tagged w/ GM Seeds
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The Justice Department is investigating whether Monsanto Co. violated antitrust rules in trying to expand its dominance of the market for genetically engineered crops.
Monsanto has provided interviews and documents to the Justice Department, company spokesman Lee Quarles said. He said the department has questioned Monsanto about its marketing tactics in the biotech seed industry, which have become a target of criticism.
Quarles said Monsanto has done nothing illegal and is cooperating with the department.
"We definitely stand behind our business," he said.
At issue is how the world's largest seed company sells and licenses its patented genes. Monsanto has licensing agreements with seed companies that let those companies insert Monsanto genes into about 96 percent of U.S. soybean crops and 80 percent of all corn crops.
Monsanto's rivals allege that the company uses the licensing agreements to squeeze competitors and control smaller seed companies — an allegation Monsanto denies.
The inquiry into St. Louis-based Monsanto is part of a previously announced Justice Department investigation of consolidation in the seed industry.
A department spokeswoman declined to confirm or deny the investigation. But the department has interviewed two of Monsanto's biggest rivals, Delaware-based DuPont and Swiss biotech firm Syngenta AG, about Monsanto's business practices. Both companies said they are cooperating with the probe.
At least two states, Iowa and Texas, are conducting their own antitrust investigations of Monsanto. Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller is investigating Monsanto's marketing practices, said Eric Tabor, Miller's chief of staff. Tabor declined to comment further.
And Texas is conducting its own inquiry, according to two people with direct knowledge of the investigation.
Quarles said Monsanto is cooperating with both states.
Syngenta and DuPont have sued Monsanto over the licensing agreements, alleging they violate U.S. antitrust law. Syngenta filed its lawsuit in 2004 and settled the case last year. DuPont filed suit last summer; the case is pending in federal court in St. Louis.
DuPont spokesman Dan Turner and Syngenta spokesman Paul Minehart declined to comment beyond saying the companies are cooperating with the Justice Department investigation.The Justice Department is investigating whether Monsanto Co. violated antitrust rules... more
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mae37
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2 years ago
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President Obama's antitrust chief Christine Varney has promised rigorous enforcement of antitrust law with a special focus on the agricultural sector. She should start with the worst of the worst, Monsanto. Sign the petition to demand that Varney immediately open an investigation into Monsanto and its abusive business practices.
Sign the petition today! Join thousands of people asking Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust Christine Varney to investigate Monsanto.
Your name will be added to the following petition letter.
Thank you!President Obama's antitrust chief Christine Varney has promised rigorous... more
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Unfortunately, it is impossible to verify that genetically modified crops perform as advertised. That is because agritech companies have given themselves veto power over the work of independent researchers.
To purchase genetically modified seeds, a customer must sign an agreement that limits what can be done with them. (If you have installed software recently, you will recognize the concept of the end-user agreement.) Agreements are considered necessary to protect a company’s intellectual property, and they justifiably preclude the replication of the genetic enhancements that make the seeds unique. But agritech companies such as Monsanto, Pioneer and Syngenta go further. For a decade their user agreements have explicitly forbidden the use of the seeds for any independent research. Under the threat of litigation, scientists cannot test a seed to explore the different conditions under which it thrives or fails. They cannot compare seeds from one company against those from another company. And perhaps most important, they cannot examine whether the genetically modified crops lead to unintended environmental side effects.
Research on genetically modified seeds is still published, of course. But only studies that the seed companies have approved ever see the light of a peer-reviewed journal. In a number of cases, experiments that had the implicit go-ahead from the seed company were later blocked from publication because the results were not flattering.
