From mono-crops to mono-bees.

Photos-Native species of bumblebees.

THE UK CURRENTLY HAS 24 BUMBLEBEE SPECIES, BUT SYNGENTA ARE BREEDING THEIR OWN FACTORY-FARMED BUMBLEBEES. . WHY?

U-turns.

Defra and the agri-chem industries are doing a few u-turns on some of their major agricultural strategies. This is since damage to UK topsoil and to the health and survival of our crop pollinators, honeybees and bumblebees has become critical.Having spent the last two years aggressively promoting huge agreages of monocrops and pesticide application, and destruction of field margins and set-aside land and hedges, this process is now having to be reversed. Environmentalists and ecologists warned that destroying natural habitat and topsoil was unsustainable, but the drive for company profits and economic growth is a short sighted affair. Anyway, in acknowledgement of the diminishing numbers of honeybees, bumblebees and other pollinators, Syngenta have have been making 'Green' noises;.....

Operation Pollinator

Geoff Coates, agribusiness manager for Syngenta UK has described its project "Operation Pollinator". which aims to see 10,000 hectares of bee-friendly wildflower and grass and pollen mixes planted across the EU. This research project (formerly called 'Operation Bumblebee'), was carried out by the company in 2005-2008, trialling the use of the mixes alongside commercially grown crops, in field margins and difficult corners etc. This news is puzzling because the project was happening whilst Syngenta et al were driving forward the destruction of field margins and set-aside land across Britain and Europe, in 2007-2009. Perhaps Syngenta hopes that 'operation Pollinator' will detract from the pesticides link with pollinator die offs? Pesticides are now generally cited as the major factor contributing to bee decline, but Defra-employed scientists at University departments and chemical companies are claiming that pesticides are a side issue, and the pesticide link is being neglected by government research departments.(see my previous post)

Factory farmed bumblebees.

But fear not, Syngenta has another money-making wheeze! Biotech companies through a subsidiary Syngenta Bioline,are part of a multi-million dollar industry breeding bees in captivity."Syngenta Bioline are dedicated to the production of premium quality bumblebees ...for use in vegetables, fruit, flowers and ornamental crops," claims the website.
On the face of it this might seem like a good idea but there are significant risks.Tom Levitt, in The Ecologist, has described the doubts which some scientists and environmentalists have about the vested interests of the agri-chemical companies in directing research:-

"Native threat"

"Pollination experts have identified three main risks. If the factory-farmed bees are better at food collecting they can out-compete local bees and establish themselves as a dominant species. They can also inter-breed and gradually dilute native gene-pools.
　
But most significantly, they can act as a vector for diseases by the shared use of flowers to collect pollen.

The manufacturers say the bees are used in polytunnel production systems for soft fruits and vegetables like strawberries and peppers, and as such are only ever released into an enclosed area.

However, ecologist and pollinator expert Dr Claire Carvell from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH), says studies from the UK, Canada and Japan have shown that even in these circumstances bees do escape and mix with the native population........

..........Helping wild bees
Some argue that the very presence of a bee-breeding industry indicates a misguided focus away from increasing the native, wild bee population, and towards selling a product.
We don't know whether the pollination service works or whether it is just clever marketing.,' says Dr Darvill.(Director of the Bumblebee Conservation Trust)
'It may be that just looking after your hedgerows will bring you more native bees and instead of relying on a factory to produce your bees. Getting a wild pollination service from a synthetic pollinator seems very odd.'......( From 'Agri-chemical companies are both breeding and killing bees.' Tom Levitt,13th october,2009. The Ecologist)

For anyone who doesn't know too much about bumblebees, it's well worth doing a teeny bit of your own research just to see what we'd be losing if our native bumblebees were wiped out. In 2007 the Bumblebee Conservation Trust(http://www.bumblebeeconservationtrust.co.uk/) carried out a survey from the records kept by people in the UK. I was hooked. That summer was a good one for bumblebee numbers, and after a few months I'd seen at least ten species in about one square mile. Some of the photos I took are at top of the page.
It's mad to blithely think we can successfully swap Syngenta's 'super bees' for our evolved native bumblebees, and what sane person would want to.

Status of scientific research on honeybees.

The UK's chief drugs adviser, Professor Nutt, has hit the news headlines this morning. He was sacked for criticising government policy. More accurately, the Professor has accused the government of using the drug classification system as a tool to send out an anti-drugs message, rather than to rate drugs in terms of actual risk, which the drugs classification system is meant to do. This has stirred up a lot of angry response to the government which is perceived as sacking a scientific adviser for not following the party line.
I mention this because about two weeks ago, in his article "Plight of the honeybee stung by funding from the chemical industry,"(Oct.14th) George Monbiot brought to light what appears to be another astonishing example of the way this government seems to habitually ignore or sabotage scientific objectivity, in order to push through its own political agenda. Astonishing on the face of it, but Defra is nothing if not predictable, so when Hilary Benn reassured us that Warwick University has been allocated £1m to research into honeybee collapse disorder, it shouldn't surprise us to hear that the study has "no pesticide component in it at all"(Dr David Chandler, one of the Warwick researchers told George Monbiot.) Further enquiry also revealed that Warwick is partly financed by Syngenta, for this research.Syngenta is the chemical company that manufactures a neonicotinoid called thiamethoxam, sold as Actara which has been implicated by a study in Washington state as responsible for incidents of honeybee deaths.
George Monbiot says "I don't know whether or not Syngenta's involvement has affected the framing of the honeybee topic, but wherever scientists are financially dependent on companies, the question arises. Given how little money corporations contribute to British science (Syngenta's 10% is about average) wouldn't we be better served by keeping them out of it so that we can be sure they can't guide the way research is framed? And while we're at it how about reducing their influence over the way that public money for science is allocated?"
In my previous post I mentioned Hilary Benn's (Defra Secretary of State) statement that "UK land has been steadily degraded by 200 yrs of intensive farming and industrial pollution". Well, we've all known that for decades Mr Benn, but it hasn't deterred you, your predecessors in Defra and Maff, and allied food and farming industries from exploiting the system, to maximise your profits, has it?!
We shouldn't be lulled into believing that Defra has had a change of heart towards agricultural sustainability. The planned strategy for conserving our precious topsoil is to use chemicals more economically. That's it.
　

Hedge Laying in Agriculture.

I'm not too keen on the trend in recent years for artists to place their objects/art into landscape, it seems like a random intrusion. The exception though are the works of Richard Long and Andy Goldworthy, who introduced their 'land' or 'earth' art in the eighties.They seemed to have an involvement with the earth's own resources, and explored the natural bonds and tensions that exist in nature. Much of Goldworthy's work only survives in photographs because he used the transient materials found in landscape.I'm not quite sure why, but the subject of this post,- hedges- put me in mind of their work again.
Anyway,good bit of news - the ancient craft of keeping hedges going has been celebrated by the "National Hedge Laying Championships" in Herefordshire today.Not a subject of high profile in agriculture at the moment in comparison to GM's etc, but they are an important element of agricultural husbandry.There is a National Hedge Laying Society, great stuff! Hedges have been around for thousands of years apparently,and nowadays play an important ecological role in providing 'corridors' for wildlife to travel through the countryside. Every forty to fifty years hedges need rejuvenating from the base to start new healthy growth again, and this is where the skills of 'hedge laying' come in. The hedges shown in my photographs above are not managed in this way, and are flailed by large machines to keep them in shape.They are still pretty impressive sculptures though.

A new younger generation is needed now to learn hedge laying skills. Anyone interested? http://hedgelaying.org.uk/

Loss of Soil and New UK Strategy.

(image)Spreading organic fertilizer

• Talk about U-turns! Picture the incredulity on Peter Melchett's face (Policy Director for the Soil Association) when he heard Hilary Benn's(Defra Secretary of State) proclamation about the need for a strategy to protect the soil for agriculture. "UK land has been steadily degraded by 200 yrs of intensive farming and industrial pollution, warned the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs(Defra)in a major study of soils".(Guardian,30/09/2009, John Vidal).
  It might have taken Peter Melchett a while to recover from the shock of hearing this belated statement from the government (belated by 60 years),because this is the length of time the soil association has been telling the government about the effects of intensive farming on soil. He welcomed Defra's..' recognition that introducing large amounts of nitrogen fertilizer was not sustainable in the long term,' but added that the government's proposed measures did not go nearly far enough.( from Community Newswire Reporters,Sep.24,2009)
  It appears that the government is finding it increasingly difficult to ignore the evidence which is presented to them. The real situation can no longer be disguised by assurances that intensive farming methods are the way forward to feed the world.Until a few weeks ago Defra was dismantling existing environmental measures which had served to maintain the quality of soil, and a healthy environment. It still aggressively promotes the use of systems and chemicals which degrade the soil, pollute the environment and damage health:-
  1)Defra defends farming of large monocrops which it claims produce higher yields.This system depends on high inputs of artificial fertilizers and pesticides.
  2)Earlier this year when new EU rules removed around 15% of pesticides, Hilary Benn confirmed his intention to vote against the new pesticide rules when they came before the Agricultural Council for final agreement.
  3)When Georgina Downs won her High Court case against the government for its failure to protect rural residents from pesticides, Hilary Benn refused to acknowledge the evidence and took it to appeal. As Georgina Downs states,' the government adopts the improper approach of 'balancing' harm to human health against the benefits of pesticide use, in which it accepts a degree of damage to human health on the basis that it is outweighed by other benefits(eg cost/economic benefits for farmers)..'
  4)Behind the premise that more land would be needed to produce food for rising populations, set-aside land and buffer zones were ploughed up in the last two years to use for food production.Set-aside land had previously provided valuable habitat for wildlife, and helped counteract flooding and wind erosion.
  5)Planting of large acreages of monocrops require the removal of hedgerows which previously prevented wind erosion of soil and run-off after heavy rains.
  All the above practices are currently being driven forward by Defra, so it is difficult to see how they will reconcile such industrialised onslaught on the land with their recent statement that .."Soil erosion already results in the annual loss of around 2.2m tonnes of topsoil. This costs farmers £9m a year in lost production. Climate change has the potential to increase erosion rates through hotter, drier conditions that make soils more susceptible to wind erosion, coupled with intense rainfall incidents that can wash rain away."(Hilary Benn, from The Guardian,24th sept.2009)
  Professor Bob Watson (Defra's chief scientist) compiled the report on loss of soil, and to be fair to him, he has warned the government regularly about the drawbacks of intensive agriculture and the limits of GM's in a future strategy for food production across the world, not simply in the UK. In April 2008, IAASTD (International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge and Technology for Development) published a report after four years of research by 400 international scientists. Professor Watson provided oversight and management of this project..IAASTD described their report as follows."This Assessment is a constructive initiative and important contribution that all governments need to take forward to ensure that agricultural knowledge, science and technology fulfils its potential to meet the development and sustainability goals of the reduction of hunger and poverty, the improvement of rural livelihoods and human health, and facilitating equitable, socially, environmentally and economically sustainable development." The following governments approved the executive summary of the report;Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Botswana, Brazil, Cameroon, People’s Republic of China, Costa Rica, Cuba, Democratic Republic of Congo, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Gambia, Ghana, Honduras, India, Iran, Ireland, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Lebanon, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Maldives, Republic of Moldova, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Philippines, Poland, Republic of Palau, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Solomon Islands, Swaziland, Sweden, Switzerland, United Republic of Tanzania, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom of Great Britain, Uruguay, Viet Nam, Zambia (58 countries)
  The report can be found at http://www.agassessment.org/index.cfm?Page=About_IAASTD&ItemID=2

Despite this the UK government, and the National Union of Farmers preferred to plough ahead(excuse the pun) with current agricultural practices.
This time around, with the report on soil erosion, Professor Watson is evidently treading carefully in his attempts to keep UK farmers on board.When interviewed on Radio 4 news, where it was suggested that the soil association had been warning the government for several decades about soil degradation, Professor Watson enumerated the efforts that farmers were now making to counteract soil degradation caused by intensive farming. Unfortunately he only managed to think of three rather tame and unconvincing solutions used by farmers, which he had to keep repeating.. One is to use organic manure rather than synthetic nitrogen, secondly to reduce deep ploughing, and thirdly, is a high tech solution of using GPS(global positioning satellite)-guided machinary to test for harvesting crops and testing for nutrients and soil quality. This allows farmers to use nitrogen fertilizers and chemicals more economically apparently, but I wonder if they simply apply more to where it is needed most. I think that Professor Watson is trying his best, but the government and allied food and farming industries prefer their big profits as opposed to farming sustainably.

Globalisation of non-sustainable industrial agriculture.

There has been a flurry of pro GM/industrial farming proclamations reaching the media recently, and BLIMEY, SAVE US from that agency designed to protect our health -'The Food Standards Agency'!
The FSA has recently published a study, (based on a review of other studies,and carried out by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine)) saying that their research shows that organic food has 'no health benefits over conventional produce.' A lot of people were bemused by this announcement, because as Geoffrey Lean pointed out,( writing in the Telegraph 31st July) ,"the FSA has an obsession with criticising organic food,( which no one claims to be dangerous),whilst at the same time it has a mixed record on additives that cause hyperactivity, toxic dyes, illegal GM foods, and pesticides.." Despite reviewing other studies, the FSA failed to mention those studies that showed organic produce has significant nutritional advantages in fighting cancer. The report doesn't even touch on the problem of pesticide residues in conventional food.

Alongside its antipathy to organic agriculture the FSA has shown a vigorous support of GM foods. It has dismissed the controlled trials on mice, fed with GM maize, which provide scientific evidence of negative health effects, and cases of damage to health caused by GM's in India are blanked in this country. The website of gmwatch.org describes a study conducted by eight international researchers, which calls into question the reliability of tests of the European Food Safety(EFSA) and the US FDA to assess the health risks of GMOs and pesticides. According to the Research Committee of Independent Information on Genetic Engineering(CRIIGEN) the study brings to light "a significant underestimation of the initial signs of diseases like cancer and diseases of the hormonal, immune, nervous and reproductive systems, among others." See http://actu.orange.fr/articles/sciences/Une-etude-met-en-cause-les-tests-menes-par-Bruxelles-sur-les-OGM.html

Despite the fact that in the UK people do not want GM's the government never tires of rejecting the wishes of the people they are meant to represent, to push ahead with GM crop trials.Early in 2009 there was a major organic food and agriculture conference which Hilary Benn was billed to speak at. Instead he chose to address the participants via telephone.
At the conference Gundula Azeez,(who was policy manager for the Soil Association for the past nine years) told Hilary Benn that he was concerned because he had heard that HB was not aware of any scientific evidence of the negative health effects of GM's, and asked why the government is still saying that it is ignorant of the science? (To read the transcript of the exchange between H.Benn and the other participants visit http://i-sis.org.uk/Who_is_Anti-Science.php) Hilary Benn's response was ..."that's not the view that the Food Standards Agency has taken in the past."

In September 2008, Lord Rooker,(who was then UK Farming Minister and is now chair of the Food Standards Agency) hit out at anti-GM protesters, claiming they were on a 'messianic mission' not based on science and that the public were being 'taken for a ride' by campaigners who behaved as if opposition to the technology was a religion.(from Western Morning News,Sept.23rd,2008)......I know, it's a jaw-dropping statement considering the reality of the situation. For an account of the real facts, eg. the effects and consequences of GM's being foisted onto farmers in India, read the accounts by Dr Vandana Shiva, scientist and environmentalist.

Through the programme of 'Navdanya', an initiative founded by Dr Shiva,(

www.navdanya.org) she is working to stop the deaths by suicide of farmers in Vidharbha. More than 150,000 farmers have committed suicide in India due to distortions introduced in agriculture as a result of trade liberalisation. More than 20,000 farmers have committed suicide in Andhra Pradesh alone. Farmers have become locked into dependence on corporate seeds supply for growing cash crops integrated to world markets, which is leading to a collapse in farm prices due to 400 billion dollars subsidies in rich countries.Navdanya also realized that one of the crisis farmers were facing was a seed famine created by Monsanto. Navdanya's initiative was to create GMO free, patent free, debt free and suicide free villages, and seed banks to conserve biodiversity and protect indigenous seed varieties.

In 2000 Dr Vandana Shiva delivered the Reith lecture, and here are a few paragraphs taken from her speech:-

...."The rich diversity and sustainable systems of food production are being destroyed in the name of increasing food production. However, with the destruction of diversity, rich sources of nutrition disappear. When measured in terms of nutrition per acre, and from the perspective biodiversity, the so called "high yields" of industrial agriculture or industrial fisheries do not imply more production of food and nutrition.
Yields usually refers to production per unit area of a single crop. Output refers to the total production of diverse crops and products. Planting only one crop in the entire field as a monoculture will of course increase its individual yield. Planting multiple crops in a mixture will have low yields of individual crops, but will have high total output of food. Yields have been defined in such a way as to make the food production on small farms by small farmers disappear. This hides the production by millions of women farmers in the Third World - farmers like those in my native Himalaya who fought against logging in the Chipko movement, who in their terraced fields even today grow Jhangora (barnyard millet), Marsha (Amaranth), Tur (Pigeon Pea), Urad (Black gram), Gahat (horse gram), Soya Bean (Glycine Max), Bhat (Glycine Soya) - endless diversity in their fields. From the biodiversity perspective, biodiversity based productivity is higher than monoculture productivity. I call this blindness to the high productivity of diversity a "Monoculture of the Mind", which creates monocultures in our fields and in our world.
The Mayan peasants in the Chiapas are characterised as unproductive because they produce only 2 tons of corn per acre. However, the overall food output is 20 tons per acre when the diversity of their beans and squashes, their vegetables their fruit trees are taken into account.
In Java, small farmers cultivate 607 species in their home gardens. In sub-Saharan Africa, women cultivate 120 different plants. A single home garden in Thailand has 230 species, and African home gardens have more than 60 species of trees.
Rural families in the Congo eat leaves from more than 50 species of their farm trees.
A study in eastern Nigeria found that home gardens occupying only 2 per cent of a household's farmland accounted for half of the farm's total output. In Indonesia 20 per cent of household income and 40 per cent of domestic food supplies come from the home gardens managed by women.
Research done by FAO has shown that small biodiverse farms can produce thousands of times more food than large, industrial monocultures.
And diversity in addition to giving more food is the best strategy for preventing drought and desertification. What the world needs to feed a growing population sustainably is biodiversity intensification, not the chemical intensification or the intensification of genetic engineering. "

Farmers from across the world met at Dublin Conference.

There was an interesting juxtaposition of two articles on page 29 in the Scottish newspaper 'The Press and Journal' on July 29th.Taking up most of the page with three times the column space plus a big photograph of a forage harvester, was an article about Britain's 'agricultural machinary trade body' and its assessment on the economic outlook for farming,as measured through machinary sales. On the right hand side of the page, with no photograph, was an article about a conference held in Dublin on 28th July, by the International Federation of Agricultural Producers. The juxtaposition is interesting because the BIG article on the left (agricultural machinary trade body) is about the profit margins of big business. The little article on the right, about the contribution made by women farmers at the Dublin conference, is a recognition that farming is not solely a production activity but is also a way of life and a means of combating poverty.Sustainable agricultural development, and community food security were the speakers' priorities.

The relative newspaper space given to these divergent visions symbolises the emphasis given to corporate agriculture and its mechanistic systems and hidebound, mechanistic thought processes. You would think by now that policy-makers would have given more of a warning-shot across the huge bows of the expensive oil-guzzling machines which will eventually come to be regarded as the SUV's of agriculture.

Back to the womens committee of farmers;
The view was expressed that "Securing food production would not only benefit individual nations, but allow countries in the developing world to concentrate on feeding their own people instead of chasing income through exports and often leaving themselves short of produce." The Irish Farmers Association farm family chairwoman Mary Sherry told the conference: "Food security is of major importance and must be addressed by all countries, not just developing countries. If Europe is food independent then the production burden on developing countries is reduced and countries can direct their food production to feeding their indiginous population."(From-' Food security top of the agenda'-The Press and Journal)
It is important that women farmers should be integrated into the decision making processes, and implementation of policies. Mary Sherry pointed out how in global terms women were the main producers of food, and that they also carry out the bulk of management and administrative tasks associated with farming.

