Genetically modified crops in your neighbourhood? March 3, 2008
Posted by Andreas in Environment, Press Release, South Africa, Sustainable Living, genetic engineering.add a comment
Do you know if there are any trial fields for genetically modified crops near where you live? According to the African Centre for Biosafety:
Their ability to escape into the environment is well known. Their safety for people with allergies remains in question. Yet we continue to experiment with genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and some have even been commercially released. And yes, they may be growing, undetected, unmarked and right out in the open in a field near you.
How would you ever know? If the Department of Agriculture and the biotechnology industry have their way, you should never find out. Unless, of course, you fall ill.
[...]
“Questions around GMO field trials in South Africa continue to be asked – where exactly are they happening, when will there be adequate environmental risk assessment and post–release monitoring, what are the effects on neighbours of GMO field trials and what are the cumulative effects of all the field trials that have happened in South Africa?” says ACB director, Mariam Mayet.
[...]
“The latest report contains both good and bad news,” says Mayet. “The good news is that there were significant refusals as a result of anti-GMO activism. More good news is that there were far fewer field trials during 2007 than 2006.”
The bad news is that there were 21 different field sites in 2007, as well as 11 medical clinical trials including GM HIV vaccine and GM TB vaccine. “The 21 field sites involved GM potatoes, GM cotton, GM maize, GM sugarcane, GM groundnuts and GM maize. Trials were conducted by both the gene giants and also public sector research institutions.”
“One of the biggest problems is that neither biotech companies nor the Department of Agriculture are prepared to reveal exactly which fields have been planted with GMOs,” says Mayet. “This is considered ‘commercially confidential information’.”
Find out if there are any trial plots near you by consulting the ACB’s updated biohazards map:
Go Organic! July 13, 2007
Posted by Andreas in Environment, Sustainable Living, genetic engineering.add a comment
Organic agriculture is a lovely idea, but it’s only for bunny-hugging rich folks with a bad conscience and it certainly won’t feed the world, right!?
In order to keep feeding the planet’s growing population we need industrialised factory farming with high inputs of synthetic fertilisers and pesticides and high-tech genetically engineered crops, right!?
Wrong. In a new study, researchers from the University of Michigan have found that “organic farming can yield up to three times as much food as conventional farming on the same amount of land”.
According to Ivette Perfecto (great name!), a Professor at the university’s School of Natural Resources and Environment and one of the study’s co-authors:
My hope is that we can finally put a nail in the coffin of the idea that you can’t produce enough food through organic agriculture.
[...]
Corporate interest in agriculture and the way agriculture research has been conducted in land grant institutions, with a lot of influence by the chemical companies and pesticide companies as well as fertilizer companies—all have been playing an important role in convincing the public that you need to have these inputs to produce food.
They found that “in developed countries, yields were almost equal on organic and conventional farms. In developing countries, food production could double or triple using organic methods.”
The rise of the super weeds April 12, 2007
Posted by Andreas in Environment, News, genetic engineering.add a comment
One of the environmental threats that campaigners opposed to genetically engineered (GE) crops have long warned about is the possible emergence of herbicide-resistant super weeds. Pro-GE pundits and multinationals like Monsanto have always dismissed these suggestion as fear mongering nonsense.
There is, however, growing evidence that such super weeds are in fact flourishing in certain areas and causing havoc in farming communities.
The biotech industry has been heavily marketing agricultural crops that are resistant to specific herbicides such as for example genetically engineered cotton that is resistant to Monsanto’s glyphosphate-based product Roundup.
The idea is that farmers who plant these proprietary crops only need to apply relatively small amounts of proprietary herbicide which will kill all plants, including weeds, with the exception of the crop plants themselves.
This would lead to lower overall herbicide use (and hence be environmentally friendly), easier crop cultivation, decreased crop losses and enhanced yields.
That all sounds great in theory, but GE-opponents warned that such practices would ultimately spawn so-called super weeds resistant to the glyphosphate herbicides. And then, farmers would be in real trouble!