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It would be chilling enough if any other type of company were able to prevent independent researchers from testing its wares and reporting what they find—imagine car companies trying to quash head-to-head model comparisons done by Consumer Reports, for example. But when scientists are prevented from examining the raw ingredients in our nation’s food supply or from testing the plant material that covers a large portion of the country’s agricultural land, the restrictions on free inquiry become dangerous...
by Editors of Scientific AmericanUnfortunately, it is impossible to verify that genetically modified crops perform as... more
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Imagine that a storm blows across your garden and that now, without your knowledge and without your consent, foreign and genetically-manipulated seeds are in your vegetable patch which you have nourished and maintained for many years. A few days later, representatives of a multi-national corporate group pay you a visit at home, demand that you surrender your vegetables - and simultaneously file a criminal complaint against you, resulting in a fine of
€ 20.000,00 for the illegal use of patented and genetically-manipulated seeds.
What's more: The court finds for the corporate group!
Yet you fight backImagine that a storm blows across your garden and that now, without your knowledge and... more
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A new bill before the Senate would create a federal mandate for genetically modified (GM) crop research as part of U.S. aid programs, despite evidence that these crops will fail to curb hunger.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved the sweet-sounding Global Food Security Act (SB 384) last month with little fanfare. The legislation, also known as the Lugar-Casey Act for the bill's authors Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) and Robert Casey (D-PA), includes a provision sought after by aid groups that would allow food aid to be purchased — at least in part, locally. The bill aims to reform aid programs to focus on longer-term agricultural development, and restructure aid agencies to better respond to crises. While the focus on hunger is commendable, funding for agricultural development — some $7.7 billion worth of it — under the proposed law would be directed in large part to genetically modified crop research.
The bill is proving to be divisive among aid groups. But according to a new report by Food First that I co-authored, this bill is not an isolated piece of legislation, but a coordinated roll-out of the "new Green Revolution," — a project that includes the Gates Foundation's multi-billion dollar Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA). In fact, the legislation is based on an industry-friendly report funded by the Gates Foundation. Initiated by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs in fall of 2008 and drafted by the end the year, the hastily prepared report on which the new law is based calls for increasing research funding for biotechnology.
In contrast, the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge Science, and Technology for Development (IAASTD), a recent four-year study conducted by the World Bank and the Food and Organization (FAO) in consultation with more than 400 scientists and development experts, reached the opposite conclusions. The IAASTD found that reliance on resource-extractive industrial agriculture is unsustainable, particularly in the face of worsening climate, energy, and water crises. And it concluded that expensive, short-term technical fixes — including GM crops — don't adequately address the complex challenges of the agricultural sector and often exacerbate social and environmental harm. The IAASTD called for land reform, agro-ecological techniques (proven to enhance farmers' adaptive capacity and resilience to environmental stresses such as climate change and water scarcity), building local economies, local control of seeds, and farmer-led participatory breeding programs.
Evidence in favor of these alternatives is building. A 2008 study by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development found that "organic agriculture can be more conducive to food security in Africa than most conventional production systems, and…it is more likely to be sustainable in the long term." Numerous studies have documented these alternatives' ability not only to raise yield — but reduce poverty and inequality, the root cause of hunger.
The Lugar-Casey Act represents the biggest project in agriculture since the original Green Revolution industrialized farming in the 1950s and 1960s. The first Green Revolution increased global food production by 11% in a very short time, but per capita hunger also increased equally as much. How could this be? Green Revolution technologies are expensive. The fertilizers, seeds, pesticides, and machinery needed to cash in on productive gains put the technology out of reach of most small farmers, increasing the divide between rich and poor in the developing world. Poor farmers were driven out of business and into poverty-stricken urban slums.A new bill before the Senate would create a federal mandate for genetically modified... more
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In this Briefing, we look at how the US's agricultural reconstruction work in Afghanistan and Iraq not only gives easy entry to US agribusiness and pushes neoliberal policies, something that has always been a primary function of US development assistance, but is also an intrinsic part of the US military campaign in these countries and the surrounding regions.
Seen together with the growing clout that the US and its corporate allies exercise over donor agencies and global bodies - such as the World Bank, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) centres, which influence the food and farm policies adopted by the recipient countries - this is an alarming development.
