GE Crops Won't End Hunger

[Guest guest]

GE Crops Won't End HungerGenetically engineered crops pose a considerable threat to farmers and foodsecurity in developing countries, according to ActionAid, a highly respecteddevelopment organization in Great Britain. The group recently issued areport, GM Crops--Going Against the Grain, that compares the promises ofbiotech companies with the real performance of genetically engineered (GE)crops in Asia, Africa and Latin America. It concludes that the newtechnology will lead to more hungry people, not less.ActionAid released the report as part of a national debate about GE foodsoon to begin in the UK. The debate has been made even more important by themid-May announcement that the U.S. will file a World Trade Organization(WTO) case against the European Union for its moratorium on biotech crops.President Bush has gone so far as to assert that Europe's refusal to allowfood from GE crops into their markets has discouraged Third World countriesfrom using this technology and thus undermined efforts to end hunger inAfrica.Matthew Lockwood of ActionAid warned, "The UK public should not be dupedinto accepting GE in the name of developing countries. GE does not provide amagic bullet solution to world hunger. What poor people really need isaccess to land, water, better roads to get their crops to market, educationand credit schemes." ActionAid is one of the UK's largest developmentorganizations, working with poor and marginalized people in 30 countriesaround the world to eradicate poverty.The report states that nearly 800 million people go hungry every day becausethey cannot grow or buy enough food. One in seven children born in thecountries where hunger is most common die before they reach the age of five.The biotechnology industry says that GE crops will solve the problem ofworld hunger by increasing food production. Yet the UN Food and AgricultureOrganization (FAO) finds there is more than enough food in the world to meetcurrent global needs, both now and several decades into the future. Thecauses of food insecurity are political and economic; many people are toopoor to buy food, lack the land or other resources to grow food themselves,or are unable to obtain food through existing distribution systems.Four GE crops, maize (corn), cotton, canola (oilseed rape) and soya(soybeans), account for 99% of all commercial GE crops in 2002. With theexception of cotton, these crops are used primarily for animal feed. Soy andthe vegetable oils derived from canola are used in processed foods.ActionAid reports the pesticide industry has been the driving force behindGE agriculture, as four multinational corporations--Monsanto, BayerCropScience, DuPont and Syngenta--have purchased seed and biotechnologycompanies around the world and now control most of the GE seed market. Theglobal market for GE seeds is on the rise, with 2002 estimates at US$4.25billion, up from US$3.8 billion in 2001. GE seeds represented 13% of theglobal commercial seed market in 2001.Despite the biotech industry's claims that genetic engineering is anessential tool to combat hunger, GE research in Africa, for instance,focuses on export crops such as cut flowers, fruit, vegetables, cotton andtobacco. In Kenya, only one out of 136 patent applications for plants wasfor a food crop; more than half were for roses.Genetically engineered seeds threaten the practice of saving and replantingseeds, which is common in many countries around the world. Up to 1.4 billionpeople, including 90% of farmers in Africa, depend on saved seed. Yet GEseeds must be bought each season, and biotech companies charge farmersroyalty fees and force them to sign contracts that they will not save orreplant seeds, use only the corporation's chemicals on the crop, and provideaccess to their property to verify compliance. These companies also continueto develop "Terminator technologies" which makes plants produce sterileseeds.The report also contradicts biotech companies' claims that GE crops willlower use of dangerous pesticides, reporting that chemical use per hectarein Argentina has more than doubled on GE soy fields compared to conventionalvarieties. Also, GE technology will enable corporations or farmers inwealthy countries to grow crops currently grown only in tropical climates.Such "crop substitutions" would deprive export-producing countries ofvaluable income and employment. For example, corporations are currentlydeveloping canola genetically engineered to produce oils to replace coconutand palm oils grown in the developing world, devastating coconut oilproduction in India and oil palm producers in Malaysia and Ghana.Sources: GM Crops--Going Against the Grain, ActionAid, 2003, available forfree download at: http://www.actionaid.org/resources/pdfs/gatg.pdf; PressRelease, May 28, 2003, Press Release, Office of the U.S. TradeRepresentative, May 13, 2003.Contact: ActionAid (44-20) 7561 7627, Hamlyn House, Macdonald Road, Archway,London N19 5PG, UK; phone (44-20) 7561 7561; fax (44-20) 7272 0899;email; Web site http://www.actionaid.org.PANUPS is a weekly email news service providing resource guides andreporting on pesticide issues that don't always get coverage by themainstream media. 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