Irish Agriculture minister Brendan Smith, made a point at the conference which is being loudly expressed by farmers now, that 'large supermarket chains needed to remember that their responsibility does not stop with the consumer and their shareholders – it must also extend to producers, processors and suppliers, who have invested heavily in building up the food industry. They needed an adequate return to ensure a system of sustainable production'

I think Brendan Smith didn't go far enough.The nature of food production has huge consequences and impacts on rural communities, not just those involved directly in the food production chain.. Farmers from across the world will be aware of the way that corporate agriculture has put thousands of small farmers out of work. Even in this country the introduction of corporate agriculture has seen the destruction of rural economies. Farm workers were the first to be made unemployed, then trades and businesses which used to be allied to thriving mixed farms, were put out of business.
A week or two after the Dublin Conference, Hilary Benn has recently published the new UK Food Strategy. It seems to be a mixed message. Oh dear.

Beautiful,fragile planet.

Even whilst international agreements are being made to cut down on carbon emissions, and promote sustainable energy, the UK government is clinging on with white knuckled obstinacy to industrialized agriculture.In sixty years crop yields have risen, but this has been at great cost to the environment, to ecological systems, and to human health. Going hand in hand with the free market economy and the global trade in food, thousands of farmers across the world have been pushed off the land, including UK farmers. Dairy farmers and pig farmers in the UK are amongst those who have suffered from skewed prices.

The blog post http://jamblichus.wordpress.com/2009/07/17/farms-worms-cash-and-the-space-time-continuum/ provides a balanced perspective on the subject.

On the bright side:-
There's an international social movement happening -and the common denominator is food. People are becoming concerned about where their food is sourced, how it is grown and processed and over-packaged, and the amount of energy used in production and transport.Issues of animal welfare in farming are also an important part of the debate.A spin-off to this interest is that many rural and urban communities are searching for local sources for fruit, vegetables and meat, and many people are enthusiastically starting their own gardens and allotments. Even bee-keeping, and smallholdings with livestock are becoming a keen hobby or means of livlihood. Everything that is required in the production of food,-animals, seeds, plants,and land are regarded from the perspective of sustainability, and natural systems. and democracy. Some people see this movement for 'homegrown' as a passtime for what they disparagely refer to as the 'green brigade'. On the other hand Tim Lang, Professor of Food Policy at City University London believes that "Gardening is poised to move from a leisure activity with aesthetic purposes to become a vital core function of food production. Garden Organic with its 40,000 members, is well positioned to enable a new culture of exchange between gardeners and encourage people across urban and rural communities, to get growing. Rather than digging for the victory of the nation as we did during World War2, I see our focus as digging for food democracy, with every person playing their part in the future food supply."
Parallel with this community involvement in sustainable horticulture and small scale agricultural projects, the media is pushing food up the political agenda. In some countries food campaigners are intent on "taking the power back from the people who manipulate the rest of us".( I think they had the WTO in mind here.) In recent years numerous films have become popular viewing..."Food Inc."... "The End of the Line,"..."Black Gold,"..."Our Daily Bread,"..."The Real Dirt on Farmer John,"...

FILM-"FOOD INC"
From website 'Hungry for Change':-
..."In 'Food Inc,' filmmaker Robert Kenner lifts the veil on our nation's food industry exposing the highly mechanized underbelly that has been hidden from the American consumer with the consent of our governments regulatory agencies, USDA and FDA. Our nations food supply is now controlled by a handful od corporations that often put profit ahead of consumer health, the livlihood of the American farmer, the safety of workers and our own environment. We have bigger breasted chickens, the perfect pork chop, herbicide-resistant soybean seeds, even tomatoes that won't go bad, but we also have new strains of E.coli-the harmful bacteria that causes illness for an estimated 73,000 Americans anually. We are riddled with widespread obesity, particularly among children, and an epidemic level of diabetes among adults." ...

FILM- "The End of the Line" is a film based on a book by Charles Clover, about diminished fish stocks.The illegal, unregulated, unreported fishing worth up to 25 billion dollars per year, has just about emptied the oceans.
He makes the point that "Europe is one of the few places where the citizen has absolutely no right to sue the executive for not observing the law that they themselves have written."

FILM- 'Black Gold'. Coffee is Ethiopia's no.1 export commodity, but the farmers barely make a living from their crops.The big profit goes into the pockets of some of our largest corporations, boosted also by the large prices we pay for an espresso drink in the west. The film follows an Ethiopean man, Tadesse Meskela, who travels all over the world, trying to get the farmers he represents a fairer price for their coffee, and trying to find new buyers by giving out samples.

FILM- "OUR DAILY BREAD". This is a movie without voiceover, with images of the way we produce food in Europe. Big greenhouses in Holland, warehouses with thousands of chickens, abbatoirs...
FILM-" THE REAL DIRT ON FARMER JOHN"- This is the story of John Peterson, a farmer in Illinois. John Peterson runs his farm based on a direct relationship with the people he grows the food for. He started CSA, 'community supported agriculture'. He talks about the way industrial farming has pushed people off the land and destroyed the livlihoods of thousands of farmers. He believes in a more respectful relationship to the land, and to what sustains us-food.

For anyone interested in the above, a good website to visit is www.slowfood.org.uk 'SLOWFOOD' campaigns for "good, clean and fair food......respect for the environment, human health and animal welfare....a fair wage for food producers...." they work to raise awareness about the sustainability and social justice issues surrounding the food we eat. "Slow Food UK aims to protect and preserve the traditional foods of the United Kingdom, defend biodiversity and promote food education." (quotes from slowfood website)

Reply to a Farmer.

Previously I mentioned the blog of Matthew Naylor http://www.fwi.co.uk/blogs/lincolnshire-farming-blog/ where I learned about the limited capacity of the peasantry to absorb knowledge and information about agricultural pesticides.

Hi Mr Naylor, I was entertained by your reply and appreciate the inclusion of my blog title on Mouth of the Wash. I look forward to exchanging ideas from across the great divide and trust that with your infinite farmer's wisdom you will further enlighten the general public...perhaps you could invite me over for one of your excellent cups of coffee and let me rifle through your spray records?

Prior notification of spraying of agri-chemicals.

Some time ago I highlighted an article by Matthew Naylor. His comments frequently feature in Farmers Weekly in addition to his own blog, and he generally seems to reflect the ethos of the NFU. For this reason I thought I'd find his views on the consultation called by the NFU to notify neighbours before farmers apply agro chemicals to their crops. It is important to note that the consultation is taking place as a direct consequence of a landmark victory by Georgina Downs against the government(Nov.2008) over pesticide spraying.The High Court ruling stated that Downs had produced "solid evidence" that people exposed to chemicals used to spray crops had suffered harm.

Peter Kendall NFU president, said "whatever the outcome of the appeal, Defra Secretary Hilary Benn had made it clear "he is going to have to do something" about government policy on Pesticides.

Mr Kendall said "we would rather look at the best ways of reassuring people, without alarming them and without creating excessive bureaucracy for farmers, than just sit and do nothing and wait for unworkable regulation to be imposed upon us."

Anyway, Defra appealed the High Court judgement and the original decision was overturned.Georgina Down's press release following the reversal of the original judgement is reproduced in my previous post.
Matthew Naylor's article should be taken seriously because (despite being a bit of patronising hogwash) it indicates how the NFU and defra attempt to mislead the public. He makes several points, all of which are flawed,- it is not until his last paragraph that he pays lip service to the premise of the Georgina Downs case...that spraying of agri-chemicals is inherently unsafe for residents close to sprayed land. The rest of his article is based on a false debate of whether or not to inform neighbours before farmers apply agro chemicals to their crops. If pesticides present no risks to neighbouring residents, why bother to notify them of spraying? In suggesting this initiative Defra is implicitly admitting that pesticide spraying is unsafe for the public.

Unfortunately there's some confusion about whether or not it breaches copyright to reproduce the relevant post of Mr Naylor's blog, so if you want to read it try 'Say it,Don't Spray it-Mouth of the Wash.' My following comments are a response to this.　

Ok Mr Naylor, do you really think that by inviting people to your office for a coffee, or to look at your records etc, that they are going to be so baffled by science or so impressed by your admin. skills that they loose all vestige of common sense, or reasoning skills?
As for your comment that people get irritated by unsolicited information in their lives- this is true if it relates to some crap advertizing trivea, NOT if it relates to the possibility of they or their children being harmed by pesticide spray/vapour/ or residues. It is not up to the NFU to decide how much information to give the public about the pesticides they are breathing on a regular basis!
One of your so-called 'safety' regulations recommends the 'oh so considerate' practice of spraying adjacent to residents property when they are away at work--, do you really imagine that they would be happy to allow their children or toddlers to come home and play around on ground next to recently sprayed land? 'Out of sight, out of mind?"
Your comment comparing our situation with Chinese factories is too fatuous and irrational to bother with.

In conclusion, we are not impressed by your assertion that you operate within the law. As Georgina Down's evidence conclusively and convincingly showed,the law and legislation on this issue is fundamentally flawed. Your cynical assumption that your .."practices are safe for the consumer, the neighbour and the operator alike. If this is not the case. then there is something wrong with the regulations"... reflects your glimmer of realization of the truth. As things stand, your claim to be professional and civilized in the way you go about business, is ludicrous.
Instead of protective legislation for rural residents, Defra is offering prior warning of spraying so that people can try to protect themselves from agri sprays by going into their homes and shutting the doors and windows. If the house,/school/ is surrounded by agricultural land this could amount to days per week.Many farmers resent any restrictions on their bad practice however hazardous this might be to others, so they would be very happy to see others freedom curtailed rather than modify their own reckless actions.

Well, as a rural resident I shall be requiring prior notification of each spraying, and access to records together with full knowledge of all chemicals used on crops adjacent to my property. If I see any breach of the safety regulations, I will not be sitting on my hands. To Mr Kendall, I would say that the public are not a lot of children to be patted on the head and told that pesticides are not harmfull, just so that farmers need not be inconvenienced by bureaucracy.

Perversion of Justice.

PRESS RELEASE sent out on 7th July 2009 at 10.45am

PESTICIDES PUBLIC HEALTH SCANDAL WHITEWASH FOLLOWING BIZARRE COURT OF APPEAL JUDGMENT, AS CAMPAIGNER VOWS TO FIGHT ON TO THE HOUSE OF LORDS

Award-winning environmental campaigner, Georgina Downs, who last November won a historic and landmark High Court victory against the Government over its fundamental failure to protect people in the countryside from pesticides has today issued a statement regarding the Court of Appeal Judgment that has been handed down this morning in the case Secretary of State for the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) v Georgina Downs.

For the purposes of this press release Georgina Downs’ statement is included in full below with notes to editors to follow. (The same statement can also be found on Ms. Downs’ website under the second link).

Speaking outside the Royal Courts of Justice this morning, Georgina Downs stated,

“I would like to start by saying that I think this may well go down in history as being the most bizarre and inaccurate Judgment to have ever come out of the Court of Appeal.

Last November I won a landmark victory in the High Court against the Government over pesticides. That High Court Judgment was very clear as the Judge, Mr. Justice Collins, said that he was in “no doubt” that the Government had been acting unlawfully in its policy and approach in relation to the use of pesticides in crop spraying, and that public health, in particular rural residents and communities exposed to pesticides from living in the locality to regularly sprayed fields, was not being protected (and this applied to both acute effects and chronic long term adverse health effects).

Mr. Justice Collins formed his judgment on the evidence that I had set forth before the High Court, in particular the detailed Witness Statements that I had produced, as he recognised that they “set out the factual basis for the arguments presented” in my case, and that they sought to “meet the contrary arguments put forward on behalf of the Government.”

Having considered my Witness Statements carefully, Mr. Justice Collins concluded that I had produced “cogent arguments and evidence,” that had been “scientifically justified.” He also concluded that I had produced “solid evidence that residents have suffered harm to their health.”

The High Court Judgment was obviously a very significant and landmark ruling for the potentially millions of residents throughout the country who, like myself, live in the locality to pesticide sprayed fields.
When granting the Government permission to appeal the High Court ruling, Mr. Justice Collins made it clear that he did not think that an appeal had a real prospect of success. This would have been based on the assumption that the Court of Appeal would form its Judgment on the very same evidence and arguments that he did.

However, today’s Judgment from the Court of Appeal which has overturned Mr. Justice Collins’ Judgment unanimously, has done so as a result of very wrongly (and possibly intentionally) substituting the cogently argued case I presented with that of another party. This means that almost the entire judgment has been formed on the wrong basis and does not in any way resemble the same case, arguments and evidence that Mr. Justice Collins based his Judgment on in the High Court.

Lord Justice Sullivan in substituting my case and arguments with those set out in a report 4 years ago by the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution has based the justification for doing that on the totally incorrect assumptions that all of the material set forth before the court had been considered by the Royal Commission and therefore that the Royal Commission’s views must be the high water mark of my case. Not only is this not correct, it is ridiculous considering that the 6 Witness Statements that I produced for this case (along with a vast amount of documentation that went with it, as there are a few thousand pages before the court) were all prepared after the Royal Commission’s report had been published in 2005. For example, my first witness statement was a year later in October 2006 and the 149 page second Witness Statement which is the most important in detailing the full factual arguments and evidence of my case was dated April 2008, which is over 2 and a half years after the Royal Commission report. Therefore it is of course not possible for the Royal Commission to have assessed the exact case and factual arguments and evidence that were set forth before the court if all the witness statements and accompanying materials that provided the critical basis of my case and arguments all post-dated the Royal Commission report.

I have put considerable work and effort into producing the arguments, evidence and materials for this legal case over the last 3 years and I have worked to the highest professional standard and been meticulous with accuracy and attention to detail. Therefore it is completely unacceptable to me to see my case and arguments fundamentally misrepresented in such a way, as today’s Judgment has effectively turned the case into the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution v DEFRA. Yet the Royal Commission is not a named party in this case, as it is supposed to be Georgina Downs v DEFRA, and I have taken this case at considerable personal, professional and financial costs for myself and my family. (The Government of course has continued to fight against me using many hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayers money!)

Last year Mr. Justice Collins went by my case and evidence that was set before him and ruled in my favour by concluding that the Government had been acting unlawfully. In fact prior to this Court of Appeal Judgment, I had actually won all 5 of the decisions that had taken place so far in this legal case since 2007. This is the first ruling out of 6 to go in the Government’s favour and it has done so in a very bizarre and questionable manner.

It also means that my actual case, arguments and evidence have not actually yet been defeated in the courts, as today’s Judgment ruled in the Government’s favour, but based on someone else’s position. Therefore this Judgment is a complete whitewash as by substituting my case for someone else’s it just says every single thing that the Government would have wanted it to say. In fact there is not even a hint anywhere in the Judgment of any criticism of the Government at all. The Court of Appeal has basically passed it back to the Government to deal with and yet it is the Government I am challenging! The Government could not have wished for a better result than if it wrote the Judgment itself! It was clear to a number of those who attended the hearing in May that the Judges came in with a pre-formed view, but why did they come in with a pre-formed view? Aside from the Government, the chemical industry and the farming unions who I am sure will be hanging off every word, I really don’t think anyone’s going to take this judgment seriously as it is just bizarre.

Obviously by not forming the Court of Appeal Judgment on the basis of my case, it means that a considerable amount of evidence that was set forth has inexplicably been ignored in the Judgment. The most important of this is that, whilst the Judges have considered whether the Government’s model is ‘suitable’ and therefore lawful for the short-term exposure of a bystander, it has completely failed to consider whether there was a suitable model for the long-term exposure of residents. Yet this has been the long-standing charge of my case, that the Government’s bystander model does not and cannot address residents, and therefore that the Government’s approach does not comply with the European Directive, as rightly concluded by Mr. Justice Collins in the High Court ruling. It is of course important to point out that Judicial Review is about points of law and not the facts or the merits (although as said in this case the Court of Appeal has based its decisions on the legal points using the wrong facts and evidence in any event). Therefore the fact clearly remains that there has never been any assessment for the long-term exposure for those who live, work or go to school near pesticide sprayed fields, which as I have continued to maintain is an absolute scandal considering that crop-spraying has been a predominant feature of agriculture for over 50 years.

The High Court Judgment last year rightly recognised that this case is based on the risk of harm to rural residents, not upon proving that such harm has already occurred. It is therefore not incumbent upon me, in relation to my challenge under the EC Directive, to prove causation. So far as the Directive is concerned, my arguments would arise irrespective of whether I had personally suffered adverse health effects, because I (and other residents) would still have been (and continue to be) exposed to the risk of harm.

DEFRA itself has previously stated that, “If there is scientific evidence that use of a pesticide may harm human health, that is considered unacceptable.”

However, in the Court of Appeal Judgment Lord Justice Sullivan has completely shifted the goalposts in relation to this issue, as he says that not only does there need to be actual harm, (which there does not, as it is supposed to be based on the risk of harm or even less if going by the Government’s statement of “may harm”), but he says that harm to an individual’s health cannot be confirmed definitively until there is consensus across the scientific community. This is a very serious misinterpretation indeed. Evidence is the word Mr. Justice Collins recognised was the right one in the High Court Judgment, as to say effectively that no diagnosis can be confirmed and thus action taken until there is scientific consensus is not only incorrect, it is an impossibility considering the diversity of scientific positions between Government scientists who want to maintain a certain position on the issue and various independent scientists who want to act on the existing scientific and medical evidence. Therefore again this is another area where this Judgment is simply bizarre and very legally flawed in view of the overriding public safety duty as required by the European Directive regarding the protection of human health.

It is important for me to point out that the draft Judgment contained a number of very serious and important factual errors in relation to my own personal health situation, which were completely unacceptable. However, considering I have only just received the final Judgment I will need to consider the content of this version carefully before issuing any further comment regarding my own personal situation.

We now have a situation where there has been 2 completely opposing judgments, as the High Court Judgment only 8 months ago was unequivocal in its conclusions of the Government’s failure to protect public health and now a Court of Appeal Judgment has put the main focus, quite frankly, on the protection of the Government and the industry position, with no real concern whatsoever for human health shown at all.

It is outrageous and complacent the position the Court of Appeal has taken in this judgement, as it basically says it is okay for people to suffer certain adverse health effects from exposure to pesticides and has effectively just given a green light to the Government to continue to carry on poisoning people in this country, which is extraordinary. This is a serious public health issue of significant public importance, so of course I will be applying to appeal to the House of Lords in relation to trying to overturn this very legally flawed judgment and to uphold the original one from the High Court.

Ironically Lord Justice Sullivan who has written the lead Judgment today, only a few months ago in March criticized the Government for not having initiated any action as a result of the High Court ruling. He stated that whilst the Government’s “Plan A” was to appeal and hope that the Judgment went in their favour, the Government clearly had no “Plan B” in relation to its response if its appeal fails. He therefore ordered that the Government should get on with its review. The Government’s review subsequently started and it has been reported that DEFRA has clearly indicated that irrespective of the outcome of its appeal that changes would be made to its policy. Therefore if changes will be made to the policy anyway, which was the whole aim of my campaign, to change Government policy on pesticides, then the campaign objective would be met, irrespective of the outcome of the legal case.
The one thing that the Government will know from all this is that I am not afraid to take them on on any level, that I will take them on in the highest courts in the land, and aside from going to the House of Lords, I will take another Judicial Review challenge from scratch on any other decisions that come out in relation to pesticides. I am on the Government’s case and will be on their case until the necessary changes are made to protect public health, as the evidence in my Witness Statements shows quite clearly that the Government has knowingly failed to act, has continued to shift the goalposts, cherry picked the science to suit the desired outcome, and has misled the public, especially rural residents over the safety of agricultural pesticides sprayed on crop fields throughout the country. The Government’s response to this issue has been of the utmost complacency, is completely irresponsible and is definitely not “evidence-based policy-making.” The unarguable evidence contained in my Witness Statements that led to the landmark High Court victory last year, but the majority of which the Court of Appeal has completely ignored in today’s Judgment, will be published on my website in due course, as for various reasons it cannot be released at this time. I will be making a further statement to accompany its publication shortly.”

