particularly Bt cotton, in India. The film covers losses suffered by farmers, allergies, animal deaths, field trial violations, state governments asserting their rights to reject GM, regulatory failures, and successful alternatives to GM. (Time for all 5 parts: 35:33)
It's time for satyagraha.A documentary on GM crops, particularly Bt cotton, in India. The film covers losses... more
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EXTRACT: Monsanto presented GMO technology as the redemption of the cotton industry; in reality it has helped take growers to the bottom of an abyss, especially the small and medium cotton-growers of Cordoba and Tolima, who in the 2008-2009 harvest had enormous losses."
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COLOMBIA: The Failure of GM Cotton
Carmelo Ruiz Marrero
Americas Program Biodiversity Report-April 2010
http://americas.irc-online.org/am/6726#2
GM cotton has been a failure in Colombia
Genetically modified (GM) cotton from the American biotechnology company Monsanto has been a failure in Colombia, announced the organization Grupo Semillas (http://www.semillas.org.co/). Last March, the Columbian Agricultural Institute (ICA) imposed a fine on Monsanto due to the poor performance of its GM cotton, which caused losses among cotton growers in the 2008/2009 season.
"Seven years after having released the seeds of GM cotton commercially, their failure is evident," declared the Colombian organization in an article circulated by the Network for a Latin America Free of Genetically Modified Organisms (Red por una America Latina Libre de Transgénicos).
"They did not live up to promises of being more productive, nor of reducing the use of pesticides and herbicides, nor the lowering of production costs, nor the generation of greater profits for growers. Monsanto presented GMO technology as the redemption of the cotton industry; in reality it has helped take growers to the bottom of an abyss, especially the small and medium cotton-growers of Cordoba and Tolima, who in the 2008-2009 harvest had enormous losses."
Civil society was not unprepared for this news. In August 2007 the participants of the Latin American Scientific Conference of Agroecology, celebrated that month in Antioquía, Colombia, wrote an open letter to the Colombian government rejecting the approval of GM crops in the country.
In the letter, they stated that, "In Colombia, genetically modified corn and cotton will create genetic crosses with native species that will cause genetic degradation or 'superweeds' in the productive agricultural ecosystems; in the same way, cultural tradition, historically the facilitator of national food security, will be vulnerable and ruined by the irresponsible policies of the Colombian state, which measures agricultural activity in terms of productivity and increases social inequality in the Colombian rural sector, forgetting their commitment to national sovereignty starting with food as a fundamental human right."
cont.EXTRACT: Monsanto presented GMO technology as the redemption of the cotton industry;... more
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1.Bt cotton has failed admits Monsanto
2.Setback for Bt cotton; main pest develops resistance
3.Bt cotton flunks pest resistance test in Gujarat
4.Bt cotton ineffective against pest in parts of Gujarat, admits Monsanto
5.Cotton in India - Monsanto media release
NOTE: The picture now emerging about Bt cotton from pro-GM sources - Monsanto and India's Central Institute for Cotton Research - is one where:
*the main pest (bollworm) is developing resistance
*"new sucking pests have emerged as major pests causing significant economic losses"
*productivity of cotton has fallen
*pesticide expenditure has gone up
Monsanto is hyping its GM Bollgard II cotton as the answer (see item 5) but agricultural scientists are calling Monsanto's advice "ridiculous" as Bollgard II has no additional toxin to combat bollworm (item 4). In fact, US farmers recently complained about bollworms "slipping" through Bollgard II and needing to be treated with pesticides. "We were supposed to have enough control of bollworms with BGII to not have to treat for bollworms," said the farmers at a meeting with Monsanto where they pressed for a rebate on Monsanto's technology fee. Details of the meeting here: http://bit.ly/bdc3EN
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1.Bt cotton has failed admits Monsanto
Dinesh C. Sharma
India Today, March 6 2010
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/Story/86939/India/Bt+cotton+has+failed+admits+Monsanto.html
New Delhi - The ongoing debate on biotechnology crops in India took a new turn on Friday when American seed firm Monsanto disclosed that cotton pest--pink bollworm--has developed resistance to its much-touted Bt cotton variety in Gujarat.
The company has reported to the regulator, the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC), that pink bollworm has developed resistance to its genetically modified (GM) cotton variety, Bollgard I, in Amreli, Bhavnagar, Junagarh and Rajkot districts in Gujarat.
This was detected by the company during field monitoring in the 2009 cotton season.
The Bt cotton variety in question was developed using a gene--Cry1AC--derived from soil bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis. It was supposed to be resistant to pest attacks. But, of late, the pest has developed resistance to the gene.
The same gene has been used in Bt brinjal to make it resistant to pests. Bollgard cotton was cited as a great success of GM technology by Union science minister Prithviraj Chavan in his July 2009 letter to former health minister A. Ramadoss.
"Resistance is natural and expected," Monsanto said in a statement. The company blamed pink bollworm resistance to Cry1Ac protein in Gujarat to "early use of unapproved Bt cotton seeds" by farmers and "limited refuge planting". Farmers are supposed to maintain a distance between Bt cotton farms and other farms as a "refuge". It also advised farmers to take up "need-based application of insecticide sprays" and "properly manage crop residue and unopened bolls after harvest". A second generation variety, Bollgard II, introduced by Monsanto in 2006, contains two proteins, Cry1Ac and Cry2Ab.
The company says no resistance has been observed in the variety anywhere in the country, including Gujarat.
The revelation has not surprised environment action groups. "This is the pattern Monsanto has been following everywhere. Once Bollgard 1 fails, they start pushing Bollgard 2 and tell farmers to apply more pesticides. This is a vicious circle that Indian cotton farmers have got into," Devinder Sharma of Forum for Biotechnology and Food Safety said.
"There is a lesson here for Bt brinjal because the arguments in favour of the crop are same as those given for Bollgard cotton," Kavita Kuruganti of Kheti Virasat said.
In a report submitted to environment minister Jairam Ramesh, K.R. Kranthi of the Central Institute for Cotton Research had cautioned about the likely failure of Bt cotton. "Farmers are not following the recommended 'refugia'. With about 90 per cent area under Bt cotton, bollworms can develop resistance soon. The concern needs to be addressed on priority before it is too late," the report says.1.Bt cotton has failed admits Monsanto
2.Setback for Bt cotton; main pest develops... more
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