These are not unique cases born from unusual circumstances, but constitute a likely template for US activities overseas, as it continues to expand its "war on terror" and pursues US corporate interests.
[Excerpt:]
Multinational companies move into farming
Soya has never been grown in Afghanistan and it doesn't form part of the country's culinary tradition, but a new programme, supposedly devised to combat malnutrition, plans to change all that. 1 USAID has funded Nutrition and Education International (NEI), set up by Nestle, to teach Afghans to sow and eat soya beans. 2 NEI is linked to the World Initiative for Soy in Human Health (WISHH),3 which was founded by the American Soybean Association (ASA) in 2000,4 to organise the distribution of free soya milk to pregnant women and infants throughout the developing world. WISHH works with the North American Millers' Association (NAMA), whose members include global giants ADM, Bunge Milling and ConAgro. In Afghanistan NEI works with Stine Seed Company, Iowa, and Gateway Seed Company, Illinois, both of which supply it with genetically modified Roundup soya and Roundup-Ready herbicide to be sold on to the farmers. According to NEI, it distributed two tonnes of genetically modified soya seed in Afghanistan in 2005.In this Briefing, we look at how the US's agricultural reconstruction work in... more
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IMMEDIATE RELEASE (November 13, 2008)
(Los Angeles, CA.) - A long-term feeding study commissioned by the Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety, managed by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Health, Family and Youth, and carried out by Veterinary University Vienna, confirms genetically modified (GM) corn seriously affects reproductive health in mice. Non-GMO advocates, who have warned about this infertility link along with other health risks, now seek an immediate ban of all GM foods and GM crops to protect the health of humankind and the fertility of women around the world.
Feeding mice with genetically modified corn developed by the US-based Monsanto Corporation led to lower fertility and body weight, according to the study conducted by the University of Veterinary Medicine in Vienna. Lead author of the study Professor Zentek said, there was a direct link between the decrease in fertility and the GM diet, and that mice fed with non-GE corn reproduced more efficiently.
In the study, Austrian scientists performed several long-term feeding trials over 20 weeks with laboratory mice fed a diet containing 33% of a GM variety (NK 603 x MON 810), or a closely related non-GE variety used in many countries. Statistically significant litter size and pup weight decreases were found in the third and fourth litters in the GM-fed mice, compared to the control group.
The corn is genetically modified with genes that produce a pesticidal toxin, as well as genes that allow it to survive applications of Monsanto’s herbicide Roundup.
A book by author Jeffrey M. Smith, Genetic Roulette, distributed to members of congress last year, documents 65 serious health risks of GM products, including similar fertility problems with GM soy and GM corn: Offspring of rats fed GM soy showed a five-fold increase in mortality, lower birth weights, and the inability to reproduce. Male mice fed GM soy had damaged young sperm cells. The embryo offspring of GM soy-fed mice had altered DNA functioning. Several US farmers reported sterility or fertility problems among pigs and cows fed on GM corn varieties. Additionally, over the last two months, investigators in India have documented fertility problems, abortions, premature births, and other serious health issues, including deaths, among buffaloes fed GM cottonseed products.
MORE IN LINKIMMEDIATE RELEASE (November 13, 2008)
(Los Angeles, CA.) - A long-term feeding... more
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Satyagraha, a non violent method of civil disobedience wherein participants bypass all laws that seek to deprive them of the basic necessities of life (food, water, shelter, medicine, a sustainable planet, freedom.) Gandhi started such a satyagraha when thousands marched to the sea risking beatings to collect salt on their own in defiance of the British and their tax on it. Dr. Vandana Shiva is now defying the laws of those seeking to patent and own the very seeds of life themselves with a seed satyagraha to speak out for our right to environmental democracy.
