THE GMO SCRAPBOOK: PUSHBACK FROM FARMERS IN INDIA AGAINST GMOs GROWS

Recently I blogged about the fact that at an official level at least, India seems to have bitten into the GMO apple. More recently, the USA and India have concluded negotiations for joint space missions between the two countries, including some Martian efforts. From where I sit, this looks like more attempts by the West to attempt to pry India out of the BRICSA bloc, a point driven home by the fact that of all the BRICSA nations, India has been the most welcoming to GMO crops.

But there's an ugly side to this story, one that gets little attention in the lamestream media of the West: Indian farmers have been committing suicide in their hundreds, as their nations agriculture is consolidated into the hands of agribusiness giants, and their small family farms disappear.

However, there is finally some hopeful signs of pushback:

GMO Agribusiness in India: Grassroots Action against Monsanto, Cargill, Sygenta

You'll note that the article calls into question the corporately controlled spin being placed on the story of Indian farmer suicides:

A 2011 report published by the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice (CHRGJ) claimed the sale of expensive genetically modified seeds to rural Indian farmers was a key factor contributing to the growing suicide crisis. 

“Multinational agribusiness corporations took advantage of India’s new market globalization … by aggressively promoting the introduction of genetically modified seeds in Indian agriculture,” said the report.

But then counters by claiming:

But in 2008, the International Food Policy Research Institute, an alliance of 64 governments, private foundations, and international and regional organizations that aims to end hunger in the developing world, reached an entirely different conclusion. 

“It is not only inaccurate, but simply wrong to blame the use of Bt cotton as the primary cause of farmer suicides in India,” said the report, stating that the introduction of Bt cotton in India had actually been effective in producing higher yields and decreasing pesticide usage by nearly 40%.

The credibility and objectivity of the “International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPR),” particularly in regards to the use of Bt cotton in India, is compromised by the fact that its donors list is dominated by organizations of which Monsanto and other GMO purveyors fund directly.

For example, the “Better Cotton Initiative” which funds the IFPR is in turn backed by big-agri giant Cargill. Another IFPR donor is Crop Life International, which in turn is funded by BASF, Bayer, Dow AgroSciences, DuPont, Monsanto, Syngenta, and others. The laundering of big-agri cash and support through proxy organizations to conceal their involvement only further raises suspicion regarding the integrity and veracity of the IFPR’s contradictory report – a report that just so happens to define reality in terms that suits big business." (All emphases in the original)

We've seen this behavior before, and it is a signal of the profound lack of any spiritual or human values in the agribusiness giants, for human lives and tragedies are being "explained", or rather, explained away, in self-serving justifications for their narcissistic corporate sense of entitlement. On a lesser scale of importance, but important nonetheless, is once again this behavior is being used to corrupt science itself, to corrupt the truth itself, while spinning a web of unreality around the whole story.

That's how toxic and poisonous the issue has become.

But India's farmers have had enough, and are beginning to fight back against the monstrous practice of these corporations and their reckless assault on natural biodiversity, and the natural seeds that have been through careful agronomical practice, cultivated over centuries:

" The above mentioned farmers’ wishlist is just one of many direct actions being pursued by grassroots activists across India. The growing backlash against big-agri is what necessitates the elaborate and expensive deceptions Monsanto and others in big-agri have found themselves increasingly dependent on for increasingly tenuous results.

 "Events like New Delhi’s “National Seeds Festival” raise awareness of the already existent biodiversity found across India and facilitate networking between organic farmers. The Hindu reported in its article, “Sovereign seeds showcase unique biodiversity,” that:

'The farmers announced the formation of a National Seed Savers Forum to strengthen conservation and breeding. They plan to impress upon the government the need to promote diversity conservation and prevent bio-piracy and corporate monopolisation.

"It also added:

'Dr. Deb said indigenous farmers have paddy varieties that are rich in Vitamin B, but the government ignores them and goes for the GM Golden rice variety being developed by Monsanto. He lamented that nutritious foods, crops and millets are being allowed to disappear. 

“'We have displayed the richness of India’s biodiversity and seed sovereignty here in the city so that the urban class can appreciate what we have and understand what we stand to lose,” said Kavitha Kuruganti of the Alliance for Sustainable and Holistic Agriculture. “Millets,” she said, “were wiped out because the government is promoting cereals.” 