Notes to Editors:-

The Judgment in the Court of Appeal case Secretary of State for the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) v Georgina Downs was handed down at 10am on 7th July 2009. The Court of Appeal hearing took place between 18th and 20th May 2009. The Court of Appeal Judges were Lord Justice Sullivan, Lady Justice Arden and Lord Justice Keene.

Georgina Downs made a statement outside the Royal Courts of Justice following the hand down this morning. This press release contains the statement in full, but it is also available on her website under the second link at: http://www.pesticidescampaign.co.uk/ Ms. Downs will now be applying to appeal to the House of Lords against the Court of Appeal Judgment.

DEFRA’s appeal was against the High Court Judgment of Mr. Justice Collins in the landmark Judicial Review case Georgina Downs v Secretary of State for DEFRA that was handed down on 14th November 2008. Ms. Downs’ case was the first known legal case of its kind to reach the High Court to directly challenge the Government’s pesticide policy and approach regarding crop-spraying in rural areas and Ms. Downs won the case.

The High Court Judgment of 14th November 2008 is available at:- http://www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/markup.cgi?doc=/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2008/2666.html&query=title+(+downs+)&method=boolean Georgina Downs made a statement outside the High Court following the hand down on 14th November 2008. The statement in full and the accompanying press release dated 14th November 2008 are available on her website at: http://www.pesticidescampaign.co.uk/georgia_high_court_victory.htm

An oral hearing regarding the Government’s application for a “stay” of the High Court Judgment and subsequent Order took place on 4th March 2009. Lord Justice Sullivan refused the Government’s application for a “stay” and ordered that the Government should get on with its review following the High Court ruling in November 2008 and as a result this review is currently underway.

Ms. Downs has spent much of the last 3 years working on the legal case and after re-reading approx. 3500 pages of documentation in the High Court she submitted a 149 page second Witness Statement which provided the critical evidence for her original Judicial Review victory. Ms. Downs produced 6 Witness Statements in total, the majority of the contents of which the Court of Appeal has inexplicably completely ignored in today’s Judgment, as the Court of Appeal has very bizarrely substituted Ms. Downs’ case, arguments and evidence with the conclusions of a report by the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution 4 years ago in 2005. The critical evidence contained in Ms. Downs’ Witness Statements has not yet been published, but is due to be in due course. Ms. Downs will make a further statement to accompany their publication.

Ms. Downs was represented by Michael Fordham QC and Emma Dixon, barristers at Blackstone Chambers. Michael Fordham was recently named as Public Law and Human Rights Silk of the Year at the Chambers & Partners Bar Awards 2008, see http://www.blackstonechambers.com/news/news/chambers_bar_awards.html

Georgina Downs runs the UK Pesticides Campaign (http://www.pesticidescampaign.co.uk/) to highlight the risks and adverse health and environmental effects of pesticides, especially on rural residents and communities. Ms. Downs has lived next to regularly sprayed fields for over 25 years and has spent the last 8 years campaigning for a change in the regulations and legislation governing crop spraying. She was the first to identify serious fundamental flaws regarding the so-called “bystander risk assessment”. The ‘bystander’ model assumes there will only be occasional, short-term exposure to the spray cloud at the time of the application only, (ie. immediate spraydrift) for five minutes (or less), from a single pass of a sprayer, based on a person standing 8 metres from the spray boom (and based on dermal and inhalation routes of exposure only). It also assumes exposure will only be to one individual pesticide at any time. Ms. Downs has continued to argue that the bystander model does not and cannot address residents who are repeatedly exposed from various exposure factors and routes to mixtures of pesticides and other chemicals, throughout every year, and in many cases, like her own situation, for decades. The various exposure factors include long term exposure to pesticides in the air, exposure to vapours, which can occur days, weeks, even months after application, exposure to mixtures, precipitation, reactivation, pesticides transported from outdoor applications and redistributed into an indoor air environment, as well as long-range transportation, as studies have shown pesticides found miles away from where they were originally applied.

The evidence set out in Ms. Downs’ second Witness Statement shows that the Government, its main advisors, the Advisory Committee on Pesticides, and the regulators, formerly the Pesticides Safety Directorate now the Chemicals Regulation Directorate, have clearly continued to allow acute effects, (including both local irritant effects, as well as systemic effects such as headaches, nausea, aching limbs, pain, dizziness etc.) to occur in residents (and bystanders), without taking any action to protect residents health. It should be noted that when acute effects are repeated again and again, as they are for people living near sprayed fields, then it can increase the risk of long-term cumulative effects resulting in chronic long-term illnesses and diseases.

There have been a number of recent and important European Commission statements that clearly acknowledged the chronic long term impacts of pesticides, including for those living in the locality to sprayed fields. For example, the EC stated that, “Long term exposure to pesticides can lead to serious disturbances to the immune system, sexual disorders, cancers, sterility, birth defects, damage to the nervous system and genetic damage.”(Source:http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=MEMO/06/278&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en)

· In January this year Ms. Downs met with the key policy advisor to Gordon Brown at Number 10 and has recently met with the Secretary of State for DEFRA, Hilary Benn, to call on the Government to introduce mandatory measures to protect rural residents. These measures include the call for an immediate ban on crop-spraying near homes, schools, playgrounds, workplaces and other public areas; for direct public access to information on the chemicals sprayed on crops; and for a new legal obligation to give rural residents prior notification before any pesticide spraying in their locality

In 2008 Georgina Downs won the first ever Inspirational Eco Woman of the Year Award, in the Daily Mail’s Inspirational Women of the Year awards. Ms. Downs also won the prestigious Andrew Lees Memorial Award at the 2006 British Environment and Media Awards (BEMAs) and the Heroine Award at Cosmopolitan magazine’s inaugural Fun Fearless Female Awards in November 2006. She was also invited to attend the 2008 “Women of the Year Lunch” where each woman is individually nominated by a member of the Women of the Year Nominating Council and is considered a “Woman of the Year” because of their special contribution to society or the workplace. Ms. Downs was also recently elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) as a result of her campaigning efforts.

**Please note that this case is Georgina Downs v DEFRA and does not involve any other group or organization. Due to legal confidentiality regarding the specific arguments involved in this case the only contact for enquiries about the actual evidence and arguments presented in this case is Georgina Downs.

Contact: Georgina Downs
UK Pesticides Campaign
www.pesticidescampaign.co.uk

Tel: Mobile: 07906 898 915
Home/office: 01243 773846
Email: gdowns25@tiscali.co.uk

Native species of pollinators.."all sprayed-out".

In a previous post I attempted to give some reasons (as an unqualified observer) why agricultural pesticides seem to be the common denominator in the story of honeybee decline.Certain pesticides have been proven to be highly toxic to bees, and Peter Melchett of the Soil Association says that "The government prefers to blame 'very wet weather' and 'poor management by less experienced beekeepers' than to face their own responsibility to control bee-killing chemicals that have been used on up to 1.5 million acres of farmland in the UK.

In 12 different European countries 30-65% of bees are declining or threatened. This is accompanied by a tightly parallel process in plants, ( 70% decline). Since 1930 we have lost 97% of our wildflower meadows in the UK. Dr Biesmeijer, ecologist at Leeds University, speaks passionately about the importance of biodiversity and how this provides resiliency to climate change and weather extremes. He warns how all our native species of pollinators, not just honeybees, are threatened or have been anihilated by the loss of wild flowers and refuge nest sites. He refers to their habitat as "all sprayed out." The photographs above demonstrate the way many farmers, (encouraged by Defra) have obliterated hedges and flower rich field margins, to expand crop production. Dr Biesmeijer warns against agricultural practices which cause a vicious cycle of changes in pollination effecting the population of plants, and visa versa. .

Having reiterated a concern about pesticides, this post is about biodiversity and the value of all pollinating insects.There is now a popular movement among members of the public (encouraged by advice and information from the Co-op and National Bee Association) to try and compensate as much as possible for the practices of industrial agriculture, by establishing gardens which provide good habitat and nutrition for pollinating insects. Additionally many people are starting their own honeybee colonies.
(Insect pollinators include 25 species of bumblebee, 240 species of solitary bees and 250 species of hoverflies, as well as butterflies and bee flies which all maintain a diverse array of plants and flowers)

Pollinating insects are an insurance policy for our survival because they provide a diversity of responses to climate. Eg, the Red Mason Bee can remain alive in low temperatures, and this means certain crops are less vulnerable to climatic variations.
Ecologists are carrying out useful research in traditional fruit orchards. Unfortunately 60% of these orchards have disappeared since the 1950's, putting local varieties of apples, cherries, pears, plums and damsons under threat. But this is a particularly sad tale because they provide important habitats for a range of species. Trees in traditional orchards are widely spaced and the sites are often grazed by animals such as sheep, or cut for hay. They provide good habitat for wildlife because they are subject to low intensity management, with few or no chemicals used, and the trees are allowed to reach a stage where they are hollowed and gnarled. Researchers have discovered that many pollinating insects fly in the high canopy of these fruit trees.

The print at the top of this page shows a modern orchard being treated with pesticides.(next to my house) The hedge in the foreground is 12ft high. Beyond the hedge, the spray is blasted well above the tops of the fruit trees. This graphically demonstrates why nothing can survive in modern orchards, and believe it or not, just to make absolutely sure, the ground under the fruit trees is periodically sprayed with fungicides. This is why fruit farmers depend on the professional beekeepers to provide a supply of bees to pollinate between pesticide sprayings.( As a neighbour to this farmer I'm definitely getting a raw deal.I supply his orchards with a rich source of pollinators from my garden, while he supplies my air with toxic chemicals)

Likewise in Italy, apple production is very intensive. In orchards which are situated on high ground nearer to forests, wild bees do the job.In valleys they have to import honeybees.
In 2007, the British government prioritised orchards as habitat to protect in recognition of their importance to wildlife. It is soul-destroying to know that, since joining the EU, many East European countries are destroying their traditional orchards in favour of intensive fruit production.

For anyone who is interested in the subject of bee declines and related information, there is a good, detailed article called "A Sting in the Tail" on the website http://www.freshinfo.com/

Ethics in agribusiness?

It probably hasn’t escaped the attention of many that the British Parliament is currently embroiled in an ‘expenses’ scandal. Exposures about individual MP’s expenses claims were leaked to the Telegraph newspaper which is publishing this information by installments and drawing-out the agony for worried MP’s who wonder if they will be the next to be shamed.--( No, I am not digressing from the subject of my blog about the machinations of agribusiness/government, so please bear with me!)
Naturally, the British public are very annoyed about MP's 'misuse' of our money. Some of us are particularly annoyed because ironically enough the Government has the temerity (and hypocricy) to put us, its citizens, under intense (for a so-called free democratic society) and constant surveillance and scrutiny via their video cameras and data bases. Well, the British public are at long last beginning to think ‘what is good for the goose, is good for the gander.’

So,(back to agribusiness) environmental campaigners have decided to introduce their own surveillance, - and this is being used to produce 'witness evidence’. For example, the pesticide campaigner Georgina Downs won a High Court victory in November 2008 against the Government.The judgement concluded that the British Government has been acting unlawfully in its crop spraying policy and failing to protect the health of the public living near agricultural land. G.D's arguments were underpinned by direct witness evidence which included a two-part video together with pesticide-soaked mannequins having a ‘picnic’ during spraying of pesticides in the adjacent field.
This approach by Georgina Downs was resorted to because for years Defra and the Pesticide Safety Directorate refused to acknowledge the inadequacy of the safety regulations when she produced her arguments and evidence to them.

Similarly and possibly inspired by Georgina Downs court case, ISIS (The Institute of Science in Society) has published on its website a post entitled ‘Call for Direct Witness Evidence of GM hazards and Failures’ by Dr Mae-Wan Ho.(14/04/09). ISIS has already exposed deliberately misleading claims about the performance of GM crops, and they say that witness evidence properly documented is taken seriously by the law courts.For this reason ISIS would like people to submit photographic and video evidence to them.
ISIS is categorical that material on its site should not be reproduced in any form without permission, so I strongly recommend you visit http://www.i-sis.org.uk/

Our government keeps us under constant surveillance, it claims, for our own safety and security,(and because it regards us all as potential criminals) On the other hand it is perfectly happy to allow the health of thousands of people to be damaged by pesticides, and to put at risk through genetic engineering the very security of our food supply. The arguments and ethics of many of our leaders should be kept under scrutiny, (even if some of them have returned our money.)

website of Georgina Downs http://www.pesticidescampaign.co.uk/

Honeybee decline and facts which DEFRA tries to gloss over.

At last the mainstream media seems to have grasped the fact that bee die-offs have serious implications for humanity, and the problem isn't going away.
Martha Kearney's documentary on bbc4 last week provided a more in depth analysis than I have seen on the tv before. In the documentary,agricultural pesticides were heavily implicated as a source of the die-offs, but Martha Kearney stopped short of saying this directly. Likewise, the scientists who were interviewed seemed to be pointing to pesticides as the greatest cause of concern and even implicating them as the root of the problem, but avoided claiming this categorically. In the documentary many possible causes were explored.
Some Facts
a) In the UK last year nearly a third of honeybees were lost.
b) 40% of hives died out.
c) The European Honeybee pollinates over 90 crops. In the UK this is worth £190 million and in the US sixty times that amount.
d) The honeybee accounts for 80% of insect pollination.

In the US:-
e) One beekeeper lost 360 out of 400 hives.
f) A big commercial beekeeper lost 200 million bees.
g) 600,000 hectares of almonds in California represent 90% of income for beekeepers.
h) Beekeepers can own around 70,000 hives which are transported huge distances(around 3000 miles) across the continent.
i) Because of the decline of bees, aeroplanes are ferrying bees from Australia to California and back. Australian bees are so far unaffected by ccd.
Environmental Stressors
a) Lack of hedges and set-aside land combined with huge acreages of monocrops, means there are fewer wild plants and biodiversity for bees to feed on.( 100 years ago there were plenty of wild bees and other insects which are now largely eradicated.)
b) In the US hives are transported huge distances accross the continent, sometimes 3,000 mile trips.
c) At the National Bee Unit in York the English Government experts attribute the problem to climate change, and weather patterns. In unseasonal weather the bees will not forage. Viruses which spread at an alarming rate become resistant to chemical treatment.
d) Pests (such as varroa mites) viruses, bacteria and fungi.
e) Genetic narrowing of the species through breeding of bees that are more docile and produce good honey yields, but are more susceptible to pests and disease.

All the above developments are helping to compound what has become a critical situation of colony collapse disorder and massive bee die-offs.Environmentalists, conservationists,ecologists, and many scientists have been expressing their concern for a long time over the lack of biodiversity caused by intensive agriculture.Despite this in 2007 the European Commission decided to abolish set-aside land so that every last strip of land could be used for intensive crop production. Scares over food shortages were exploited to push for the expansion of more intensively farmed agricultural land, and to push for the introduction of genetically modified crops which had previously been banned in Europe. Now, just over a year later we are literally reaping what we have sown,- the extermination of the main crop pollinators-bees.
Although no single event by itself can be identified as a cause of the honeybee decline, scientists agree that something is weakening the bees resilience, and immunity to diseases.
Conflicting Theories.
But scientists seem to be promoting two conflicting theories. On the one hand they say that pesticides are not the single culprit of bee deaths. Something, or a combination of things, is making bees weak and more vulnerable to pathogens which are killing them.( Pathogens are found in dead bees, but in healthy bees too)Alternatively they are saying that bees are subjected more than ever before to contamination by pesticides on food crops. At Penn State University in the US, Maryanne Frazier points out that bees are at risk from a whole cocktail of pesticides.There's no doubt that lack of wild plants and adequate food has a significant impact on bees, and unseasonal weather also effects how they survive, but these elements cannot explain the following:-
Pesticides
Some commercial apiarists in the USA have monitored and described the care of their bees in the months leading up to the wipe-out of their bee colonies. These bee keepers went to great lengths to make sure the bees had adequate nutrition over the winter period. One beekeeper transported thousands of hives a distance of hundreds of miles to spend the winter away from any risk of contamination from already effected bees. The following Spring his bees had disappeared with only a small number of dead bees around the hives.This demonstrates there is no link between the husbandry of individual beekeepers and the death of colonies, or between weather conditions and the bee deaths.. This seems to put pesticides at the top of the list again. Maryanne Frazier (Penn State University) wonders whether "the whole toxic soup is having a long-term effect to push bees over the edge?" Marryanne collected bee samples from a number of beekeepers and found pesticides in every class that are currently being used-insecticides,fungicides and herbicides.In one bee she found 25 different agro chemicals.
This research so far, makes it difficult to understand how pesticides can be dismissed as not being the source of colony collapse disorder, or honeybee decline. Research scientists have no idea what the pesticides in combination (the toxic soup or cocktail effect) are doing to bees, or to anything else for that matter. Given the number of pesticides found in bees, it would take many more years of research to analyze the interraction of the different compounds and their effect on bees and how they effect the immune system of bees.One of the most damaging group of pesticides seem to be the 'neonicotinoids' (nicotine based). They are systemic, meaning they are applied to seeds and distributed throughout the plant.Imidacloprid (sometimes called Gaucho) is a neonicotinoid which it is claimed, at low level or sub lethal doses, effects the brains of growing bees resulting in damage to their navigation system and homing instinct. For this reason the pesticides have been banned in France, Germany, Italy and Slovenia.
There is another reason to suspect that pesticides might be at the root of the bee decline. A number of beekeepers in Britain and America have reported that when their bees are put into or near to farmland where there are treated crops, their bee colonies have died. By contrast when their bees have been able to forage on land or woodland which is free of pesticides, the bees remain healthy.

Mike Thurlow, a beekeeper in Britain has described the problem he has encountered since 2002. Hundreds of thousands of dead bees were found around the hives, they weren't disappearing. Mr Thurlow complained that there is a lack of wild flowers for bees to feed on, and consequently his bees are struggling.He went on to describe the difference he saw when his hives were put in farmland. When bees came back from pollination they were divided three ways-one lot into a wood(lime trees) and the other two lots in intensive agricultural areas, where the colonies collapsed.
This account is echoed in the experience of urban beekeepers. In cities there is more food for the bees in parks and small gardens with there diversity of plants.
I think A.Jarvis of the Independent newspaper provides some apt comments on this issue. Referring to systemic pesticides he writes ...."They're supposed to be discriminatory-in the same hopeless way, smart bombs are meant to be-but,like the smart bombs, they're actually pretty dumb. In fact, they're probably worse for the bees than the old-fashioned spray-and-be-damned kind, as they're aimed at the seeds, and the problem has become systemic. Now when the bee pollinates a plant, it picks up a cocktail of drugs along the way.........It does all seem absurb, the idea of an aeroplane ferrying bees from Australia to California and back. How did the simple practice of beekeeping become this convoluted?And how can it be reversed?...."
Finally I think it is important for us all to realize that Colorado beekeeper Tom Theobald is right when he says that "pesticide laws are routinely ignored and disregarded.....new pesticides are not properly evaluated independently to assess the impact they might have on bees....." Orlando Clarke, an urban beekeeper says...."if you've got one creature that's so widespread accross the planet and suddenly it's coming under such an attack that it's almost being wiped out-we've got to be asking how that's feeding further up the food chain and right accross nature."

Police tried to recruit environmental campaigner to spy.

The photos above were taken three years ago on the south coast of Kent, England. They show surveillance of seagulls, beach huts and anyone who might wander onto beach.