What Monsanto and other companies are doing in monopolizing seed is a crime of immense proportions in regards to denying freedom and environmental biodiversity which threatens life. But there are ways to move around their schemes to control our food and water. The wisdom of Gandhi and great advocates of freedom, peace, and environmental democracy like Dr. Shiva are greatly needed in our world now.
Make no mistake about it, Monsanto cares not for your health or for feeding you. They care about profit at any cost even at the expense of the sustainability and biodiveristy of this planet.
Would I walk to the sea risking beating to show my support for food democracy and having a sustainable planet for the future in defiance of Monsanto and all those seeking to deny it to me? Damn right I would. Would you?
Thank you Dr. Vandana Shiva for being a voice of truth, wisdom, and freedom for so many people around this world.Satyagraha, a non violent method of civil disobedience wherein participants bypass all... more
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another possible first... an organic fruit and vegetable garden to replace part of the south facing White House lawn.
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"...Claire Strader won the most votes in a national online election to name candidates to fill the role of "White House Farmer."
"Strader's name will be forwarded to President Barack Obama, along with the names of the second- and third-place finishers -- Carrie Anne Little of Mother Earth Farm, in Puyallup, Wash., and Margaret Lloyd of Home Farming in Davis, Calif. -- for consideration."
"This new post would be charged with implementing what could turn out to be your most symbolically resonant step in building a new American food culture. And that is this: tear out five prime south-facing acres of the White House lawn and plant in their place an organic fruit and vegetable garden."another possible first... an organic fruit and vegetable garden to replace part of the... more
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Are we setting ourselves up for a health catastrophe in the future? To allow GM foods to go out freely into our market and our environment without adequate testing is opening a pandora's box to a possible epidemic of illnesses due to GM foods. It may take another twenty years before the real consequences of this technology is known, or to concede we may not see any. However, without the proper testing and oversight we will never know and that is simply unacceptable.Are we setting ourselves up for a health catastrophe in the future? To allow GM foods... more
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Kudos to the author of this article. Yes, Obama, just what are you thinking by supporting biotechnology and in essence then supporting Monsanto and their attempts to starve this world and keep poor farmers at their mercy? Do you think the farmers of Africa are unqualified to know what they want and need? To know the difference between natural food and biocrap for profit? Just why are you supporting the ethanol lobby that is starving people over the right course? Why are you bowing down to corporations when you claimed we would have change? It is an insult to think you think we need to foist this patented poison on the people of Africa who know better what they want than you or Monsanto.
Why don-t you go to the World Bank, the WTO, and the IMF and tell them what these farmers really need? Why would you sell out people in your native Kenya to Monsanto and other agribusiness companies? These farmers in Africa, South America, Asia, and elsewhere INCLUDING America need self determination and the ability to grow the traditional BIODIVERSE food they wish to grow which is what NATURE INTENDED and has been the way of agriculture for centuries.
And nations of this world need ACCESS to food that the rich nations of this world HOLD UP to keep prices high. It is not a problem of not enough food, it is a problem of political interference and a lack of access due to that intereference. How disappointing to think that you may just well turn out to be no different on this than Bush was at a time when food and water insecurity will be crucial to the lives of millions of people worldwide. We do not need a subtle rehashing of Bush agriculture policy. We need someone who will stand up to the agencies and organizations that have done nothing but place these countries in poverty with their skewed food policies and their loans with privitization stipulations attached to keep these countries in perpetual poverty and war. If Monsanto and other multi nationals are allowed to control the seeds of this world, the results of it will also rest in your hands.Kudos to the author of this article. Yes, Obama, just what are you thinking by... 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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Following similar actions by the Scottish Government and the Welsh Assembly, agriculture ministers from the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland have confirmed their plans for the entire island to be declared a GM-free zone.
The ministers announced their plan at the Terra Madre Ireland 2008 conference on food and farming policy in September.