It turns out that the concerns over super weeds may have been very well founded.
The Delta Farm Press (not exactly the most radical of sources when it comes to environmental issues) reports that glyphosphate-resistant horseweed (which has been shown to reduce cotton yields by up to 70 percent), Palmer pigweed and waterhemp have been causing major problems for cotton farmers in Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Georgia and the Carolinas.
Glyphosphate-resistant horseweed has spread much more quickly than anticipated [...].
[...]
The staggering increase in glyphosate-resistant horseweed followed a spectacular rise in the amount of glyphosate products (Roundup, Touchdown and others) being applied in cotton and other glyphosate-tolerant crops.
[According to Larry Steckel, Extension weed scientist with the University of Tennessee,] “We saw a 752-percent increase in glyphosate applications between 1997 and 2003″[emphasis added] [...]
[...]
Weed scientists say glyphosate-resistant horseweed and pigweed can be managed with a combination of herbicides, but it will cost growers more.
These are sobering if not unexpected findings and, for me at least, they provide more concrete evidence that genetically-engineered agricultural crops will result in more damage than benefits in the long run.
A documentary about biotechnology April 11, 2007
Posted by Andreas in Cape Town, Environment, Film screening, genetic engineering.2 comments
Permacore, a Cape Town group of permaculturists, are screening a documentary called Seeds of Change this Thursday (12 April) at 7pm at The Door in the Floor, Trill Road, Observatory. I’ve stolen all of the info from urban sprout…
I know this is extremely short-notice, but I thought this looks very, very interesting and worth promoting here. Unfortunately I won’t be able to make it to the screening myself.
If you get there early food will be available to order in the courtyard. Texting 084 951 5535 if you plan to eat will assist with the catering. Or email info@permacore.org.za for more info.
Seeds of Change is a 70 minute fast-paced and moving documentary about the views of western Canadian farmers on both the benefits and risks associated with using genetically modified crops.
“Our film addresses the biotechnology industry and how it has changed the face of agriculture. As such it has great relevance for stakeholders around the world - activists, industry people, policymakers, and farmers not least among them,” states video researcher Stéphane McLachlan.
Genetically engineered bee killer ? March 30, 2007
Posted by Andreas in Environment, News, Sustainable Living, bees, genetic engineering.3 comments
I came across this really worrying article in Spiegel Online (the virtual version of the reputable German lefty print magazine Der Spiegel) that I though was scary enough to warrant quoting at some length.
For unknown reasons, bee populations throughout Germany are disappearing [...] [I]n the United States, [...] bees are dying in such dramatic numbers that the economic consequences could soon be dire. No one knows what is causing the bees to perish, but some experts believe that the large-scale use of genetically modified plants in the US could be a factor.
[...]
Manfred Hederer, the president of the German Beekeepers Association, [...] reported a 25 percent drop in bee populations throughout Germany. In isolated cases, says Hederer, declines of up to 80 percent have been reported. He speculates that “a particular toxin, some agent with which we are not familiar,” is killing the bees.
[...]
Since last November, the US has seen a decline in bee populations so dramatic that it eclipses all previous incidences of mass mortality. Beekeepers on the east coast of the United States complain that they have lost more than 70 percent of their stock since late last year, while the west coast has seen a decline of up to 60 percent.
[...]
Millions of bees have simply vanished. In most cases, all that’s left in the hives are the doomed offspring. But dead bees are nowhere to be found — neither in nor anywhere close to the hives.
[...]
In many cases, scientists have found evidence of almost all known bee viruses in the few surviving bees found in the hives after most have disappeared. Some had five or six infections at the same time and were infested with fungi — a sign, experts say, that the insects’ immune system may have collapsed.
The scientists are also surprised that bees and other insects usually leave the abandoned hives untouched. Nearby bee populations or parasites would normally raid the honey and pollen stores of colonies that have died for other reasons, such as excessive winter cold. “This suggests that there is something toxic in the colony itself which is repelling them”.