This morning John OConnor (former commander of Scotland Yard) was interviewed re the police infiltration of environmantal groups. He said they(the police) "have to police everything". Judging by the photos above the police take this absolutely literally.

With regard to environmental groups, the police were caught on tape trying to recruit a Plane Stupid protestor as a spy. The Guardian newspaper says that undercover police are running a network of hundreds of informants inside protest organisations who secretly feed them intelligence in return for cash. These disclosures were revealed in almost three hours of secretly recorded discussions between covert officers claiming to be from Strathclyde police, and an activist from the protest group Plane Stupid, whom the officers attempted to recruit as a spy after she had been released on bail following a demonstration at Aberdeen Airport last month.

Below-from The Guardian

Matilda Gifford,24, said she recorded the meetings in an attempt to expose how police seek to disrupt the legitimate activities of climate change activists. She met the officers twice; they said they were a detective constable and his assistant. During the taped discussions the officers:
• Indicate that she could receive tens of thousands of pounds to pay off her student loansin return for information about individuals within Plane Stupid.
• Say they will not pay money direct into her bank account because that would leave anaudit trail that would leave her compromised. They said the money would be tax-free,and added: "UK pic can afford more than 20 quid."
• Accept that she is a legitimate protester, but warn her that her activity could mean shewill struggle to find employment in the future and result in a criminal record.
• Claim they have hundreds of informants feeding them information from protest
• Indicate that she could receive tens of thousands of pounds to pay off her student loansin return for information about individuals within Plane Stupid.
• Say they will not pay money direct into her bank account because that would leave an audit trail that would leave her compromised. They said the money would be tax-free,and added: "UK pic can afford more than 20 quid."
• Accept that she is a legitimate protester, but warn her that her activity could mean shewill struggle to find employment in the future and result in a criminal record.
• Claim they have hundreds of informants feeding them information from protest
• Warn her that she could be jailed alongside "hard, evil" people if she received acustodial sentence.
The meetings took place in a Glasgow police station last month and in a supermarketcafe on Tuesday. Gifford used a mobile phone and device sewn into her waistcoat torecord what they described as a "business proposal" that she should think of as a job.
They intimated that in return for updates on Plane Stupid's plans she could receive large sums of money in cash.

....In a statement, Plane Stupid said: Our civil liberties were invaded and our right to peaceful protest called into question simply to defend the interests of big business.

Plane Stupid has pointed out the common theme running through all governments policies regarding agriculture and the environment. The collusion with big business has been noted repeatedly by pesticide campaigners, particularly with DEFRA'S refusal to acknowledge the overwhelming evidence regarding damage to human health and also the bee die offs across Europe and America.

'Taking Charge of who's Destiny?' Agriculture.

Blimey!...Question to Mr Naylor..Where are people who live in cities and do not own land expected to get their food if they do not delegate their food needs to farmers and retailers? Personally I think urban allotments are a good idea, but I don't think this is what Mr Naylor was suggesting.

(J. -Thanks for the comment on previous post- I tried to trace a link to the article but they seem not to have archived this feature which was published on the opinion page. I've reproduced the first half of the article verbatim below, so that I don't quote out of context.)

Sorry I have removed quote because of question-mark over copyright.

At grass roots level people are taking charge of their destiny-agriculture.

It was with interest that I read an article by Farmer Mathew Naylor(a Nuffield Scholar) called “Take Charge of your own Destiny.”(I was flipping through an old edition of Farmers Weekly, 23rd Jan.) It seemed a muddled and contradictory piece of writing to me, but in summary I think the message was that those farmers who are used to ‘mastering the elements’ are those who have an ‘Internal Locus of Control’ and take charge of their own destiny. Those farmers and horticulturists who don’t exterminate all insects with crop sprays are called ‘hippies’ and believe in an ‘External Locus of Power’ and put themselves at the mercy of fate. Mr Naylor concludes his thesis with the thought that despite the increasingly turbulent commodity and currency markets he still ‘holds firm with (his) opinions as a free-trader. Fate isn’t getting its hands on me…”

Well, ummm... thanks for those thoughts Mr Naylor.

Now, to return to the title of Mr Naylor’s article, (the reason it captured my attention in the first place),-"Take Charge of Your Own Destiny”. I had coincidently listened to Helen Kongai on the radio last week, when she had used a similar phrase…that at grass roots level people were…”taking their own destiny in their hands”. She too was referring to farming, and food production. This is where the parallel ends.
Helen Kongai is development officer for sustainable agriculture in Africa. This project was founded in 1988 by a group of UK farmers who sent cows to families in post-conflict Uganda. It now runs sustainable agricultural programmes in nine countries in Africa to help small-scale farmers overcome poverty and malnutrition. It is called the Send a Cow Charity. All those who use the Charity project undertake to pass on the benefits they gain such as livestock and skills to another family, so that the work goes on multiplying throughout communities.
So we see that Helen Kongai’s ideas for agriculture are ethically and in practical terms totally different from those of Mathew Naylor. Her strategy is to grow staple crops which are indigenous to the regions. Her farming methods work with nature and do not try to bludgeon the soil into submission with pesticides and synthetic nitrates.

The International Seeds Day which I mentioned in my previous post demonstrates the like-minded movement across the world for communities to ‘take charge of their destiny’ by producing their own food. This means resisting the attempts by corporates to colonize their land, or pressurize them into purchase of gm seeds.

International Seeds Day

I've just visited Jamblichus's Weblog, and have copied this information(below) from one of his links.... Please visit http://Jamblichus.wordpress.com

Below from http://www.ineas.org/events.htm Institute of Near Eastern and African Studies.

International Seeds Day
Organizations, activists and people from various professional and linguistic backgrounds will observe April 26 as International Seeds Day (ISD) advocating for patent-free seeds, organic food and farmers' rights. ISD will be an educational day for the public to learn about genetically modified food and its health hazardous effects and the agribusiness of major US and European companies and their monopoly over the agriculture in Africa and Asia with emphasis on India, Iraq and Afghanistan. It will be a day of solidarity with farmers in countries devastated by war (Afghanistan, Iraq & others) and of resistance.
Join us to endorse and publicize April 26 as International Seeds Day
and/or organize an event on April 26
Final deadline to endorse and/or organize an event is: April 12

Why April 26?

Order 81 was signed on April 26, 2004 by Paul Bremer, the administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Iraq to control Iraq's agriculture. The Order was a declaration of war against farmers. Article 14 of this law states "Farmers shall be prohibited from re-using seeds of protected varieties," Order 81 mends Iraq's original law No. 65 on patents, created in 1970. The most significant part of Order 81 is the subject of 'Plant Variety Protection' (PVP), which ensures not the protection of biodiversity, but rather the protection of the commercial interests of USA and European major seed corporations. In order to qualify for PVP, seeds have to be 'new, distinct, uniform and stable'. Therefore, the sort of seeds being encouraged to grow by corporations such as World Wide Wheat Company (WWWC), Monsanto and others will be those registered under PVP.
Interview with Dr. Vandana Shiva dedicated to Iraqis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-B1yU278zk
Full text of Order 81 http://www.trade.gov/static/iraq_memo81.pdf
Detailed information on the status of agriculture in Afghanistan and Iraq: http://www.grain.org/briefings/?id=217

Partial List of Events:
More details about the events listed will be updated and other events will be added daily.
1. USA: Phone Campaign to Iraqi farmers, farm owners, agriculture experts and women in Iraq to educate about terminator seeds, Order 81 and seed keeping and resistance by the volunteers at INEAS.
Institute of Near Eastern & African Studies (INEAS), Cambridge, MASS
http://www.INEAS.org
INEAS@aol.com and INEAS_1994@yahoo.com

2. Iceland: "Awareness for April 26th International Seeds Day"
University of Iceland Reykjavik - Iceland April 26 3-6 pm
Organized by activists Anouk Petzoldt, Charlotte Ferrier and Oscar-Mauricio Uscategui
Presenting "The world according to Monsanto" film,
Participants, speakers and exact address will be announced shortly
Contact: Anouk at Anoukpetzoldt@gmail.com and, Oscar-Mauricio at seeds@seedsiceland.org 354 845-6178

3. USA: "GMO Teach-In"
Local Food Coop - Albuquerque, New Mexico April 26 10:30 am
Sponsored by La Montanita Coop (www.lamontanita.coop). Cuatro Puertas, Arid Crop Seed Cache and GMO Free NM
Celebrating the 20th Annual Earth Festival
Location: At the Tent on the West End of the Festival Site - on Silver Street behind the Coop.
Contact: Isaura Andaluz at c4puertas@yahoo.com 505-620-5692

ISD Endorsers:

Institute of Near Eastern & African Studies (INEAS), http://www.INEAS.org, (MA, USA)

Navdanya, http://www.navdanya.org, (New Delhi, India)

Institute of Science in Society, http://www.i-sis.org.uk, (London, UK)

Brussells Tribunal, BRussells Tribunal, (Brussells, Belgium)

Grain International, http://www.grain.org, (Bercelona, Spain)

The Green Party of the United States, http://www.gp.org, (DC, USA)

GMO Free New Mexico, www.gmofreenm.com, (New Mexico, USA)

Slow Food Rio Grande, www.slowfoodriogrande.org, (New Mexico, USA)

Dr. Vandana Shiva, http://www.navdanya.org, (New Delhi, India)

Wafaa' Al-Natheema, http://www.INEAS.org, (MA, USA)

Brian John, Ph.D., http://www.gmfreecymru.org, (Wales, UK)

Andrew Bosworth, Ph.D., www.biotechempire.com, (Okinawa, Japan)

Dirk Adriaensens, SOS Iraq, (Brussells, Belgium)

Dr. Maha Alsakban, http://www.nwciraq.org, (Diwaniya, Iraq)

Dr. Souad Naji, BRussells Tribunal, (Baghdad, Iraq)

Yasir Allawi, http://www.dental-tribune.com, (Dubai,UAE)

Garda Ghista, www.worldproutassembly.org, (Kentucky, USA)

Amy Mall, http://www.twinenfp.org, (Chicago, USA)
Anouk Petzoldt & Charlotte Ferrier, http://umhverfi.hi.is, (Reykjavík, Iceland)
Oscar-Mauricio Uscategui, http://seedsiceland.org, (Reykjavík, Iceland)
Paola Pisi, http://www.uruknet.info, (Rome, Italy

Energy Dependence of Modern Agriculture.

Above - fourteen 600kg bags of nitrate.

Way back in 1980 Fritjof Capra (physicist) wrote a critique of Western societies overreliance on the ‘scientific method’. He predicted how a reductionist approach, and obsession with economic growth and production was depleting the planet’s natural resources. He even accurately predicted catastrophic climate change through ozone depletion. Not many people took any notice back then, but we’re paying for it now.

The world’s governments have emerged from the G20 summit claiming to have taken ‘unprecedented steps’ to rectify the global recession. Infact they are stubbornly avoiding dealing with the real issues. Rather than grasping the opportunity to invest in new technologies to counter the effects of climate change and depleted natural resources, our world leaders have instead chosen the same old paradigms that led us to the current crisis.

In his book ‘The Turning Point’ Capra made reference to the work of the geologist M.King Hubbert who as early as the 1950’s predicted the rate of depletion of the planet’s natural resources. There have been decades of negligence by Western governments.

A report by Caroline Lucas(Green MEP)in 2006 cuts through the establishment prevarication. It’s called ‘Fuelling The Food Crisis-The Impact of Peak Oil on Food Security.’

Whilst there is no concencus on how soon global oil will peak(the point at which half of the total oil known to exist has been consumed, and beyond which extraction goes into irreversible decline) many expect it to occur well before 2020.

Caroline Lucas states…..
..."Petroleum has become the lifeblood of both industrialised and developing economies. It would be difficult to find a single product available to us in the UK that has not consumed crude oil derivatives (as well as natural gas or coal) during its production, distribution and retail. Yet there is increasing evidence that days of easy access to cheap oil are fast running out.
The implications of this are vast. Since the first oil crisis of 1973, some of the inevitable consequences of addiction to fossil fuels have been well documented, particularly in terms of its impact on our transport systems. What has been much less analysed, however, is the impact of higher oil prices on our increasingly industrialised food system. This report aims to help address that question, by highlighting the extraordinary dependence of existing food and agriculture policy on cheap oil, and by demonstrating why this will have to change....
In my work as an MEP, I have long argued that the European Union's policies of ever greater free trade and more open markets must change, since they destroy the livelihoods of small and medium sized farmers, jeopardising food security, and increasing our dependence on imports. They also adversely affect the environment, as agricultural commodities are transported ever longer distances,and are processed and packaged to survive the journey. To these social and environmental problems must be added a new imperative - weaning the industrialised food production system itself off its high-energy use....
The priorities are clear. The Common Agricultural Policy must be replaced by a policy framework that minimises fossil-fuel use through the prioritisation of self-reliance, so that Europe can meet this new challenge head on, delivering food security into the future. The current emphasis on ever increasing international trade needs to be replaced by policies to relocalise our food systems.Finally, the EU must urgently refocus its development policies, so that poorer countries can put food security before exports, and replace their dependence on Western markets by much greater national and regional self-reliance. These are ambitious goals. The purpose of this report is to demonstrate why they are so urgently needed.
Higher energy and fuel prices will be a triple blow for the synthetic fertiliser industry, and for those farmers that have become dependent on this quick fix and are unwilling to consider the alternatives.Firstly, because of the large amount of energy required to extract ores and consumed during the manufacturing process; secondly, the use of natural gas as a feedstock, and thirdly, the costs of the fuel required to transport these bulk commodities. The export of fertilisers and their raw materials are a significant constituent of sea-borne bulk trade: the fourth most traded bulk commodity in world shipping trade after iron ore, coal and cereals.
Initially, the energy required to produce nitrogen fertilizer was provided by cheap electricity and derivatives of coal, inputs that were mostly available only in industrialised countries. Trade in fertilisers has increased because the fertiliser industry has gradually relocated plants to countries that have low electricity prices as well as the required natural gas feedstock. These include the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Venezuela. The need to access raw materials forother fertilizers has seen the industry also move into areas that have extensive natural reserves, including Africa, China, the US, and Morocco. Worldwide demand for fertiliser has necessitated significant levels of international trade. Shipping costs are relatively high for these low-value bulk commodities: the lower the value of the shipped material, the greater the incidence of transport in the landed cost.
The fertiliser industry does not see peak oil and natural gas as being a problem for fertiliser producers. According to the International Fertiliser Industry Association"...processes for ammonia production can use a wide range of energy sources. Thus, even when oil and gas supplies eventually dwindle, very large reserves of coal are likely to remain. Coal reserves are sufficient for well over 200 years at current production levels, and their location is geographically diverse. 60% of China's nitrogen fertiliser production is currently based on coal." The consequences in terms of climate change, however, would be catastrophic. Additionally, production of ammonia from coal is 70% more energy intensive than production from natural gas.
Given the high energy input required to produce nitrogen fertiliser, it is inevitable that manufacturing costs have risen as oil and gas prices worldwide have increased. Since 2003, ammonium nitrate costs, for example, have risen from £90 per tonne to over £170 per tonne in early 2006.”….

Even without the Peak Oil situation, Capra describes the damaging effects of fertilizer use in agriculture. Remember he wrote this in 1982.
"...The long-term effects of excessive 'chemotherapy' in agriculture have proven disastrous for the health of the soil and the people, for our social relations, and for the entire eco-system of the planet. As the same crops are planted and fertilized synthetically year after year, the balance in the soil is disrupted. The amount of organic matter diminishes, and with it the soil's ability to retain moisture. The humus content is depleted and the soil's porosity reduced. The changes in soil texture entail a multitude of interrelated consequences. The depletion of organic matter makes thesoil dead and dry; water runs through it but does not wet it.
The ground becomes hard-packed, which forces farmers to use more powerful machines. On the other hand, dead soil is more susceptible to wind and water erosion, which are taking an increasing toll. For example, half of the topsoil in Iowa has been washed away in the last twenty-five years, and in1976 two-thirds of America's agricultural counties were designated drought disaster areas. What is often called 'drought,' 'wind breaking down the land,' or 'winterkill are all consequences of sterile soil.
The massive use of chemical fertilizers has seriously damaged the natural process of nitrogen fixation by damaging soil bacteria involved in this process. As a consequence crops are losing their ability to take up nutrients from the soil and becoming more and more addicted to synthetic chemicals.Because their efficiency in absorbing nutrients this way is much lower, not all the chemicals are taken up by the crop but leach into the ground water or drain from the fields into rivers and lakes".....

Trees

Thanks for your comment J. I liked your article on GM's. The pro GM propaganda machine is pretty repetitive now-'luddite' seems to be one of their favorite insults for the opposition-as opposed to their scientific gravitas I suppose.

David Hockney's experience re the dissappearance of trees shows how blithely authorities can rob us of things that matter. I liked his painting which reminded me of P.Nash.-(one of his above.)

Decades of Inaction over Pesticides.

The Pesticides Safety Directorate(PSD), the key officials advising Ministers on pesticides, receives approximately 60percent of its funding from the agro-chemical industry.

In November last year, Georgina Downs won a High Court victory against the Government over its fundamental failure to protect people in the countryside from pesticides.

Speaking after the ruling, she stated, “The Government’s relentless attempts to protect the industry as opposed to the health of its citizens were abundantly clear in the 2 witness statements produced by the Chief Executive of the PSD. It is striking that, despite such a significant and landmark High Court ruling,that found the Government failing in its legal obligation to protect public health,(particularly rural residents) that neither Witness statement of Mr Wilson displayed any concern whatsoever in relation to securing the protection of public health, nor seemingly any genuine desire to rectify the Government’s policy in accordance with the terms of the judgment.”

The Government’s position regarding pesticides seems to be that they attempt to balance the harm (or risk of harm) to human health with the supposed benefits of pesticides such as cost or economic benefits for farmers and the chemical industry. This doesn’t seem to be a terribly appealing prospect for those people exposed to pesticides from living in the locality of regularly sprayed fields. I doubt if those who are ill with cancer or damage to the immune system caused by pesticides, will comfort themselves with the thought that farmers and agribusiness are benefiting financially.

There have been a number of important European Commission statements that clearly acknowledged the chronic long term impacts of pesticides, including for those living in the locality to sprayed fields. For example, the EC stated that, "Long term exposure to pesticides can lead to serious disturbances to the immune system, sexual disorders, cancers, strerility,birth defects,damage to the nervous system and genetic damage.(Source:http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=MEMO/06/278&format=HTML&aged=0andlanguage=EN&guiLanguage=en)

Defra contributes to Extinction of Honeybees and Birds in the UK.

With disappearing bee colonies in Europe and America, and dwindling oil reserves,what is DEFRA pinning its hopes on for the future of farming in Britain?

Answer.-They are pinning their hopes on the false promises and spurious claims of the hugely rich and powerful biotech corporates. The most persistant claim which holds governments in thrall is that GM crops will solve all our food problems for the future. In fact, GM crops are a failed experiment based on obsolete scientific theory.

Despite the destructive effects of intensive farming (which is driven by biotech companies)and despite the urgency of global warming and other environmental stressors, Defra seems sunk in a catatonic-like state,chanting “science, science, science” as if this word alone has the power to save us from starvation. Perniciously Defra believes that ‘science’ is synonomous with the short-term technical fixes of the biotech industry.

Meanwhile the destructive effects of intensive monoculture farming, are having to be constantly rectified, costing millions of pounds. Precious time is being wasted on a defunct agricultural system when we should urgently be developing sustainable, localised food and energy systems which do not depend heavily on fossil energies and water. GM crops have all the worst aspects of unsustainability, including susceptibility to diseases and climate extremes because of genetic uniformity.