The Irish Minister of State for Food and Horticulture, Trevor Sargent, emphasized the pitfalls of GMOs in agriculture, and also pointed out the opportunity available to Ireland in the controversy- ' the option for us in Ireland is very clear: Ireland- the food island. We can sell that! The green clean food island-they really want that in Germany . Anywhere you go where our main markets are, they want that green clean food island. How about if Bord Bia [the Irish food Board] tries to sell Ireland- the GM laboratory? I wonder how that would go down.'
The Northern Ireland Minister for Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Michelle Geldernew, said, 'We must protect the diversity of both plants and animals, and avoid damaging natural resources and contributing to climate change. Once we go down the GM route there is no going back: we need to keep Ireland GM-free.'
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At least we will have the natural beauty of Ireland, Scotland and Wales untouched by Monsanto s demon seeds. So if you are shopping and want to buy imported foods that are GMO free, Ireland may just be your best bet.
go raibh míle maith agat.Following similar actions by the Scottish Government and the Welsh Assembly,... more
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They may be moving to do so but they are coming up against much resistance from farmers, consumers, and various organizations that see their patenting of seeds for what it is: a move to control food and water to exploit the poor and this planet for profit.The encouraging news is that more people every day are waking up to the truth about our food and buying locally, growing food themselves, and fighting back. And we must fight back. Our future depends on it.
From article:
New report warns of corporate concentration, commodification of nature; highlights global resistance grounded in 'Food Sovereignty.'
ETC Group today releases a 48-page report, 'Who Owns Nature?' on corporate concentration in commercial food, farming, health and the strategic push to commodify the planet's remaining natural resources.
In a world where market research is becoming increasingly proprietary and pricey, ETC Group's report names names, discloses market share and provides top 10 industry rankings up and down the corporate food chain. Not all the corporations identified in ETC Group's new report are household names, but collectively they control a staggering share of the commercial products found on industrial farms, in our refrigerators and medicine cabinets.
An international advocacy organization based in Canada, ETC Group has been monitoring corporate power in the industrial life sciences for the past 30 years. The report reveals that:
From thousands of seed companies and public breeding institutions three decades ago, 10 companies now control more than two-thirds of global proprietary seed sales From dozens of pesticide companies three decades ago, 10 now control almost 90% of agrochemical sales worldwide From almost 1,000 biotech start-ups 15 years ago, 10 companies now account for three-quarters of industry revenues The top 10 pharmaceutical companies control 55% of the global drug market
With collapsing systems - eco, climate, food and financial - as the backdrop, Who Owns Nature? warns that, with engineering of living organisms at the nano-scale (a.k.a. synthetic biology), industry is setting the stage for a corporate grab that extends to all of nature.
'About one-quarter of the world's biomass has already been commodified, explains ETC Group's Pat Mooney.'With extreme genetic engineering, we're seeing new corporate strategies to capture and commodify the three-quarters of the world's biomass that has, until now, remained beyond the market economy.'
snip
Who Owns Nature? reports on daunting trends in corporate concentration and technology convergence, but it also points to a very different reality and a powerful contrast to the corporate-controlled life sciences. Although a single company - Monsanto - accounts for almost one-quarter of proprietary seed sales, about three-quarters of the world's farmers routinely save seed from their harvest and grow locally-bred varieties. Wal-Mart may be the world's largest buyer and seller of retail food, but 85% of global food is consumed close to where it is grown - much of it outside the formal market system.
'There is vast and growing resistance to the dislocation and devastation caused by the agro-industrial food system,' points out Silvia Ribeiro of ETC Group. 'In the global struggle for Food Sovereignty, the playing field isn't level, but the scope of resistance is massive - peasant farmers, fisher people, pastoralists and allied civil society and social movements are fighting for locally controlled and socially just food and health systems.'
To download the full report:
http://www.etcgroup.orgThey may be moving to do so but they are coming up against much resistance from... more
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With pollen from Monsanto's genetically engineered Roundup Ready sugar beets in the wind, gardeners must get to know their seed suppliers if they're going to keep their vegetable beds free from genetically engineered DNA.
