The global control of food, countries and populations

untested GMOs that are already on the market.Consequently,hehasbeenaccused of deceit simply because his research has raised serious questions about GMOs and health. A prominent figure within the industry recently told me that anti-GM brigade (which apparently includes Professor Seralini) comprises disgusting enemies of poor farmers by trying to block a safe product of a frontier technology. Little mention there of the tens of thousands of poor farmerswho took their own lives because of this frontier technology. Little mention too of farmer suicides as a result of falling global commodity prices due to policies that have benefited the same US agribusiness companies. If there is a disgusting enemy, surely it is profiteering corporate-controlled terminator seed technology that has resulted in mass suicides and the destruction of traditional farmer-controlled agricultural practices developed over thousands of years. The GMO agenda represents the socalled Green Revolutionssecond coming. Environmentalist Vandana Shiva notes tremely lucrative for the oil and chemicals manufacturing industries and has served to maintain sestern hegemony, not least via structural adjustmentpolicies and the consequent uprooting of traditional farming practices in favour of single-crop export-oriented policies, dam building to cater for what became a highly water intensive industry, debt and dependency. Unequal system Apart from tying poorer countries into an unequal system of global trade and reinforcing global inequalities, the corporate hijacking of food and agriculture has had many other implications, not least where health is concerned. Dr Meryl Hammond of the Campaign for Alternatives to Pesticides told a Canadian parliament committee in 2009 that a raft of studies published in prestigious peer-reviewed journals point to strong associations between chemical pesticides and a vast range of serious life-threatening health consequences. But anyone who questions the safety of GMOs can expect a bumpy ride. The same prominent GMO sector figure referred to earlier says that certain scientific jokers (credible scientists like Seralini) would not be allowed to set foot in the real world of science in North America and that they have an impact in countries like India because of ignoramuses. But can we expect much better of an industry that has a record of smearing people who criticise it? Not only that, sections of the industry have bullied farmers with lawsuits in North America, have been charged with and often found guilty of contaminating the environment and seriously damaging health with PCBs and dioxins and have been complicit in concealing the deadly impact of GM corn on animals. The industry has also been associated with bribery, linked with human rights violations in Brazil and will not label its foods in the US as containing GMOs. Indias Knowledge Initiative on agriculture was drawn up with the full and direct participation of representatives from various companies, including Monsanto,

By Colin Todhunter

hen rich companies with politically-connected lobbyists and seats on government-appointed bodies bend policies for their own ends, we areinserioustrouble.IntheUS,manysenor figures from the Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) industry have moved witheasetotakeuppositionswiththeFood and Drug Administration (FDA). In 1998, enior Monsanto figure Phil Angell stated ntheNewYorkTimesMagazinethatMonantoshouldnothavetovouchforthesafety of biotech food and that its interest is in elling as much of it as possible, while asuring its safety is the FDAs job. The revolving door between top figures atMonsantoandpositionsattheFDA,however, makes it very difficult to see just how he safety of biotech food can be independentlyguaranteed.Aswillbeshown,thismay well have important implications for India. The onus has been placed on the likes of Prof Seralini at the University of Caen in France to test previously independently

that after the Second World War, chemical weapons manufacturers turned their attention to farming. Dwarf seedswere purposively created to specifically respond to their chemicals and agriculture soon became transformed into a chemical-dependent industry that has, among other things, negatively impacted biodiversity. This type of agriculture has proved ex-

Cargill and Walmart. Unsurprisingly, pressure is now building to release G food onto the market. It is interesting t the Supreme Court has not banned o field trials of GM food crops. Contam tion of traditional crops by GM crops t remains a serious issue. In 2001, Don Westfall, a leading biot industry figure, was quoted in the Toro Star as saying that the hope of the indu is that over time the market is so floo withGMOsthattheresnothingyoucan about it. Open field planting is but one w of achieving this. The European Comm sion has already suspected GMO conta nationinexportedbasmatiricefromIn Robert Fraley, a senior Monsanto fig in 1996, was quoted at the time in Fa Journal as stating that what we are see is not just a consolidation of seed com nies, but a consolidation of the entire f chain. As US agribusiness seeks to c solidate the entire food chain, it is cl that its not just our health that is at sta but the global control of food, count and populations too.