Wherever GM’s are grown in the world, they pose a risk to the environment, to ecology, to the livelihood of farmers, and the health of local communities and livestock. To establish themselves in regions they wish to exploit, GM companies use the carrot and stick strategy. First the carrot, then a lot of stick. The sort of compulsion that biotechs use on farmers varies according to their local circumstances In poorer countries if they do not grow gm crops,or monocrops for export, small family farmers can be driven off their land and local people cannot afford to buy what is grown. Some small farmers attempt to grow gm’s but end up in debt. Rolling out the technology is facilitated by steamrolling policy makers and those responsible for safety regulations….

In Britain
“GM:The Secret Files
Ministers are funding genetically modified crop projects with scores of millions of pounds every year and are colluding with a biotech company to ease its GM tests, the IoS can reveal.
Geoffrey Lean, on a murky tale that Whitehall tried to hide”(Published:28 October 2007-The Independent.)

Last year on July 15, six German apiarists moved their 30,000 bees to Munich city some 500 km south of Berlin. They were trying to save their bees from genetically modified crops near their village Kaisheim. “If our bees were to come in touch with the GM maize, and the honey were contaminated with it, we would not be allowed to sell it.” said Karl Heinz Bablock, one of the six apiarists. In Germany gm crops are legal but their harvests are forbidden for human consumption. Earlier this year Bablock and several of his colleagues filed a protest against the GM crops before a tribunal in Augsburg, but the court ruled in May2008 that because the crops were legal, it was the apiarists who should move their bees somewhere else. Relocation of bees is taking place all over Germany.

In February 2008 Terry Boehm, vice president of Canada’s National Farmers Union warned Australian Farmers against adopting GM crops. By patenting both naturally occurring and GM crops, these companies can use aggressive lawsuits to ward off any potential rival. At the same time insidious forms of surveillance and barely concealed threats are whittling away any options farmers have for getting seeds from other suppliers. He says GM crops are introducing a crippling new form of feudalism where farmers are tied to biotech companies through expensive licence fees, royalties for seeds and commitment to buying the company seeds.(From: 'GM crops a new form of feudalism', by Janet Grogan, Perth)

Greenpeace points out that technological ‘solutions’ like genetic engineering mask the real social,political, economic and environmental problems responsible for hunger. Unfortunately, when the UK government is challenged over its collusion with the Biotech industry, it simply regurgitates the propaganda. This completely abysmal agricultural policy is contributing to the extinction of honeybees,(our main food crop pollinators), and birds.

Honeybees,Defra dithers, and denies, denies, denies.

.
Top picture-neonicotinoid chemical structure and honeybees.

Second picture-organophosphate chemical structure and honeybees.

BIG QUESTION-

WHY IS THERE NO SERIOUS GOVERNMENT FUNDED RESEARCH INTO THE LINK BETWEEN THE HONEYBEE DECLINE AND PESTICIDES?

The bee die-off has become critical, and after a long period of complacency Defra has at last committed £4.3 million to “safeguard and undertake more research into the health of bees.” Despite this Defra still prefers to stress abnormally wet weather, coupled with the fungus Nosema as being the cause of bee deaths.
Whilst some private companies and beekeepers in Europe are making efforts to address the causes of the alarming bee decline, Defra continues to avoid the issue of pesticides.

Simon Press, the Co-op group senior technical manager, said that “We believe that the recent losses in bee populations need definitive action and as a result are temporarily prohibiting the eight neonicotinoid pesticides until we have evidence that refutes their involvement in the decline." Elliot Carnell, coordinator of Pesticide Action Network, said that the government had failed to recognize that “pesticides could be a contributing factor in the honeybees dramatic decline.” He claims "the government has fought against any attempts to protect bees which pollinate a third of the average diet.”

Last year the president of UNAAPI (the Union of Italian Beekeepers) claimed that a group of comparatively new pesticides, the neonicotinoids, were killing the bees. He said “These substances were irresponsibly authorised by public powers that bowed to pressure from the chemical industry.” (It is worth noting here that Italian beekeepers might feel less inhibited about criticizing their government than our beekeepers might criticise Defra, because they receive no type of aid from the State or the EU.)

A number of studies have linked neocotinoids to die-offs in bee colonies and also found that they are responsible for a breakdown of their navigational abilities. Germany banned the use of all neonicotinoid-based pesticides last year, and France imposed strict limits on their use on bee crops following mass die-offs in the 1990’s.

Despite these problems and the proven link between pesticides and bee deaths, Defra recently opposed the European Commission’s new rules to ban 15 percent of the most hazardous pesticides. Defra secretary of state Hilary Benn has confirmed that the government would be voting against the new pesticide rules when they come before the Agricultural Council for final agreement in March or April.

The president of the Union of Italian Beekeepers reference to pesticides- “These substances were irresponsibly authorized by public powers that bowed to the pressure from the chemical industry.” –could equally accurately be applied to the British government.

A Farmer in Wales has deliberately and illegally planted GM's

In pugnacious mood a farmer told BBC news this morning how he had planted GM's in Wales. He claimed he had not acted illegally.

Farmer Jonathan Harrington has been secretly planting and harvesting two varieties of genetically modified maize on his own land within the Brecon Beacons,-a National Park and protected area.

In 2000 the Welsh Assembly voted to keep Wales a GM free zone.

Mr Harrington said he had been trying to influence the Assembly government's policy on GM's for many years, without success. Consequently he has decided to break the law, saying.."But I wanted to make the point that we should welcome GM crop technology and that Wales could not be described as a crop free zone".

An Assembly government spokeswoman explained that..."However we cannot legally ban GM crops in Wales because we have to work within a European legal framework. Our policy is to take a precautionary and restrictive GM crop policy stance which is in line with our commitment to sustainable agriculture....Anyone growing a GM crop in Wales would need to comply with all relevant legislation. A grower would be required by law to retain documentation for a period of five years, would have to detail the operator providing the product and who the product was sold to."

Pesticide PM continued...

• save our honeybees


• save our insects and birds


• save our wildlife


• save our rivers and watercourses


• save our ecology


• save the health of our children and the general public

BAN THE MOST HAZARDOUS PESTICIDES!-

carcinogens,reprotoxins,mutagens,endocrine disruptors

SUPPORT THE EU PESTICIDE PROPOSALS.

The Pesticide PM, and his toxic policies.

In response to the EU pesticide proposals which aim to ban some of the most toxic agricultural chemicals, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has stated that impending changes to EU pesticide rules “will damage food production without benefiting human health or the environment”.

The above statement is an outrageous insult to everyone who lives in proximity to pesticide spraying.Rural residents experience first hand the impacts of crop spraying and know that the new EU rules would substantially improve their quality of life by removing the risk of inhaling toxic fumes, or of pesticide poisoning through skin contact.

Gordon Brown’s statements about crop yields are also inaccurate and highlight his economically bullish motivation, and support of the chemical industry, rather than the health of the general public.

Farmers Weekly magazine features a “Save Our Sprays” campaign. Prime Minister Gordon Brown has chosen to support this campaign rather than the campaign which seeks to save
peoples lives and protect our health.

Pesticide poisoning, Gordon Brown couldn't care less.

When Georgina Downs won the High Court case against the government recently, the judge concluded that the government had fundamentally failed to protect people in the countryside from pesticides and has also knowingly allowed residents to continue to suffer from adverse health effects without taking any action to prevent the exposure, risks and adverse inpacts occurring.

The Judgment had concluded that Ms. Downs had produced “solid evidence that
residents have suffered harm to their health”, particularly in relation to acute effects, and
that “a different approach” should have been adopted and accordingly there has “been
both a failure to have regard to material considerations and a failure to apply the
[European] Directive properly.”

In response to this ruling the government has paid lip service only, saying...."The
protection of human health is paramount” and “we will look at this judgment in
detail to see whether there are ways in which we can strengthen our system…”

Later they declared that they will be appealing the High Court decision, and soon after Gordon Brown communicated to the EU that he was not in favour of the EU proposals to ban some of the most toxic pesticides.

Despite all reliable independent evidence relating to the risks of agricultural pesticides, Gordon Brown has explicitly conveyed his support for the interests of big business over the health of ordinary people, not only in his own country, but throughout the world.

New EU Pesticide Proposals.

"These Pesticide Proposals(the Proposal for a Framework Directive on the Sustainable Use of Pesticides and the Proposal for a Regulation Concerning the Placing of Pesticides on the Market) will set pesticide policy throughout the whole of the EU for at least the next ten years and possibly even the next few decades." Georgina Downs warns that serious lobbying by the chemical and farming industry and the UK government itself has meant that the proposals are not as strong as they were.

The agricultural industries and NFU have used the press to push their scaremongering about supposed 'negative impacts on farming and food prices'. The CPA (crop protection association) which represents the agrochemical industry has a vested interest in trying to ensure that all pesticides remain on the market-and they are putting these interests before the health of the people of the EU.

Extremely toxic pesticides include carcinogens, repro-toxins, mutagens and endocrine disruptors. In order for the original pesticide proposals to succeed it is essential for MEP's to vote in favour of the proposals. Please write and ask your local MEP's to support the proposals to ban the pesticides. This is urgent as they vote soon.

Pesticides cocktails.

Since Georgina Downs won her high court battle against the government, she has written a comment on the 'Farming Today' blog to correct any misinterpretations around her message regarding agricultural pesticides. I have recorded below paragraphs from her comments which enumerate the important points:-

……"agricultural pesticides are commonly used in mixtures, often 4 or 5 different products in any one application. Each product formulation in itself can contain a number of different active ingredients, as well as other chemicals such as solvents, surfactants and co-formulants (some of which can have adverse effects in their own right, even before considering any potential synergistic effects in a mixture(s)). Therefore when people are exposed over the long-term to ongoing mixtures and then go on to suffer a chronic illness or disease it will be almost impossible to know which pesticide led to the illness or whether it is as a result of synergistic effects of mixtures of pesticides and the long term cumulative build up in the individuals. The Judge in my case recognised both the point of mixtures and of cumulative effects and therefore it is simply not the case as Elliott incorrectly put it of just getting rid of what he classes as the most "toxic" (which he stated is about 20 pesticides (5% of those currently on themarket)) as a) all chemical pesticides are designed to be toxic, that is their purpose; b) they are used in cocktails anyway and not individually and c) the Ontario College of Family Physicians in its thorough and detailed 2004 pesticides literature review quite rightly concluded that "Our review does not support the idea that some pesticides are safer than others; it simply points to different health effects for different classes of pesticides."The review?s overall message to people was to avoid exposure to all pesticides whenever and wherever possible.

…… It should be noted that the Judge in my case did not say that the UK system could be made lawful by just getting rid of a handful ofpesticides…..

The Judge agreed with my long-standing charge that the Government has fundamentally failed to protect people in the countryside from pesticides and has also knowingly allowed residents to continue to suffer from adverse health effects without taking any action to prevent the exposure, risks and adverse impacts occurring"

Victory of Right over might.

Georgina Downs has won a milestone High Court action against the government, after her seven year campaign to reveal the fundamental inadequacies of the regulation and control of agricultural pesticides.

The High Court has ruled that “people living in the countryside are at risk from crop sprays and must be given better protection.”

In court the Department of Environment,Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) had argued that its approach to the regulation and control of pesticides was "reasonable, logical and lawful in all the circumstances".
But the judge ruled that the result of his judgement was that Mr Benn "must think again and consider what needs to be done".

Georgina Downs said that “the UK government’s relentless and extraordinary attempts to protect industry, as opposed to people’s health, has been one of the most outrageous things to behold in the last seven years of my fight.”

I would like to thank Georgina Downs for her courageous and phenomenal dedication to the campaign in those seven years.

For more information, Georgina Down’s campaign website is called UK Pesticides Campaign.

UK countryside in poor health.

The degraded condition of land and the near extinction of some birds and wildlife is to a large extent due to the bullish attitudes of successive governments.
Hedgerows, woodland, and wildplants, insects and wild animals have been sacrificed to the intensive use of pesticides and industrialised farming methods, in the mistaken belief that this is a realistic or sustainable system of food production for the future post peak oil world.

Last week the House of Commons Environmental Committee published a report which concluded that…” the government needs to do more to halt the dramatic decline in our native landscape and wildlife”

Biodiversity loss and loss of our native landscape is considered by government to be necessary collateral damage in the drive for economic growth. Infact some individuals don’t consider it to be damage at all. They simply don’t recognize or care about their self condoned vandalism, (it is government which sets the policies for agricultural practice). Biodiversity isn’t an optional extra, It is fundamental to our survival on this planet. Culturally and aesthetically it provides more than just a pleasing panomara which is appealingl for the tourist industry.
In a metropolitan setting no government would be allowed to destroy historic buildings or parklands for economic reasons, yet they consider they have the right to allow farmers to destroy the fabric of our rural landscape.

Tim Yeo, who chairs the select committee, stated that the balance of nature is economically important.- that there is a compelling economic case for protecting the environment. …”Environmental gain is conducive to economic growth-prosperity and good environment go hand in hand- they are not conflicting objectives.”

One result of the destruction of the fabric of the countryside is that farmland birds, like the turtle dove, grey partridge and linnet have declined to their lowest level on record, with some species becoming extinct in some regions of the UK. The latest survey by DEFRA shows the number of breeding pairs of farmland birds has now more than halved since intensive farming with chemicals was introduced in the 1960’s.
Some species have declined more than 85% leading to local extinctions, including the corn bunting in Northern Ireland and yellow wagtail in Devon. Other affected species are lapwing, grey partridge, tree sparrow and skylark.

Meanwhile, what exactly is the motivation of the UK government in threatening conservation schemes by cutting budgets to key organizations like Natural England?

Too few frogs, too much Monsanto.

Over half of Europe’s amphibians face extinction by 2050. Climate change, diseases and habitat destruction and urbanisation are blamed. This was an assesment of the Zoological Society of London, in September.

This week the World Conservation Congress is gathering in Barcelona to discuss environmental problems and how to work towards a biodiverse and sustainable world. Thousands of the worlds leading decision makers in sustainable development will be at the conference which is run by the IUCN the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.Valli Moosa, the president of IUCN, said in the opening session that industry, commerce and businesses are significantly responsible for pollution and degradation of ecosystems, and he said there is a clear sense of urgency in stopping the die off of the Earth's animal and plant life which could have dire consequences for humans as well.

The 'Red List' is the global standard for conservation monitoring, and the 2007 edition shows more than a third of 41,000 species surveyed are facing extinction; a quarter of all mammals, one out of eight birds, one out of three amphibians, and 70% of plants.

I don't know whether Monsanto were invited to attend this congress. It is not likely because they have a history of walking out of important meetings when they cannot get there own way. This happened at the sessions held by IAASTD to make decisions on the future direction of agriculture. Anyway Monsanto’s methods are also responsible for loss of farmland wildlife... The government body ‘Natural England’ demonstrated through field based trials on GM crops which were prepared for commercial release in England, that wildlife is damaged far more by the GM process than by conventional methods. Michael McCarthy in his article ‘Hello green concrete, goodbye wildlife’’ wrote… ’It means a landscape in which fields have a crop growing in them but nothing else. No wild plants or flowers of any sort, no butterflies or moths, no smaller insects on which birds and their chicks can feed, and so no birds. Green concrete means a countryside that may still be called the countryside, and may still appear green, but apart from the crop, it will be entirely sterile and lifeless.

I can predict the self righteous response from Monsanto, I have heard it before., along the lines of…they are attempting to solve the world’s food shortage, etc. Monsanto persist in this argument despite the fact that the recent IAASTD report, after four years research, concluded that GM’s and intensive farming methods were not the answer to feeding the world’s population.

They are agreed that the solution to climate change is biodiversity and eco-system management. The problem is that the foundation of sustainable life is disappearing.Meanwhile Monsanto persists in its catastrophic use of Roundup(glyphosate) so called because nothing survives.

Film Documentary, "The World According to Monsanto."

The following information is sourced from GMWatch.eu/

Marie-Monique Robin's excellent documentary film "The World according to Monsanto" will be shown at the European Social Forum(ESF) on Wednesday the 17th September in Malmo Sweden.

After the screening, there will be presentations on the current situation as regards GMO's by guest speakers including Daniel Mittler(political advisor, Greenpeace International) and Benjamin Sourice(Combat Monsanto).

Please join us! The movie is free of charge. Let's make the world free of GM- contamination!

The movie at the ESF is presented by Combat Monsanto, Sherpa France, Friends of the Earth, and Greenpeace.

Title: The World according to Monsanto
Date: September 17th,2008
Time: starts at 16.00
Place:Cinema Spegein(Stortorget 29, Malmo) TEL:+46-40-125978
http://www.biografspegein.se/

Monsanto is the worlds largest seed company and many are concerned. Troy Roush says "They are in the process of owning food, all food" Paraguayan farmer Jorge Galeano says "its objective is to control all the worlds food production" Renowned Indian physicist and community organiser Vandana Shiva says"If they control seed they control food;they know it, it's strategic. It's more powerful than bombs; it's more powerful than guns. This is the best way to control the populations of the world."

This post will include more info. re this film soon!

GM's, Phil Woolas and the elephant in the room.

GM proponents like to label those who oppose GM technology as ‘Luddites’ or ‘unscientific’. Presumably they imagine that by using these labels on their critics, they confer more gravitas to themselves and their erroneous claims for these agricultural crops. Prince Charles’ recent criticism of GM’s, triggered some bizarre and irrational responses. Because the science is powered by money, many politicians turn a blind eye to the glaringly obvious drawbacks of GM’s. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, Phil Woolas, the English environment minister, accused Prince Charles of ignoring the needs of the worlds poorest countries by attacking GM crops, and insisted the government would go ahead with trials unless scientific evidence showed they were harmful. He challenged Prince Charles… “If it has been a disaster then please provide the evidence.” Infact Woolas is stubbornly ignoring independent research, and the actual experience of farmers from across the world.
Vandana Shiva, a physicist and campaigner against privatisation of the world’s croplands, immediately demolishes the cynical argument that the needs of the world’s poorest countries are being ignored by anti GM campaigners.(www.navdanya.org)
In challenging Prince Charles to produce proof of potential disaster, Phil Woolas has reversed the protocol for scientists to produce research to prove that a product is safe.Woolas is condoning the corporate colonisation of areas of British land(within barbed wire and cctv surveillance) to conduct trials of crops which have already been proved to be damaging to human health, wildlife and the environment.

Clare Oxborrow, Friends of the Earth, points to the fact that governments are evading the conclusions of the IAASTD Report. “The UN International Assesment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development, written by 400 scientists and backed by 60 governments, found no conclusive evidence that GM crops increase yields. In fact, the scientists were so unconvinced about the role of GM crops in meeting future food needs that the pro-GM US government refused to endorse the report, and the biotechnology industry pulled out of the process, despite having provided substantial funding at the outset.
The report stated that yield gains achieved through industrialised farming have come at an unacceptable environmental and social cost. Prince Charles has identified that GM crops will exacerbate these problems. It is now time for governments to act on the IAASTD’s findings and work for a radical shift towards local sustainable solutions for communities across the world, by combining latest research with traditional knowledge.”

Finally, re Woolas’s attack on Prince Charles, Robin Maynard of the Soil Association pointed out that the Prince of Wales ..”did not say that the problems emanating from overreliance on intensive farming methods during the Green Revolution in Punjab or exacerbating soil salinity in Australia stemmed from GM crops, but that these represented the latest manifestation of industrial agriculture’s overreliance on technological inputs to overwhelm natural resource limits, rather than following sustainable techniques which seek to work in balance with those limits.”

Monsanto's Roundup.

The application of agricultural pesticides to crops across the world has created a huge problem of toxic pollution in our air, soil, watercourses and sea. Monsanto is trying to exploit this problem by promising that GM crops will largely do away with the necessity for pesticide applications. Biotech companies claim that GM crops will provide the magic bullet to feed the world, and that the number of pesticides, and the frequency of applications will be reduced.

'Friends of the Earth' have explored these claims and their analysis is very different. Below(in blue text) I quote from “who benefits from gm crops?” by Friends of the Earth,(January 2008).