"Similar to how the food scares like E. coli in spinach and peppers have driven people to get closer to their source of food, the concern about genetically engineered seed and pollen spreading around means that you need to know where your seed comes from," said Tom Stearns, owner and president of High Mowing Organic Seeds in Wolcott, Vt. "You need to have a relationship with the company, and make sure that the company itself knows where their seed is coming from."
Sugar beets, chard and table beets can pollinate one another. Couple that with the tendency of genetically engineered pollen and seed to ignore the boundaries we set for them, and the fact that seed for all three crops is grown primarily in Oregon's Willamette Valley, and there is real concern that we'll soon be tending genetically contaminated chard and beets in the backyard.
Simply buying organic chard and table beet seed won't ensure that the seed has not been contaminated. Though the National Organic Program prohibits certified organic seed from containing genetically engineered DNA, unless a seed company is testing for genetic contamination, the company won't know whether its seed was cross-pollinated by genetically engineered sugar beets.
Gardeners must question seed companies about how they are isolating their seed fields from genetically engineered sugar beet seed fields, and whether they are testing their chard and table beet seed.
"The best way to make sure that you're not buying seed contaminated by genetically engineered DNA is to buy organic seed from a reputable source," Stearns said. "You need to be buying from a company who is either doing testing, or doing field inspections, or who has as direct a relationship to where they're sourcing seed as possible."
Resources
All three of these sources for organic chard and beet seed are testing their chard and table beet seed for contamination by genetically engineered DNA.
High Mowing Organic Seeds
76 Quarry Road
Wolcott, VT 05680
(802) 472-6174
http://www.highmowingseeds.com
Seeds of Change
P.O. Box 15700
Santa Fe, NM 87592
(888) 762-7333
http://www.seedsofchange.com
Wild Garden Seed
P.O. Box 1509
Philomath, OR 97370
(541) 929-4068
http://www.wildgardenseed.com
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Transgenic contamination is not just confined to open fields and the seeds grown in them. The contamination can spread even to the seeds you buy as a gardener. Knowing where the seeds you buy come from is an important step to preventing GM pollution from spreading to your own backyard garden.With pollen from Monsanto's genetically engineered Roundup Ready sugar beets in... more
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The above paragraphs summarize published data that clearly show the following:
(1) Compounds structurally related to a common small molecule can have a lethal effect when present as even a minor contaminant in a food supplement.
(2) The GM enhancement of a metabolic pathway by the overexpression of genes for that pathway can have unpredictable consequences in the form of synthesizing a toxin.
(3) Finally, in the case of golden rice, it is argued that biologically active compounds derived from aberrant plant carotenoid synthesis could have profound effects on human development.
Similar arguments can be made for NEP-derived fatty acids that are directly incorporated into brain lipids and about NEPs overproducing vitamin E. Aberrant fatty acid composition of brain lipids is implicated in Alzheimer’s disease,45,46 and vitamin E has a role similar to RA in mammalian development.47 The excess consumption of a nutrient can also have negative effects. For example, a clinical trial with vitamin E supplementation showed that a relatively small dose increased the risk of heart failure,48 and smokers who supplemented their diet with -carotene had an increased risk of lung cancer.49 Therefore, there is a potential for nutrient toxicity in NEPs because upper tolerable levels of many nutrients are not well established (p. 107)35 and are likely to vary between individuals and lifestyles.
The information presented here shows that not only the potential harm of the product should be considered for risk assessment, but the GM process itself. The data clearly invalidate the argument that "the regulatory trigger for risk assessment should be based upon the physical features of the product rather than the process by which the product was generated."50 While it is true that traditional breeding methods can give rise to potentially hazardous products, the most recent assessment of GM food safety by the National Research Council35 stated that GM “has a higher probability of producing unanticipated changes than some genetic modification methods" (p. 118), but it curiously concludes by stating that the risk of GM technology is no greater than conventional breeding methods.