A massive dying off of bee colonies is obviously a real disaster, but what had me most worried was the possible connection with genetically engineered crops, especially BT corn, which is, of course, grown here in South Africa.
[...] [R]esearchers [at the University of Jena] examined the effects of pollen from a genetically modified maize variant called “Bt corn” on bees. [...] The study concluded that there was no evidence of a “toxic effect of Bt corn on healthy honeybee populations.” But when, by sheer chance, the bees used in the experiments were infested with a parasite, something eerie happened. According to the Jena study, a “significantly stronger decline in the number of bees” occurred among the insects that had been fed a highly concentrated Bt poison feed.
According to Hans-Hinrich Kaatz, a professor at the University of Halle in eastern Germany and the director of the study, the bacterial toxin in the genetically modified corn may have “altered the surface of the bee’s intestines, sufficiently weakening the bees to allow the parasites to gain entry — or perhaps it was the other way around. We don’t know.”
I know one small study proves nothing and this sort of thing should not be used to whip people up into an irrational frenzy. This is, however, exactly the kind of scenario many anti-GE people warn us about.
What are the consequences of introducing artificially manufactured life forms (which we understand only to a limited degree) into an exceedingly intricate, but increasingly threatened and fragile natural environment (which we understand very poorly in its overall complexity)?
For all our sakes, let’s hope that the dying of the bees has nothing to do with genetically engineered crops, because if it does, this may only be the first sign of a much larger disaster.
South Africa heads for a genetically engineered future January 25, 2007
Posted by Andreas in Environment, News, South Africa, genetic engineering.add a comment
AgriSA (formerly the South African Agricultural Union, which according to its website “serves some 70 000 large and small-scale commercial farmer members”) announced on Tuesday that the cultivation of genetically engineered (GE) crops in South Africa increased by a whopping 180% (by area) from last year to a current total of 1.4 million hectares.
Only India has a faster growth rate (192%) and South Africa is now the eighth biggest producer of GE crops worldwide with 44% of all maize, 80% of all soya and 90% of all cotton grown in the country being genetically engineered.
There has been considerable opposition to the introduction and accelerated cultivation of these crops in SA, especially from activist groups like SAFeAGE, Biowatch and Earthlife Africa, but much of it appears has fallen on deaf ears. The ANC government seems to be as steadfastly pro genetic engineering as it is pro nuclear power.
It is pretty safe to say that the vast majority of South Africans are unaware of the increasing quantities of GE crops being grown in the country. Most, in fact, are entirely unaware of what GE crops are in the first place and what their potential environmental, economic and health impacts may be.
Under similar circumstances free-market advocates may conceivably (I know, you’re laughing, but just bear with me on this one) claim that we should simply let the market take care of the situation. If consumers don’t want foods and other products that contain GE components, they won’t buy them and in the absence of a profitable market for its goods, the GE industry will simply wither away.
In South Africa we can’t even appeal to this mystical magical market mechanism (if we really wanted to, ahem) since consumers here have no choice in the matter at all. Even if they were the most GE-informed community in the world they wouldn’t have that choice.
In South Africa, GE crops and products containing them are still not required to be kept separate from non-GE crops, do not have to be appropriately labelled (although some retailers do it voluntarily) and, in effect, can not be traced through the various stages of production and processing.
Personally, I think all of this sucks on a number of levels - a major disaster on a national scale.
So what am I going to do about it? Well, I’ll talk to as many people about GE crops in South Africa (especially any Free State mielie farmers I come across), I’ll support organisations such as Biowatch and SAFeAGE wherever and whenever I can (any night-time raids on GE fields, count me in), I’ll try to grow more food in my garden and I’ll eat as much seasonal, locally-grown organic produce as I can lay my hands on (if you live in Cape Town, I can highly recommend Wild Organic Foods and The Ethical Co-op). It doesn’t sound like a lot, I know, but… baby steps, right!?