…….”As in the past, virtually 100% of
world acreage planted with commercial GM crops have one or
both of just two traits: herbicide-tolerance and insect-resistance.
In the U.S., the world leader in GM crop production, companies are
focusing their development efforts on producing new herbicidetolerant
(HT) crops.Two of the fourGMcrops approved over the past
year and five of 12 new GM crops awaiting commercial approval
from the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture (USDA) are herbicide-tolerant.
Two of these crops in the pipeline are tolerant to two herbicides
rather than one, a new development driven by the spread of
herbicide-resistantweeds.

1.2 gm crops increase pesticide use
Pesticides are chemicals that target weeds (herbicides), insects
(insecticides) or other pests. HT versions of soya, corn, cotton and
canola represent 4 of every 5 hectares (81%) of GM crops
worldwide. HT crops are ‘pesticide-promoting’ – that is they
encourage the development of herbicide-resistant weeds, which
in turn lead to yet more pesticide use.
HT crops allow farmers to spray a particular herbicide more
frequently and indiscriminately without fear of damaging the
crop. They also allow larger, wealthier farmers to cultivate more
acres with less labor, advancing the world-wide trend towards
fewer and bigger industrial-style farms.
Pesticide-promoting HT crops have spawned an epidemic of
herbicide-resistant weeds in the U.S., Argentina and Brazil,
thereby encouraging still greater use of chemicals to control
them. Pesticides have adverse health and environmental
impacts that GM agriculture is exacerbating.
It is no accident that agrichemical-biotech companies focus
development efforts on pesticide-promoting, HT crops: they
lead to increased sales of the chemicals these firms also sell.
Monsanto's Roundup
Ready soya is modified for resistance to the herbicide glyphosate.
It is the world’s most widely planted GM crop and it suffers from
a “yield drag”due in part to reduced uptake of essential nutrients.
Herbicide-tolerant crops are designed to permit “over-the-top”
application of chemical weed killers without killing the crop itself.
Their chief benefit has been convenience: HT crops allow farmers
to spray a particular herbicidemore frequently and indiscriminately
without fear of damaging the crop.They also allowlarger,wealthier
farmers to cultivate more acres with less labor, facilitating the
world-wide trend to fewer and bigger industrial-style farms. It is no
accident that GM soya is most prevalent in Argentina, a country
known for some of the largest soya plantations in theworld.
Just as bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics, so weeds have
become resistant to weedkillers. Resistant weeds are not new,
but they have become much worse in the era of GM crops.
Roughly 99% of the world’s GM herbicide tolerant crops are
Monsanto’s Roundup Ready varieties, tolerant to the herbicide
glyphosate (marketed by Monsanto as Roundup). The
dramatically increased reliance on glyphosate with the
Roundup Ready system has spawned an epidemic of
glyphosate-resistant weeds.
In addition, there is increasing evidence that insect resistant
GM crops, which produce a toxin derived from Bt (Bacillus
thuringiensis) bacteria, do not provide a sustainable means of
decreasing the use of insecticides.
Although comprehensive data on pesticide use are difficult to
obtain in most countries, the available data and anecdotal
evidence demonstrate that pesticide use is on the rise:
• the huge increase in glyphosate use in the united states.
In the US, the widespread adoption of Roundup Ready crops
combined with the emergence of glyphosate-resistant weeds
has driven a more than 15-fold increase in the use of
glyphosate on major field crops from 1994 to 2005. In 2006,
the last year for which data are available, glyphosate use on
soybeans jumped a substantial 28% (see Table 1). The
intensity of glyphosate use has also risen dramatically. From
1994 to 2006, the amount of glyphosate applied per acre of
soya rose by more than 150%, from just 0.52 to 1.33 lbs. per
acre per year.
glyphosate is not replacing other herbicides in the united states.
While farmers growing Roundup Ready crops initially used
lower quantities of herbicides other than glyphosate, that
trend has changed in recent years. Increasingly, farmers find it
necessary to apply both increased rates of glyphosate and
large quantities of other herbicides to kill resistant weeds.
From 2002 to 2006, use of the second-leading soya herbicide,
2,4-D, on soybeans more than doubled from 1.39 to 3.67
million lbs.,while glyphosate use on soybeans increased by 29
million lbs. (43% rise). Atrazine, banned in 2006 in the EU due
to its link to several health problems like endocrine
disruption, breast and prostate cancer, is the most heavilyapplied
corn herbicide in the US. While glyphosate use on
corn increased five-fold from 2002 to 2005, atrazine use rose
by nearly 7 million lbs. (12% increase), and aggregate
applications of the top four corn herbicides rose by 5%.
Clearly, glyphosate is not displacing the use of atrazine or
other leading corn herbicides.
steep increase in glyphosate-resistantweeds in the united states.
Of the 58 cases of new glyphosate-resistant weeds identified
in the last decade around the world, 31 were identified in the
US, which has the largest area in the world devoted to HT
crops. Thirty of those cases occurred between 2001 and 2007.
Experts agree that continuous planting of Roundup Ready
crops and over-reliance on glyphosate are to blame.
Documented glyphosate-resistant weeds now infest an
estimated 3,251 sites covering 1 million hectares. This
estimate does not include weeds with suspected resistance,
which are likely to infest a much larger area
rise of glyphosate use and weed resistance in brazil.
Data from Brazilian government agencies show that the
consumption of the 15 main active ingredients contained in
the most heavily used soya herbicides increased 60% from
2000 to 2005. The use of glyphosate increased 79.6% during
this period,much faster than the expansion in area planted to
Roundup Ready soya. In 2005 and 2006, three new weed
species have evolved resistance to glyphosate in Brazil.
Brazilian authorities have already recognized glyphosateresistant
weeds as amajor threat to the country’s agriculture.
• increase in glyphosate use and weed resistance in argentina.
In Argentina, herbicide use has increased dramatically in the
last decade with the progressive expansion in the area
planted to soya, nearly all of it GM Roundup Ready soya. In
2007, Argentine agricultural experts reported that a
glyphosate-resistant version of Johnson Grass now infests
over 120,000 ha of the country’s prime cropland. According to
the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, Johnson Grass is
one of the worst weeds in the subtropics, and resistance to
glyphosate will make it all the harder to control. Experts
estimate that 25 million litres of herbicides other than
glyphosate will be needed to control the resistant weed,
resulting in an increase in production costs of between $160
to 950million per year. Despite this threat, Argentine officials
recently approved a new variety of glyphosate-resistant corn,
which is likely to exacerbate the problem.
• bt cotton does not reduce pesticide use in india. In 2007, the
Agro-Economic Research Centre of Andhra University
published a new study on pesticide use on GM cotton during
the 2004-05 season in the Indian State of Andhra Pradesh.
The study concludes that Bt cotton farmers apply the same
quantity of pesticides, and spend the same amount on them,
as conventional cotton farmers.
• secondary pests increase pesticide use in pakistan and indian
punjab. In 2007, infestation of cotton by secondary pests not
killed by the Bt cotton insecticide in Pakistan and the Indian
State of Punjab have dramatically increased the use of
pesticides and increased input costs for farmers.
herbicide-tolerant crops suffer “yield drag”: ISAAA maintains
that HT crops are neutralwith respect to yield, butmany studies
of Roundup Ready soya, the most widely planted GM crop,
suggest that it has on average 5-10% lower yield than
equivalent conventional varieties. Recent research has identified
at least one cause of this yield drag. Glyphosate hinders uptake
of essential nutrients like manganese in Roundup Ready soya,
both reducing yields and making plants more susceptible to
disease. Moreover, some countries like Paraguay have
experienced record low yields due to drought during 2005 and
2006, corroborating several reports that indicated that RR soya
was performingworse than conventional soya in dry conditions.
Figure 3 confirms stagnating yield in countries that have heavily
adopted Roundup Ready soya”.

The Scottish Government is to maintain its opposition to GM crops.

From ‘The Press and Journal’.(June 20th2008)

'....First Minister Alex Salmond delivered the unequivocal message that Scotland would remain GM free as he arrived at the Royal Highland Show.

Mr Salmond had no objection to a debate on the use of GM, but said the Scottish Government was wholly against its use. He added:”The reason we are against it is because we have a very clear vision of Scotland’s future and that is of a clean, green and quality food from Scotland. The problem with GM is that it cuts across the image and positioning that we have for Scottish food and Scottish farming. We would do that at our peril.”

Mr Salmond did not accept GM as pressing for Scottish farmers, saying the more important issue was in addressing escalating production costs, and soaring prices of fertilizer, fuel and feed.

“The benefits of (of GM)-even if they were realized-would be small in comparison with the penalty. We think Scotland’s place as a clean, green place for growing food would be compromised if we went down the GM route.”

Greenpeace accused the biotech industry of “abusing the misery of millions of hungry people” by trying to promote its products as a solution to rising food prices....'

The above quotes by Alex Salmond were recorded in the Press and Journal by Joe Watson. I have taken these quotes from the full article.

Biotechs, Gordon Brown and GM's versus Natural England.

McCarthy predicts that the countryside will ‘become entirely sterile and lifeless’.

Michael McCarthy in The Independent, Thurs.19th June, predicts that the environmental and ecological impacts of introducing GM’s commercially into Britain, would mean that…'Nothing would be left'…. 'the countryside will become entirely sterile and lifeless.'

Contemplating this scenario leads to a lot more questions eg. 'what will the governmental organization ‘Natural England’ decide to do about all their crucial conservationist work?' On Natural England's website there are pages of information about the actions which they consider to be vital for wildlife and the environment, for example…

'WILDLIFE. Biodiversity is the variety of life on the planet. This includes the plant and animal species that make up our wildlife-and the places or habitats in which they live. Natural England is responsible for ensuring that England’s rich biodiversity is protected and improved.'

I reproduce below McCarthy’s article so that we can compare his information with further extracts from Natural England. Perhaps like me you will wonder if Natural England’s existence will become a sham,- will they try to backtrack on their stated intentions and declarations about the environment, will the department be disbanded by Gordon Brown in favour of his vision for a sterile and lifeless countryside full of green concrete? What will be the implications for our countryside tourist industry, when the countryside no longer exists as such? What will be the implication for survival of crops which rely on pollination of bees, when so much of the eco system will be destroyed?

Michael McCarthy: Hello green concrete, goodbye wildlife.
The argument against allowing genetically modified crops to be grown commercially in Britain can be summed up in two words: green concrete.
It means a landscape in which fields have a crop growing in them but nothing else. No wild plants or flowers of any sort, no butterflies or moths, no smaller insects on which birds and their chicks can feed, and so no birds. Green concrete means a countryside that still may be called the countryside, and may still appear green, but apart from the crop, it will be entirely sterile and lifeless.
That is what would happen if the GM crops previously proposed, including maize, beet and oilseed rape, were allowed to be grown on a commercial scale. For they were all genetically engineered to be able to survive the application of increasingly powerful weedkillers, known as "broad spectrum" herbicides, which would kill everything else in the field.
The best known of these chemicals is glyphosate, made by Monsanto under the trade name Roundup. Why is it called Roundup? Because nothing escapes.
In some countries, losing farmland wildlife might not matter so much. In the US, for example, people do not go to the grain prairies of Kansas to see flowers and birds; American agricultural areas are for agriculture. If you want to see wildlife you go to a wilderness area. The US is so big that there are plenty of these, some of them the size of Wales.
But Britain is different. It is a relatively small nation with an intimate, patchwork countryside and, if we want our wildlife to survive, much of it must survive on farms. Yet our farmland wildlife, especially birds and wild flowers, has already been given a catastrophic battering by the intensification of agriculture that has taken place in recent decades.
Who sees a cornfield dotted with red poppies now? How many people hear skylarks? Declines in farmland birds are incredible. Since the 1970s, tree sparrows have declined by 93 per cent, corn buntings by 89 per cent, grey partridges by 88 per cent, turtle doves by 83 per cent and so the list runs on.
This has happened just with conventional weedkillers and pesticides, which do allow some fauna to survive. The introduction of broad-spectrum chemicals, which GM technology would allow, would be a further and fatal ratcheting-up of the intensification process for farming. Nothing would be left. The Government demonstrated this with its farm-scale evaluations of GM crops from 1998 to 2003. They proved wildlife was damaged far more by the GM process than by conventional methods.
Of course, there are many other crop modifications possible besides herbicide tolerance. In years to come, as climate change takes hold, we may need crops engineered to be drought-tolerant or salt-tolerant. They could be real life-savers – but they are not on offer yet.

Below from Natural England website. Natural England was formed by bringing together English Nature,Countryside Agency and the Rural Development Service.

From Natural England:

Wildlife
Biodiversity is the variety of life on the planet. This includes the plant and animal species that make up our wildlife - and the places or habitats in which they live. Natural England is responsible for ensuring that England's rich biodiversity is protected and improved.
The UK is one of 188 Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity which was adopted at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. This Convention has three main objectives: the conservation of biodiversity; the sustainable use of biodiversity; and the sharing of benefits from the use of genetic resources. In the UK this commitment led to the launch of the UK Biodiversity Action Plan(BAP) in 1994.
The Plan’s overall goal is to conserve and enhance biodiversity within the UK and to contribute to efforts to conserve global biodiversity. The UK BAP targets the recovery of some of our most threatened species and habitats in the terrestrial, freshwater and marine environments. For each priority species and habitat, an action plan describes the current status and threats, and sets out an action programme for achieving 10-15 year objectives and targets.
These action plans, and the UK BAP process as a whole, represent a consensus of Government, the statutory and voluntary conservation sectors, land owners and managers. They give us the best opportunity to date of reversing the major declines in the populations, range and quality of the UK’s biodiversity resource.
Each of the four countries of the UK has subsequently produced country strategies for biodiversity. The England Biodiversity Strategy was published in 2003; it identified new approaches and partnerships across sectors as being essential for achieving the conservation of biodiversity.
At theGothenburg Summit in 2001 the EU committed itself to the objective of halting the rate of biodiversity loss, with the aim of achieving this by 2010. At the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002, Heads of Government committed themselves to achieving a significant reduction in the rate of biodiversity loss by 2010. These, and other, multilateral environmental agreements cover the UK’s action to conserve biodiversity both globally and within the UK.
Species Recovery Programme
Natural England’s Species Recovery Programme seeks to reverse the declines in England’s animals, plants and fungi. The programme recognises that current habitat-based management approaches are often not enough to prevent extinctions and restore species populations to a point where they are secure. Instead, targeted action is often required. This may include a dedicated research programme to understand why a species is declining and what its habitat needs are; a period of trial management to assess how best to reverse the decline (possibly requiring reintroductions); and a period of recovery management to increase population sizes. Natural England is involved in all stages of this recovery process.
Most of the species selected for our Species Recovery Programme are UK Biodiversity Action Plan priority species. We work in partnership with government, voluntary conservation organisations, land owners and business to deliver the targets for these species. Whenever possible, we also try to involve the public so that the enriched natural environments achieved by the Programme are enjoyed by all.
Biodiversity duty guidance
The aim of the biodiversity duty is to raise the profile of biodiversity in England and Wales, eventually to a point where biodiversity issues become second nature to everyone making decisions in the public sector.
All public authorities are affected, including over 900 public bodies local authorities, fire, police and health bodies, museums and transport authorities.
In recognition of the key role local authorities play with regard to conserving and enhancing biodiversity, Defra has produced two sets of guidance.

Benn says "yes" to GM crop trials.

"Our food, Our future!” say environmental protestors.

Hilary Benn(Secretary of State for the Environment) has agreed to let scientists at Leeds University conduct the trials over the next three years.

Since I wrote this post, Gordon Brown has declared today (19/6/08) that he wants the GM debate to reopen. He seems to be in favour of GM's (surprise, surprise),this is a sample of Gordon Brown's democracy in action-ie 'ignore overwhelming public opinion, and ignore the evidence for damage to health and environmental catastophe.'

There are two outdoor field trials taking place in the UK this year. The BASF potato trial at NIAB is a trial for blight resistance in GM potatos; a further trial for nematode resistance is taking place near Leeds, under the auspices of Leeds University Faculty of Biological Sciences.

Leeds University scientists have added a gene to the potatos’ roots that is designed to give it nematode resistance.

At the Cambridge site Rosie Perkins, a spokesperson for Earth First! UK said: "Today’s protest was staged to send a clear message to scientists, companies and politicians across the world; that message is that genetically modified food is not the answer to either climate change or world food shortages and we stand here today in solidarity with the many farmers and local food producers across the world who are speaking out against GM crops.....The GM trial at NIAB is being conducted under siege-like conditions with high levels of security, including a permanent security personnel presence, high metal fences, alarms and floodlights. The fact that this trial is taking place under such conditions clearly demonstrates the contempt in which the people of this country hold the development of these crops."



With reference to the Leeds crop trials, Pete Riley of ‘GM Freeze’ protest group is worried about the inclusion of a gene which confers resistance to the antibiotic neomycin, which he says could interfere with its medical effectiveness.





Joe Cummins from the Institute of Science in Society(ISIS) shares these concerns. He says that Britain’s ‘Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment’(ACRE) shows a disturbing bias towards GM technology and disregard for safety.

Ch. Narenda who covers agricultural issues for’MyNews.in’ reports Cummin’s views. The nptll gene is for resistance to the antibiotic neomycin, a member of the aminoglycoside family. The resistance to neomycin may be cross resistant to other members of the aminoglycoside family including kanamycin, streptomycin, gentamycin, and tobramycin all of which are used to treat humans or domestic animals.“He also said that they have prepared an extensive review which showed that horizontal transfer of transgenic DNA has indeed occurred, and that it has been greatly underestimated, hence, ‘There is little doubt that environmental antibiotic resistance will be significantly enhanced by planting crops modified with antibiotic resistance genes.’(MyNews.in)

Intensive industrial agriculture, reasons why not,-part two.

Email the Commission before May7th GMO vote!

An important vote on GMO's is due to take place on May 7th in Brussels. The agro-chemical industry wants EU permission to grow pesticide-producing maize plants and a GM potato that contains an antibiotic resistant gene.
(For information about GM crops and intensive, industrialized arable agriculture with pesticides, please see my previous post)
Greenpeace International wants EU commissioners to say "No!" when they discuss the applications and vote them. The Greenpeace International website provides more information and the email addresses of all EU commissioners.(Go to 'Greenpeace International' and on the right hand side of the webpage under "things you can do now" follow the link- "Help make Europe GM free.")

Points made by Greenpeace:-

• "The two maize varieties that will be debated on May 7th produce their own pesticide. According to current practices these crops were only tested for 90 days for health effects whereas pesticides are tested for two years!
• The GM potato contains a gene that makes cells resistant to antibiotics! If this were to get released into the environment there could be serious problems in treating diseases such as tuberculosis.
• Recently 37 scientists wrote a letter to the commission pointing out from a scientific point of view the many gaps and uncertainties in relation to GMO's.
• The majority of European citizens oppose the use of GMO's and this opposition has been consistent for the last ten years.
• Industry promotes GM crops as potentially feeding the world, however this has not materialized whilst ecologically sound farming models and methods show real potential. Recently even the UN admitted that genetically engineered crops are not a solution for poverty, hunger or climate change.
• The body responsible for advising the Commission on GMO's, the European Food Safety Agency (EFSA) is not doing its job properly. First of all it has recognized that it lacks the methods for carrying out long term assessment of the health and environmental impacts of GMO's. Secondly it is relying on incomplete data that is submitted by the agro-chemical industry-and it hardly ever checks it properly." (Greenpeace)

Intensive industrial agriculture, reasons why not.

What is intensive/industrial farming?

Intensive farming is an agricultural system through which (it is claimed) more food will be produced and the lower the price will be for the consumer.

This system infact generates huge external economic costs and other serious impacts on humanity and the environment:-

• Loss of farmers' livlihoods, and cause of malnutrition in developing nations.