There are, in fact, no data comparing the food safety profiles of GM versus conventional breeding, and the ubiquitous argument that since there is no evidence that GM products make people sick, they are safe (see, for example, McHughen and Smyth,50 Bradford et al.,51 and Miller et al.52) is both illogical and false. There are, again, simply no data or even valid assays to support this contention.53 Without proper epidemiological studies, most types of harm will not be detected, and no such studies have been conducted.
The necessity of labeling all GM products and particularly NEPs is therefore critical if there is any hope of monitoring adverse health consequences due to their consumption. For example, it would have been impossible to identify the source of the toxic tryptophan supplement if the product were not traceable through labeling. It follows that before NEPs producing biologically active molecules such as -carotene, omega-3 fatty acids, or vitamin E are introduced into the food chain, great care must be taken to do rigorous, multigenerational animal safety assessments with the hope of identifying risks to health (for methods, see, for example, the 2007 publication by the National Toxicology Program54 and Pusztai and Bardocz55). In addition, the products must be labeled and traceable, and the unpredictable and unintended metabolic changes that may occur in NEPs require the thorough testing of the entire edible portion of the plant, not just the designated product as is almost always done by biotech companies...
David R. Schubert
Cellular Neurobiology Laboratory, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, California
JOURNAL OF MEDICINAL FOOD
J Med Food 11 (4) 2008, 000–000
The above paragraphs summarize published data that clearly show the following:
(1)... 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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That's a lot of poison in our rivers, streams, food, air and stomachs. Poison for profit. That should be their slogan. And why are these profits so high? Well, because they have bought up close to 90% of the global seed market thus forcing farmers to sign their bogus contracts holding them to buying their seeds and poison every year. They cannot save the seeds, and they have to buy the poison sprays with the seeds yearly. And the pesticides sprayed on crops made by these companies have also been found in higher levels in beehives, suggesting that it is possible that when bees have tried to pollinate GM crops they carry these pesticides back to the hives which makes them sick, thus causing them to desert the hives. Imagine what their seeds with built in pesticides can do for your salad!
And yet, the FDA states there is no difference between this poison and the conventional crops that farmers once grew and could regrow with saved seeds as has been the tradition in agriculture since ancient times. That way they also get out of responsibility from labelling the food you eat. That way you don't know the poisons you are consuming. And even if you are an organic farmer, chances are your crops have also been poisoned by their transgenic pollution. Even without selling you the seeds, you are a part of their big happy poison family.
Oh, and of course, these fake seeds with the poison centers are feeding the world! Don't pay attention to all of the starving people in Haiti, Africa, Asia and elsewhere. Don't let the real truth blind you to their propaganda... profit is good even at the expense of morality, truth, and this planet. That's the Monsanto way.
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From the entry noted:
Monsanto positions itself as a green company.
"Using the tools of modern biology," its website informs us, "we help farmers grow more yield sustainably so they can produce more and conserve more."
Compare that twaddle to this bit from Monsanto's announcement on Tuesday:
[Monsanto's Chief Financial Officer Terry] Crews will indicate that Monsanto's Roundup® and other glyphosate-based herbicides business is on track to be above $1.9 billion of gross profit for the 2008 fiscal year, ahead of the previous forecast. Wow. Nearly $2 billion in profit, from Roundup alone. As recently as February, Monsanto was expecting to make $1.4 billion from its herbicide division this year. I guess farmers applied it even more copiously than expected.
But the company isn't just churning out profit by peddling weed-killer. Its seeds are doing pretty well, too -- particularly corn:
Crews will also note that for the 2008 fiscal year, the company's corn business should exceed $2 billion in gross-profit generation for the first time. Interesting. So it makes nearly as much on herbicide as it does on corn seeds. (Overall, the company expects to make $3.8 billion on seeds in '08).
Investors applauded Monsanto's announcement, sending shares up 7.5 percent Tuesday.