"Like elsewhere, organic farmers realize that the government has been, and most likely always will be bent to the will of both domestic and foreign corporate-financier special interests. Getting organized and engaging in increasing degrees of direct action is the only way to influence public perception and protect both their own livelihoods as well as the genetic heritage of their nation’s agricultural resources."(Boldface emphasis added, all other emphases in the original)

In other words, farmers in India have started to utilize their freedoms to start their own seed banks of heirloom seeds. We can, of course, expect the inevitable corporate backlash against this, as they will seek laws making this either illegal, or through the imposition of fees, financially unprofitable. In doing so, they will only expose their own unjustified entitlement and corruption even more. With falling yields evident in GMO crops, increased use of pesticides to make them profitable, it is perhaps time to reexamine their whole track record of performance and more importantly, the mercentilist privileges that surround the purveyors of GMOs.

This comes at a time when the agribusiness sharks have begun to feed off each other, initiating lawsuits against each other... but that's another story for another day.

For the moment, take note: India's farmers are beginning to fight back. And for that, we can all be grateful.

See you on the flip side...

(My thanks to Mr. M.D. for sharing this important article)

Joseph P. Farrell

Joseph P. Farrell has a doctorate in patristics from the University of Oxford, and pursues research in physics, alternative history and science, and "strange stuff". His book The Giza DeathStar, for which the Giza Community is named, was published in the spring of 2002, and was his first venture into "alternative history and science".

10 Comments

  1. Frankie Calcutta on October 16, 2014 at 7:58 am

    Advantage goes to the Corn God (in his many Hindu manifestations) who will have home field advantage against the encroaching blood god. If the blood god loses you can expect sour grapes and a few Pakistani nukes to drop on those Indian fields of non-GMO food.



  2. Robert Barricklow on October 14, 2014 at 5:14 pm

    India’s elites seem to have justified their behavior by swallowing whole the idiotic neoliberal swill as religion.



  3. marcos toledo on October 14, 2014 at 11:35 am

    There are other small farmers around the World who are in the same boat to speak. As these small farmers in India fighting to stop the resurrection of the slave farms of the Roman Empire on steroids. Some and indigenous and other are descendants of conquer settlers but both love the land they grow their crops and graze their livestock. And both are in the crosshairs of these mammon worshipers who’s greed and power lust is all that motivates them to exist



  4. marcos toledo on October 14, 2014 at 11:02 am

    And we must not forget the other brave indigenous people around the world from Africa, Americas, Asia even Europe. Who are fighting these fiends and paying with their lives to defend this Blue Marble we call home. Yes the wiseguys who think they know every thing and really know nothing are playing casino with life itself.



  5. Urban Gal on October 14, 2014 at 9:16 am

    Please give credit to the brave physicist, Vandana Shiva,for leafing the local effort to stand up against agribusiness in India. She has taken her protest and awareness campaign to worldwide. She has started an heirloom seed saving program in India..”Navdanya.”. Do a YouTube search on her name and hear her international seminars about organizing against Big Agribiz.



  6. Reno on October 14, 2014 at 6:22 am

    And I tried my “friendly” credit union and was denied a car loan. Toyota financial said “here’s the cash”. So we are like small pieces of floating driftwood carried in by the waves always returning to the corporate shore.



  7. Reno on October 14, 2014 at 6:05 am

    Diversity- Non diversity USA 1. Non diverse Strip mall A. Mc Donald’s, JC Penney, Asian takeout.
    Diverse strip mall B. Mc Donald’s, Burger King, JC Penney, Target,
    Asian takeout, the burrito place.



  8. Reno on October 14, 2014 at 5:57 am

    American investors are not fighting back as most federal, state, and local pension plans are invested in GMO’s, vaccines, etc. so there is both white and blue collar backing of these monstrosities. They are to a large extent the “fruits” of our collective labor.



    • jedi on October 14, 2014 at 6:54 am

      That’s the entrpeneral, management class that has disappeared. A trend I noticed in corporations is top heavy with not so bright people concerned and financed by a stock market ponzi scheme. Also they sell off technology patents and implode the business resetting up in cheap labor pools outside of the west. Effectively destroying the middle class and entrepreneurs in one swoop.



    • RAJM on October 15, 2014 at 5:15 am

      So, when they fail investors will look elsewhere. Investors care little about anything other than margin. Nudge the market in favour of Heirloom agriculture and the investment will follow.



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