• Severe and chronic illnesses caused by pesticides/fungicides


• Environmental pollution.


• Soil degradation.


• Lack of biodiversity.


• Extinction of crop varieties and gene pools.


• Loss of nutritional value of food.


• Huge external economic costs, involved in production and food-supply chain.

More information on the above included in this post.

• Brief description of farming system below:-
  
  · Monoculture. Large areas of a single crop, often grown year after year on the same land, or with little crop rotation.
  
  · Agrichemicals. Intensive use of pesticides and fertilizers to fight pests and diseases and provide nutrients.
  
  · Hybrid seed. Use of specialized hybrids designed to favour large scale food distribution, eg ability to ripen off the vine, to withstand shipping and handling.
  
  · High mechanization.
  
  · Large scale irrigation- heavy water use and in some cases growing of crops in otherwise unsuitable regions (rice paddies on arid land).
  
  · Genetically engineered crops. Use of genetically modified varieties(GMOs) designed for large scale production (with ability to withstand selected herbicides)
  
  Opponents of the intensive system of agriculture say that politicians, business leaders and the media are misleading the public in their claim which states ‘ the more that chemicals and technology are applied to agriculture, the more food will be produced and the lower the price will be for the consumer.’
  
  Opponents also question the fundamental objectives of the structure of the modern food chain.:-
  
  The Ecologist Magazine, in its article ‘Fatal Harvest’(01/11/2002) says ‘The myth of cheapness completely ignores the staggering externalized costs of the food, costs that do not appear on supermarket checkout receipts. Conventional analyses of the cost of food completely ignore the exponentially increasing social and environmental costs consumers are currently paying and will have to pay in the future. Americans spend tens of millions of dollars in taxes, medical care, toxic clean-ups, insurance premiums and other pass-along costs to subsidise industrial food producers. Given the ever –increasing health, environmental and social destruction involved in industrial agriculture, the real price of food production for future generations is incalculable.’
  
  ‘Around 31,000 tonnes of chemicals are used in farming in yhe UK each year to kill weeds, insects and other pests that attack crops and in 2004, 40% of the fruit, vegetables and bread samples tested in the UK contained pesticides. There is very little control over how these chemicals are used in the non-organic sector and in what quantities or combinations. The Food Standards Agency recocnizes that most people do not want pesticides in their food. Pesticides have a devastating effect on the environment and there are real concerns about the effectiveness of official safety regulations of pesticides, and some risks to human health are unknown.’ (Soil Association)
  
  For information concerning exposure to agricultural pesticides for rural residents in the UK, visit the website pesticidescampaign.co.uk
  
  Summary of Impacts of Intensive Agriculture.
  
  1. Health problems. Vast quantities of pesticides and fungicides are sprayed onto farmland every year- 31,000 tons in the UK. This leads to a range of health problems. Pesticide exposure can happen through skin contact, inhalation, or pesticide residues in food and water. .Studies have shown that a combination of low-level insecticides, herbicides and nitrates can effect our bodies in ways chemicals in isolation do not. ‘Studies have shown that 3 pesticides consumed together equal up to 100 times the effect of any one on its own.(sometimes referred to as the cocktail effect) Along with their cancer risk, pesticides can cause myriad other health problems-especially for young people. For example, exposure to neurotoxic compounds like PCB’s and organophosphate insecticides during critical periods of development can cause permanent damage to the brain and nervous and reproductive systems’(Ecologist Magazine,article Fatal Harvest).
  
  2. Environmental Pollution..
  
  1. Pollution though spraydrift in the air. Spraydrift can be carried for many miles by the wind/air currents..Rain water in parts of Europe contain such high levels of dissolved pesticides, it would be illegal to sell it as drinking water.
  2. Pollution through agrichemical build-ups and run-off.
  3. Carbon emissions. Use of fossil fuels for agrichemical manufacture and for farm machinery and long-distance distribution. Processing and packaging also adds to high energy use.
  
  3. Soil degradation. Heavy use of fertilizers, and lack of crop rotation, causes degradation of soil quality and lack of soil fertility.
  “The overuse of chemicals and machines on industrial farms erodes away the topsoil-the fertile earth from which all food is grown. The US has lost half of its topsoil since 1960, and continues losing topsoil 17 times faster than nature can create it”(The Ecologist)
  
  4.Lack of Biodiversity. Biodiversity can refer to:-
  (1) Genetic diversity in agriculture
  (2) Animal/insect/plant species.
  
  The UN Food and Agriculture Organization report that 70% of genetic diversity in agriculture disappeared in this last century. The resulting monocultured crops are genetically limited and far more susceptible to insect blights, diseases and bad weather, than are diverse crops.
  
  Biodiversity in wildlife. Pesticides and fungicides are toxic to insects, fish and wildlife. Some birds, butterflies and non-pest insects have become endangered or extinct through intensive agriculture. This represents a threat to the ecological system.In addition many target insects and plants which damage crops are becoming resistant to pesticides. 1000 species of insects, plant diseases and weedsare now resistant to pesticides.
  
  5.Loss of indigenous crops. Indigenous crops are going out of production because demand is driven by the global market.
  
  6.Crop varieties and gene pools are under threat from monocropping system. - “The world’s crop gene pool contained in seeds is essential for increasing crop productivity, mitigating environmental stress such as climate change, pests and diseases, and ensuring a genetic resource base for the future. Crop diversity contained in the world’s seed collections is constantly under threat from natural and human-led disasters”(Jacques Diouf, Director of Food and Agriculture Organization of The United Nations.)

7.Loss of farmers' livlihoods. "The economic pressures of industrial
agriculture have led to a sharp decline in the numbers of so-called 'inefficient' farms with smaller family farms being particularly badly hit. For example in the US there were close to seven million farms in the 1930s, but less than 1.8 by the mid 1990s; in France 3 million farms in the 1960s, yet fewer than 700,000 in the 1990s, 450,000 farms in the UK, in the 1950s, half that number in the 1990s. Over the past 50 yrs the number of actual farmers has declined by 86% in Germany, 85% in France, 85% in Japan, 64% in the US, 59% in Korea, and 59% in the UK." (Food Wars,Tim Lang & Michael Heasman).

"In Brazil soybean cultivation displaces 11 agricultural workers for every one who finds employment.....In Argentina 60,000 farms went out of business while the area of 'Roundup Ready' soybean almost tripled. In 1998 there were 422,000 farms in Argentina while in 2002 there were 318,000. One and a half million Mexican farmers have been put out of work because of the Free Trade Agreement with America in which cheap (subsidized)American corn was imported." (GM Soya Disaster in Latin America, Hunger, Deforestation and Socio-Ecological Devastation.Professor Miguel A. Altieri, University of California, Berkeley and Professor Walter A. Pengue, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina).

8. Impact on nutritional value of food. This includes freshness, flavour and range of products available.
Research at Newcastle University has found that…”organically produced crops and dairy milk usually contain more ‘beneficial compounds’ such as vitamins and antioxidants. The research has shown up to 40% more beneficial compounds in vegetable crops and up to 90% more in milk. It has also found high levels of minerals, such as iron and zinc in organic produce” (Sunday Times, ‘Eat your words, all who scoff at organic food’, By Jon Ungoed-Thomas,Oct.28,2007)
. For a list of research results regarding nutritional value of organic versus intensively produced produce, see Soil Association Press release, 22/2/2008, ‘Soil Association response to Horizon programme’. ·

Genetically modified crops.

.“In the context of agriculture and animal husbandry this technology has far reaching implications as it allows the introduction into plants and animals of entirely new characteristics including genes originally found in unrelated plants, animals or micro-organisms. This is very different from traditional breeding practices”( From-‘How GM Crops Endanger Environment and Agriculture’. (Bharat Dogra, Mainstream Weekly, Saturday 26 January 2008.)

The crucial claim of gm protagonists is - because the world’s population is rising fast, famine and increasing food deficiency is inevitable without GM crops. They also claim that GM crops are good for consumers, farmers and the environment.

Opponents of GM’s point to how arguments for GM’s are based on a misreading of the worlds food problems. They say that the problem is one of distribution, and globalisation, rather than production. Further to this they strongly dispute the claims for GM crops made by corporates.

Further doubts regarding GM technology in agriculture is that they represent potential health hazards, and endanger the environment and agriculture. These issues are outlined in 'Potential Health Hazards of Genetically Engineered Foods’ by Stephen Lendman, -opednews.com March 2008.

In 2003, six principal countries grew 99% of the global transgenic crop area. The US grew 42.8 million hectares, followed by Argentina with 13.9 million, Canada 4.4million, Brazil 3 million, China 2.8 million and S.Africa 0.4 million hectares.

‘Friends of the Earth International’ has recently published a full, fact-based report called “who benefits from gm crops?"(Jan 2008)
The report seriously challenges the claims of GM proponents, and says they have failed to deliver on any of the proposed benefits, these are summarised below:-

• Claim-GM crops will need less spraying of pesticides and will therefore benefit the environment. FAILED


• Claim-Poor farmers will benefit. FAILED


• Claim-GM's will tackle hunger. FAILED
  
• Claim-Higher crop yields. FAILED
  Summary of report:-



• It describes how in the US there was a 15 fold increase in the use of herbicide Roundup between1994 and2004, because pests and weeds are becoming resistant to pesticides.


• Seed prices are on the rise, fewer suppliers means less competition and more market power to set prices.


• Fewer seed choices.


• Since gm cotton was adopted in the Makhatini Flats in South Africa, around three quarters of small farmers have gone out of business.


• Most commercial gm crops are grown for animal feed for western countries and biofuels. None have been used to address hunger and poverty issues.


• Brazilian experience in 2007 proved beyond doubt that gm crops are extensively contaminating conventional and organic soya.


• By the end of October 2007, it has been estimated that there have been over 900 cotton farmer suicides, or an average of three suicides a day (ENS, 3 October 2007;Wide angle,2007; Petition to Indian Prime Minister,Swift, April2007) Despite the increase in adoption of Bt cotton, this trend has not diminished, and farmers' livlihoods are under dire threat. In addition, many reports of poor performances of Bt cotton have been registered in the area ('The Hindu,' 16 February 2007)

Friends of the Earth International states...."in the US the biotech industry has still not introduced a single GM crop that has enhanced nutrition, higher yield potential, drought tolerance, salt tolerance or other promised traits..."

.

Big Bully says, "Disagreements...should be expressed in legal ways".

On March 7th about 300 Brazilian women raided a research unit of the agricultural biotech company Monsanto and destroyed an experimental field of corn. These facilities are located in Santa Cruz das Palmeiras, in Sao Paulo state.
The group of activists protested the Brazilian government's decision last month to give clearance for two varieties of GM corn for commercial use-MON810, produced by Monsanto and Liberty Link made by Germany's Bayer CropScience.

MON810 is the variety which has been banned in France after strong protests in that country.

The claim by Monsanto that small farmers could be among the most who benefit from biotechnology, is by now proven around the world to be disastrously misleading. (see previous posts).

Monsanto condemned the invasion by the Brazilian activists, saying in a statement "in a democratic regime, disagreements, ideological or not, should be expressed in legal ways". The problem with this rather hypocritical statement is that around the world we see that the takeover by biotech companies is impervious to the democratic process, because governments are approving the GM technology counter to public opinion. Big farmers, and governments are attracted by the financial and convenience factors of GM technology, but these are temporary advantages. GM farming involves loss of land and livlihoods for small farmers throughout the world. Even in Canada, US, and Europe, farmers have discovered that GM crops have not delivered on their claims, and pesticide use has had to be increased.

In Brasilia, a protest by another 400 women from an umbrella group, Via Campesina(the Rural Way) was held in front of the Swiss Embassy against Syngenta, A Swiss company that is selling genetically engineered seeds in Brazil. Via Campesina said in a statement that "no scientific studies exist that guarantee that genetically modified crops won't have negative effects on human health and on nature." A spokesperson for Via Campesina also said "The authorization of these varieties shows once more that (President Luiz inacio Lula de silva's) government favors agribusiness and bigforeign companies abandoning land reform and family farming"

Pro-GM PM.

Public demand for free range eggs and chickens has soared in the UK since the tv series featuring two chefs who highlighted the cruelty involved in raising battery hens. The demand has been so great that UK producers have run out of supply and supermarkets have resorted to sourcing from France. What has all this to do with GM’s?.... despite ever increasing demand for organic and free range produce, these foods which the public prefer are being bullied out of the market by the biotech industries’ unethical practices.

GM’s are making inroads by stealth, one route being by contamination of non-GM crops. Greenpeace said (on 28/2/2008) that it recorded 39 instances (in 24 countries) of genetically modified crops spreading improperly in 2007. Doreen Stabinsky, a US geneticist working on Greenpeace’s anti-GMO campaign said the report dealt with several types of contamination, including cases of crops that have not yet been approved for release escaping into the wild. More commonly crops approved for use in one place had spread elsewhere. Most of the contamination involved such staple crops as rice and maize, but also soy, cotton, canola, papaya and fish.
Considering that contamination scandals are not good publicity for GM’s exports or reputation, Greenpeace wonders why biotech companies let it happen? They observe that contamination allows biotech companies to argue that their crops should not be regulated as they are already in the food chain.

Meanwhile the UK government is paving the way for future GM trials (somewhere near to Cambridge). They are keeping the locations secret in case anyone may try to rip up the crops. Julian Little of the Agricultural Biotechnology Council said “We have to find a way of reducing the amount of damage you get when you do a field trial in the UK,that’s absolutely imperative.” This statement is of breathtaking audacity, considering the damage they do to farmers’ livelihoods, for which they provide no compensation.

The Independent featured John Turner (28/10/07)….’A succession of trials near his 250 acre farm…..south Lincolnshire, between 2000 and 2002 forced him to stop growing certain crops-suffering heavy financial losses as a result. John Turner said “It was a nightmare and we just felt absolutely powerless to do anything over it at all……without any real protection against contamination, we were forced to stop growing crops like maize that could be vulnerable to cross pollination. It wasn’t easy but it was preferable to the damage that could have been done if our crops were no longer GM free”. Mr Turner believes the facts are being twisted to fit a commercial agenda…”There is no sound science behind the push for GM crops. It’s all about money and control of not only the seeds but also food production from one end to the other. The more I find out about it the less I understand why there has been this impetus to force this technology on farming. It has been hugely overhyped by those trying to promote it. There are plenty of ways of improving crops that don’t involve swapping genes around…..”

So why haven’t the government introduced legislation to hold biotech companies to account financially for contaminating non-GM crops?

GM crops,World Shortage of Wheat and Biotech Industry.

The UK is seen as one of the last bastions to be conquered by the biotech industry regarding GM crops. They aim to establish GMO’s as the only farming system worldwide. At the present time public opinion in the UK and France is standing in the way of this corporate ambition in Europe.
This take-over process doesn’t involve real dialogue with the public about the risks and dangers of GM’s, or the social and moral issues concerning their introduction. It does involve wielding brute economic power. The United States says it could seek compensation for the millions of dollars in lost exports and licensing fees for biotech crops it is suffering because of EU bans.

When the GM industry does attempt to influence public opinion, they often refer to the problems experienced by southern hemisphere countries of food shortage due to crop failure. In answer they claim that GM crops bring higher yields.
John Hillary, Policy Director of ‘War on Want’, supports a safer more sustainable policy for dealing with crop shortages. He points out that as a result of the trade liberalisation packages which opened up new markets, some countries were made more vulnerable to the vagaries of world economy. Because their own domestic supplies are put under more strain as a result of having been opened up to global economy, they are made more reliant to imports of basic staple foods, which they cannot afford. Twenty years ago 90% of all rice eaten in Ghana was grown in Ghana. That percentage is now only 10%. In the last 10 to 15 years, 30 million jobs have been lost around the world because local domestic supply chains have been opened up.
John Hillary says we must support the development of sustainable LOCAL food production systems.

This local control over food production would also mean that communities would be able to grow the most appropriate crops for their own consumption, rather than crops dictated by global trade demand.

Genetically modified crops are not delivering on the promised benefits of increased yields, reduced pesticide use or tackling world hunger.

Last year there was a big increase in the production of crops for biofuels at the same time as an increased demand for wheat (eg from China)

The growing of biofuels last year caused the food prices in the United States to more than double. Tortilla flour, staple food of the Mexicans more than doubled in price.

So one immediate action should be to cease the growing of biofuels.It has been proven that biofuels do not solve the problem of carbon emmissions.

The Sky is Thin as Paper Here.

THE SKY IS THIN AS PAPER HERE.

Section of lithograph, Robert Rauchenberg,1981

GM Crop Trials.

Is this what DEFRA refers to as 'stewardship of the countryside?'

For most people stewardship of the countryside probably brings to mind well-kept hedgerows, woodland and strips of set-aside land, for wildlife to thrive, or at least survive. But DEFRA's brave new world involves the forceful protection of vast acreages of monotonous monocrops, grown so that corporate capitalism can thrive.

The company BASF will begin planting GM potatos on the outskirts of Cambridge soon. In preparation they are constructing hundreds of metal fences with the attendant security and surveillance paraphernalia. Question- 'are they intending to protect commercial crops in this way if they get the government go-ahead in the UK?'

Friends of The Earth have compiled a long and detailed report which exposes the misleading propaganda of the pro-GM lobbies (DEFRA, NFU, Biotech firms) Rather than be misled by the claims for higher crop yields, less pesticide use, etc etc, it's vital to find out what the huge impacts and risks of GM's really are on the environment, on human health, on wildlife, and on the future of food and agriculture. We can't risk not finding out, there's too much at stake. Visit the FOE website to download their report.

Pests have evolved resistance to GM crops.

The GM corporates seem like those stubborn and relentless rulers who won't relinquish their hold on power and cease their destructive policies, despite the suffering and protests of their citizens.

Recent news on 8th Feb, has reported that one of the most destructive pests of cotton crops has evolved a resistance to GM crops. It is believed to be the first documented example in the wild of an insect pest becoming resistant to this particular type of GM crop which was thought to be immune to the problems that have plagued conventional pesticides.

The Independent says that 'In the case of the GM cotton crop the Bollworm insect developed resistance because of the huge area of land in America and elsewhere where GM crops modified with Bt genes are now grown. This has generated one of the largest forces of natural selection for insect resistance that the world has ever known, according to the researches whose study will be published in the journal Nature Biotechnology.'

Genetically modified crops, secrecy, lack of democracy,UK Government and GM crops.

'Friends of The Earth' commented on their website that public companies have to maximise profit and keep investors happy. This means economic growth comes before people and the planet. They also stated that many corporates were now more powerful than governments. Both of these assertions are undoubtedly true but the fact that corporates are more powerful than governments doesn't necessarily mean that there is not an enthusiasm on the part of governments to accomodate the demands of corporates.

Our own UK government is hell bent on introducing GM crops into the UK, in direct opposition to the wishes of the majority of the population. The purpose, they tell us is to create more economic growth. Yet the experts (and common sense) tell us that economic growth will create more environmental damage and global warming.

In October 2007 newspapers described how the government was concealing its support for biotech research. This support involved funding genetically modified crop projects with scores of millions of pounds every year and colluding with a biotech company to ease its GM tests.

The documents which revealed this information were obtained through the freedom of information act and showed that the government colluded with a biotech company in setting conditions for testing GM potatos. In other words DEFRA officials repeatedly went to remarkable lengths to make sure that the trial conditions supposed to protect the environment and farmers, were 'agreeable' to the company.

FOE obtained information which showed that the government provides at least £50 million a year for research into biotechnology, largely GM crops and food. This in stark contrast to £1.6million given in 2006 for research into organic agriculture.

We always come back to the same question. 'Who really stands to gain from the introduction of GM crops?'

GM crops pose an issue of universal human rights.