I wonder if they're being short-sighted. Monsanto's success rests on Roundup Ready technology -- selling seeds genetically engineered to withstand heavy doses of its flagship herbicide.
But Roundup-tolerant weeds (so-called "superweeds") are on the rise. Eventully, farmers will have to shift away from Roundup -- Monsanto's $1.8 billion cash cow.
Meanwhile, Bayer is rolling out a new line of herbicide-tolerant seeds, this one designed to withstand doses of Bayer's glufosinate herbicide. Ain't the agrichemical industry grand?
That's a lot of poison in our rivers, streams, food, air and stomachs. Poison for... more
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(That was) then
When I was a boy growing up here outside of Langdon, everything on the farm belonged to my family.
At about the age of ten, Dad taught me how to raise hogs. The sows we grew from Hampshire gilts were ours. So was the alfalfa field where we grew hay and hog pasture. Planted to Vernal seed (a public variety), it was where piglets played and slept in the warm summer sun. The wheat field we harvested later that summer was planted to Gage seed, another public variety. We harvested that wheat in July, then sold some for seed and some for grain. Dad saved seed for next years crop, and Mother cooked a little into breakfast cereal and even ground some flour.
After the wheat harvest, we mowed the stubble and baled the straw. The same pigs that grazed the alfalfa were farrowed and later bedded in our wheat straw as the days grew cooler, and Dad fed the shoats our own corn.
When we fed the hogs Dad told me about how he used to go to the corncrib and select ears of open pollinated seed corn from the thousands he had there. He told me how he'd sort through them and choose only the very best of what he'd grown.
And then he told me about how single cross seed corn had replaced open pollinated varieties that he had planted since he was a boy on his father's farm, where everything they grew belonged to them.
The open pollinated ears of corn from Dad 's crib were never worth more than about a penny apiece.
The cloth sacks that held the first single cross seeds he planted still rest in the attic of my home. Most of the seed company imprints on the sacks would be unrecognizable to young farmers today, but they tell a story that is very up-to-date. It is a story of progress, a story of consolidation, and a story of control.
Even as privatized seed came into being, competition made it difficult for one seed company to dominate another. Seed sales depended simply on appearance, the hybrid's ability to withstand stress, its harvestability, marketing, and most of all yield.
Those were the basic parameters of operating a successful hybrid seed company. Farmers might spend a little more for the very best hybrid, but the bottom line was always about profit on the farm. For a hybrid to be good, it had to be profitable because, after all, the profits belonged to the farmers who grew the crops.
snip
(Then came) Monsanto
The seed company where I bought my first private soybean variety seed was purchased lock, stock, and barrel, by Monsanto.
Monsanto was the first commercial company to patent seed, and first to aggressively enforce its rights as a patent holder of living things.
Monsanto has actively sued many farmers for seed patent infringement. Given the power of a billion dollars in earnings, Monsanto never loses a case. Right or wrong, the company can afford to maintain lawsuits in the courts for years. Eventually, farmers who may or may not have done what they were accused of are forced to capitulate or spend the farm to defend themselves.
Thanks to higher land costs and higher prices for petroleum, machinery, chemicals, fertilizer and seed, the cost to grow an acre of soybeans now approaches $500 per acre.
The 2008 national average soybean yield is predicted to be 40.5 bushels per acre -- or about the same yield I got from the public varieties I planted nearly 40 years ago.
At today's price of about $12 per bushel, an average acre of soybeans is worth $486 [barely a break-even price before federal subsidies.]
As a commercial grower who produces soybeans for the price of $12 per bushel, I haven't simply lost the right to plant my own seed.
I may also have lost the right to earn a profit.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
What Monsanto is doing to farming and the livelihoods of farmers is nothing less than a crime. And for those who wanted proof of that, there it is straight out of the farmer's pen.(That was) then
When I was a boy growing up here outside of Langdon, everything on... more
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