The more I learn about farming in Cuba, the more impressive I realize the Cuban achievement is. I mentioned the organic agriculture of Cuba in a previous post. Using little mechanization and no pesticides or fungicides or synthetic fertilizers, Cuba has managed to produce enough food to feed its high population. In addition, the overall effect of living in the city (Havanna) with every available little space of land, and bigger allotment areas given over to the growing of lovingly cared for fruit and vegetables, this is something that environmentally has a positive psychological effect on communities. Britain has a lot to learn in this respect about land use, rather than using our unused bits of grassland and scrubland in towns and cities as dumping grounds for litter, or the UK government making it policy to build housing in gardens. With the problems of global warming this issue of land use is as vital for the western world as it is for Cuba.






Bharat Dogra, a respected journalist in India has written about the social, cultural, human health and environmental problems caused in his own and in developing countries, posed by intensive farming systems and GM crops.Talking about GM technology, Bharat says that ..."critics fear very serious and irreversible damage can be caused to our environment, to our food systems and to the health of millions of people".


His article in 'Mainstream Weekly entitled "How GM crops Endanger Environment and Agriculture" is an excellent summary of the main issues. For the purpose of this post I would just like to mention his comments regarding the social impacts on communities of a technology which is not only in effect stealing and destroying our universal human rights to preserve the genetic make up of our crops and all plant life, but also the right of farmers thoughout the world to farm their land according to their own sophisticated and deep knowledge derived from thousands of years of farming tradition, in their own geographical areas.





Bharat Dogra says GM .."technology is spreading so fast that very adverse consequences can result even before we have the time to understand the consequences"..He continues..."In this context the experience generally has been that the high expectations created by big companies promoting GM crops were not justified. In some cases the yields for a short initial period were indeed high, creating a rush for the new seeds, but after some time such expectations could not be maintained. On the other hand, there are many examples of farmers who invested their meagre resources and borrowed heavily to buy expensive GM seeds and other supporting inputs (for example, herbicides linked to these seeds) but later felt betrayed as the low yield left them indebted and saddled with debts. There were even reports of suicides by these farmers. There have been allegations of GM crops like Bt cotton being introduced in rainfed areas like those of Vidarbha (India) for which these were not suited."


One of the reasons the GM industry uses to justify its reductive technology is that less pesticides will be necessary to use with these crops. However, although this might initially be the case, throughout the world farmers are reporting that soon they are having to use more pesticides than ever.

At the end of his article Bharat quotes a paper written by Ricarda A. Steinbrecker (Science Director of the Genetics Forum UK) and Pat Roy Mooney (widely acclaimed winner of The Right to Livlihood Award).


.........." On March 3rd, 1998 the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) and a little-known cotton-seed enterprise called Delta and Pine Land Company, acquired US patent 5,723,765 - or the Technology Protection System (TPS). Within days, the rest of the world knew TPS as Terminator Technology. Its declared goal is to promulgate plants that will produce self-terminating offspring-suicide seeds. Terminator Technology epitomises what the genetic engineering of food crops is all about and gives an insight into the driving forces behind the corporate campaign to control and own life.


The Terminator does more than ensure that farmers can’t successfully replant their harvested seed. It is the “platform” upon which companies can load their proprietary genetic traits—patented genes for herbicide-tolerance or insect-resistance and get the farmers hooked on their seeds and caught in the chemical treadmill.
Further this paper says:
Most alarming though is the possibility that the Terminator genes themselves could infect the agricultural gene pool of the neighbour’s crops and of wild and weedy relatives, placing a time bomb. Temporary “gene silencing” of the poison gene or failed activation of the Terminator countdown enables such infection.
Between 15 and 20 per cent of the World’s food supply is grown by poor farmers who save their seed. These farmers feed at least 1.4 billion people. The Terminator “protects” companies by risking the lives of these people. Since Terminator Technology has absolutely zero agronomic benefit, there is no reason to jeopardise the food security of the poor by gambling with genetic engineering in the field. Whether the Terminator works immediately or later, in either instance it is biological warfare on farmers and food security. The Terminator also portends a hidden dark side. As a Trojan Horse for other transgenic traits, the technology might also be used to switch any trait off or on. At least in theory, the technology points to the possibility that crop diseases could be triggered by seed exports that would not have to “kick in” immediately—or not until activated by specific chemicals or conditions. This form of biological warfare on people’s food and economics is becoming a hot topic in military and security circles.Clearly the threat from GM crops to natural farming systems and environment is so serious that any commercial release cannot be allowed. Even any experimental trials should be asked to wait till definite ways to avoid hazards can be found."





In terms of human rights alone, there are huge issues at stake with the advent of GM crops. Brutal corporate pressure is eager to recover their investments and make profit.

Biotech companies reveal their selfish motives....again.

Biotech companies such as Monsanto, Syngenta and BASF claim that they are committed to reducing poverty and hunger throughout the world (altruistic motives indeed), but they have withdrawn from a major international project to map out the future of agriculture.

The International Assembly of Agriculture, Science and Technology for Development is concentrating attention on how to feed the world's population. This project is based on the work of 4,000 scientists and experts from around the world.However, Monsanto, Syngenta and BASF resigned after a draft report from the project highlighted the risks of GM crops and said they could pose problems for the developing world.

So, it seems that these corporates are not so altruistic after all. When they are prevented from distributing their GM seeds throughout the world, they are not interested in contributing to the project at all.

The draft report of the project said there is a "wide range of perspectives on the environmental, human health and economic risks and benefits of modern technology many of which are yet unknown." The report also stated that it is not clear whether GM crops increase yields and warns that use of the technology in the developing world could concentrate "ownership of agricultural resources" in the hands of the companies involved, as well as causing problems with patents.
The science journal 'Nature' commented that the view that "......biotechnology cannot by itself reduce hunger and poverty" is mainstream opinion among agricultural scientists and policy makers.

French Farmer Calls Off Hunger Strike.

The following is from Paris 'Associated Press' Jan 11 2008.

..."Militant French farmer Jose Bove and about 15 supporters called off their hunger strike in its eighth day after the government ordered the suspension of the use of genetically modified corn.

France will suspend cultivation of MON810, the seed for the only type of genetically modified corn now allowed in the country, until a European Union review is conducted, Prime Minister Francois Fillon's office said.

The move was based on a recommendation this week by a government-appointed panel calling for "the need for additional analyses on the health and environmental effects of the genetically modified product MON810 in the long term," Fillon's office said in a statement.

Bove and his supporters began the hunger strike Jan 3, saying they hoped to pressure the government to make good on a promise in November to suspend cultivation of MON810. He said they only drank water or unsweetened tea during the protest.

The seed, which resists some types of insects, was authorized before a government-ordered moratorium on genetically modified products took effect in 1999. Last year, it was planted in about 54,000 acres in France-mainly in southern farmland.

Bove rose to fame in August 1999 when he and supporters used farm equipment to dismantle a McDonald's branch under construction in the foothills of France's Massif Central mountains.

He has faced repeated trials and served jail time for destroying genetically modified crops." (End of quote)

France's environment minister Jean-Louis Boloo told the National Assembly that the clampdown on MON810 was a precaution that would only last until the release of an European re-evaluation of the crop in the coming month. Borloo insisted that biotechnologies were crucial for France....."In terms of agriculture it is doubly crucial for us. We have trouble feeding six billion people, nine billion tomorrow, with less arable land and probable less productive soil" Borloss said.

Borloo voices the pro GM mantra here, that 'biotechnology is needed to feed the growing populations.' The more we explore this claim, the more a different story emerges....

I mentioned in a previous post the Ethiopian farmers who have rejected the introduction of foreign seeds, due to the negative environmental and health impacts . The same sort of resistance to the introduction of foreign seeds has recently been expressed by farmers and scientists in Bangladesh. Agents of multinational companies have made a bid to introduce one-time usable foreign hybrid paddy seeds in the Sidr-southern region. (hurricanes have led to a seed crisis in this region.) Local agricultural experts and farmers have said that the introduction of foreign seeds will threaten extinction of local varieties, which have good taste and greater nutritional value. Also production costs will rise as foreign varieties need more care and costly fertilizer, irrigation and pesticides. The Bangladesh Rice Research Institute says that the government should take initiative for collection, preparation development and supply of local varieties of paddy seeds and take measures so that farmers are not lured to use foreign seeds for 'more profit'.

We see here an echo of Jose Bove's warning of how GM crops represent more than a potential risk to health and environment, but also destroy communities as small farmers are forced off the land.

French farmer on hunger strike over GM crops

Much of the opposition to GM crops is based on the potential harm they pose to humans and wildlife, and the possibility of uncontrollable spread of modified genes into non GM plants and crops.

In addition to the risks posed to humans and the environment, Jose Bove expresses a further concern over GM's. His ethical opposition is perhaps best summed up in his slogan "the world is not merchandise" and " the earth is not for sale".

Many French people regret the effects of globalisation on its rural traditions and farming practice. Bove and his supporters talk about "preservation". He describes how small farmers in France preserve nature through their inherited knowledge and expertise in agriculture. These skills are inseperable from the cultural and social aspects of rural life, from land and animal husbandry to food production,(wine, cheese, meats, pate, etc.)

When Bove refers to "preservation" he is not speaking in a nostalgic or luddite way,(as UK Professor David King likes to characterise the anti-GM campaigners).

From 1998 Bove represented small family farmers as being uniquely qualified to speak about food quality and to fulfil their duty to protect and develop French seeds.

The idea of "preservation" that Bove portrays is a practical, robust, and economic concept. One that is both productive and environmentally sustainable, while continuing to care for cultural and social traditions.

Bove challenges the multinationals for imposing an exploitative international economy. By colonizing and controlling the whole of the food chain, multinationals impose homogeneity on agricultural production, and food production. Nations which are colonised in this way by corporates experience the destruction of their rural communities, livlihoods of farmers, environmental degradation, and also detrimental effects on the health of their people.

French farmer Jose Bove on anti-GMO hunger strike.

Jose Bove (see previous post) and 15 other campaigners started their hunger strike two weeks ago on January 3rd.

Bove wants the French government to use European Union Legislation that allows members to ban GM crops.

At the present time Nicolas Sarkozy, France's President, has suspended the use of MON810, the only GM crop currently authorized in France. This crop is a brand of maize which is highly bug-resistent, and developed by the US agrochemical company Monsanto.

A bill on regulating GM crops is due to be debated in Fance's national assembly later this month and a vote is expected before February 9th, when the government's temporary freeze is due to end.

(More on Bove and his campaign here soon.)

EU Faces Deadline on GM Food Ban. The Parasite Crops.

"People who campaign against GM crops are committing a crime against humanity". Not my words. This seems to be the latest ludicrous claim of the GM protagonists in their attempts to conquer the European market. 'Ludicrous' because in view of the problems caused by GM's, described only briefly below, it would be far more accurate to describe the GM corporates as committing a crime against humanity:-

• the contamination of non gm crops and wild plants by gm varieties.



• resistance to pesticides and herbicides of insects and weeds.



• continuous use of herbicides with herbicide tolerant crops leads to serious ecological problems.



• some herbicides effect non target species in the soil such as beneficial predators-spiders, mites, beetles, earthworms, and microfauna and aquatic organisms including fish.



• large scale soyabean monocultures have rendered Amazonian soils unusable. In Bolivia in many areas soils are compacted and suffering severe degradation. In Argentina intensive soybean cultivation has led to soil nutrient depletion.



• The obliteration of traditional crops and horticulture by corporate farming has led to detrimental health effects on local communities, caused by vitamin deficiencies. Eg. monocultural rice, or maize growth (in Latin America) for export as cattle feed is a prime cause of vitamin A deficiency which leads to blindness.



• there are serious legal consequences for farmers regarding contracts that control farming methods and future use, seed purity and its saving for home use, food contamination, the intrusion into non gm crops and wild plants of gm varieties, and the difficulty in obtaining insurance cover should any harm result.


• (The following extract is from "GM soya Disaster in Latin America" by Prof. Walter A Pengue, Univ.of Buenos Aires, Argentina, and Prof.Miguel A. Altieri, Univ. of California, Berkley.)....

...."In Brazil soybean cultivation displaces eleven agricultural workers for every one who finds employment in the sector"........."In Argentina.....in 1998 there were 422000 farms in Argentina while in 2002 there were only 318,000, a reduction of a quarter. In one decade soybean area increased 126% at the expense of dairy, maize, wheat and fruit production............For the biotech industry huge increases in the soybean area cultivated and a more than doubling of yields per unit area are an economic and agronomic success. For the country, that means more imports of basic foods, therefore loss of food sovereignty, and for poor small and consumers increased food prices and more hunger.

This brings us back to the GM corporate pronouncement that "anti-GM campaigners are committing a crime against humanity"....a claim made no doubt to deflect from their own blatant exploitation of farmers and consumers.

It isn't just that GM crops act parasitically on the soil and wildlife and the environment. GM's are a parasite on the health and livlihoods of farmers and local populations in many parts of the world. At the most extreme there are suicides among Indian farmers, resulting from the increased seed costs and reduced yields.

Thankfully some communities, eg in Ethiopia have been able to resist the domineering influence of the corporates. They tried growing imported seeds and noticed the detrimental health effects on children. They also recognized that it was easier to mill and cook wheat which was grown from their indigenous seed varieties. The effect on digestion was also noticed to be better after consuming the traditional varieties. And last but not least the crop yields were higher! Happily farmers and local communities are collaborating with their seed scientists to return to growing and improving their traditional seed varieties.

In his article "Feeding People is Easy" Colin Tudge concludes....."In reality then our food problems are of two kinds. The first is to grow food well, get it to people and then cook it properly. That should be straight forward. Far, far harder is to circumvent the corporates and their attendant governments. New Labour has applied the same general strategy to food as to all things: to sell off the assets to the highest bidders and to hand the reins and profits to the corporates, which in this case means Tesco, Monsanto and the makers of agrochemicals. The aim is not to grow good food but to maximize cash. That in all ways is immensely destructive. In short the great threat to humanity comes from our own leaders. Now that really is a problem".

In 1998 the EU introduced a moratorium on new biotech authorizations that lasted six years, due to continuing concerns about GM crops.In November 2007, the World Trade Organization gave the EU an extra two months to comply with its ruling for the EU to end restrictions of imports of genetically modified food. The United States, Argentina and Canada argue that their farmers lost money because of GM bans, and they are now threatening to call for WTO sanctions against the EU.

French anti-globalisation activist, Jose Bove, who was convicted of destroying GM crops in southern France has gone on hunger strike to demand a year long embargo.

MEP's vote this week, how sustainable are they?

DEFRA supports the spraying of agricultural pesticides next to residential properties and other buildings such as schools and hospitals. Despite the report of the Royal Commission DEFRA CONTINUES TO SHOW CONTEMPT for the UK residents who are repeatedly exposed to highly toxic chemicals in this way. The European Parliament are voting on new safety policies which will provide more protection for people who live near to sprayed crops.

One very important new regulation in the European Commissions pesticide proposals, would be to introduce buffer zones between sprayed crops and peoples homes.

If you are concerned to protect your health from exposure to agricultural pesticides through inhalation, or skin contact, or water pollution, please contact your MEP's today by email. Please recommend to your MEP that they vote for the Environment Committee's adopted reports which will now all go to plenary to be voted on by all MEP'S.

You can find MEP's names and email addresses on the website http://www.europarl.org.uk/ They vote next week!

Urgent.EU vote on pesticide policy proposals.

1000 species of insects, plant diseases and weeds are now resistant to pesticides.-but humans are not!

Rainwater in parts of Europe contain such high levels of dissolved pesticides it would be illegal to sell it as drinking water.


If these facts are of concern to you, it is not too late to email your MEP today, before he/she votes on the EU pesticide proposals this month!


The pesticide proposals include the following amendments, which you might like to support in your email.,

• the prohibition of pesticide use in 'substantial no spray zones' around residential areas, parks, public gardens, sports grounds, school grounds, playgrounds amongst other places, especially to protect local groups, such as babies, children, pregnant women, the elderly, those with pre-existing medical conditions and who may be taking medication, along with all other vulnerable groups. The amendment also specified that in all these areas non-chemical alternatives should be used.
• a new legal obligation to inform residents and neighbours about pesticides spraying in their locality.
• a new legal obligation for farmers and other pesticide users to provide information on the pesticides used directly to residents and neighbours.
• a clear definition of a substance of concern being any substance that has or potentially has either carcinogenic, mutagenic, endocrine disrupting, neurotoxic, immunotoxic, reprotoxic, genotoxic or skin sensitizing capabilities should be regarded as a substance of concern.
• the entire terminology used throughout the adopted text of the Regulation proposal, including the title, to be changed from "Plant Protection Products"(PPP's) to pesticides.
• a new definition for the prioritization of non-chemical methods of plant protection and pest and crop management (including rotation, physical and mechanical control and natural predator management).

After next year the European Commission plans to abolish set-asides. The reason for this is to make way for the growing of cereals for animal feeds and biofuels. Consequently more land will be sprayed with pesticides, providing no breathing space (literally) for wildlife, and a visually more barren and polluted agricultural landscape for all of us. This makes it even more urgent that large buffer zones be provided between sprayed crops and residential areas.

Biofuels, Agro-fuels,-Myth and Rip-off.

Why are we using precious land
to feed our gas-guzzling cars?

Governments and corporate bodies present agro-fuels as the panacea for the problems of a post peak oil era.

Their bold assertions are myths.

(text in colour are quotes from an article of Eric Holt-Gimenez, Ph.D.Executive Director,Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy)

It is now acknowledged by the scientific community that biofuels are not the magic bullet to the problem of either carbon emmissions or the transition from peak oil to a renewable fuel economy. The industrialized countries are aggressively promoting an agro-fuels boom, through mandating renewable fuel targets. However, these targets far exceed the agricultural capacities of the Industrial North. Consequently Northern countries expect the Global South to meet their fuel needs, and most Southern governments seem happy to oblige. Indonesia and Malaysia are rapidly cutting down forests to expand palm-oil plantations targeted to supply up to 20% of the EU bio-diesel market. In Brazil-where bio-fuel crops already occupy an area the size of Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and Great Britain combined-the government is planning a five-fold increase in sugar cane acreage with a goal of replacing 10% of the worlds gasoline by 2025.

In Columbia, land-grabbing from local peasants as well as from indigenous and minority groups. Should anyone resist they or members of their family might be made to disappear, by paramilitaries.

For more information on Columbia -see September issue of 'Ecologist' September 2007.

MYTHS-
Myth 1- Agro fuels are clean and green.

Myth 2- Agro-fuels will not result in deforestation.

Myth 3- Agro-fuels will bring rural development.

Myth 4- Agro-fuels will not cause hunger.

Myth 5- Better "second-generation" agro-fuels are just around the corner.

(from foodfirst.org).

Pesticides in Farming, Driven by Supermarkets.

Agri-business, food processors and supermarkets have totally taken over control of our food, from the time it is planted, (or born) to its purchase at the retailers. They have degraded its nutritional value, and contaminated it with chemicals:pesticides and herbicides on crops, and antibiotics and growth hormones in animals. This is before it even reaches the processors where additives and more go into the mix.

This whole process is referred to by its protagonists as 'efficiency' but nothing could be further from the truth! It's simply convenient to the corporates, who centralise control.

Food manufacturers attempt to sqeeze more and more profit from food:..."the increasing 'fractionation' of foodstuffs into smaller and smaller biological components and ingredients and then the recombining of these fractions into 'value-added' retail food products. Such activity has spawned a massive food technology industry whose practitioners have been increasingly involved over the past ten years in 'adding' health 'benefits' to foods and beverages.
..........Corporations are often mainly concerned about sourcing a product with the least cost and then move the product where it can be sold at the highest price. In many poor countries workers in rural areas receive less than five dollars a day, with health and environment regulations unlikely to be enforced, again helping to drive down costs. It is remarkable how cheap labour characterises the supposed 'efficiencies' of the food supply chain. Behind low cost food can be even lower cost labour. Transnational corporations are experts at reaping the economic benefits of globalization while pushing the economic, social and environmental costs onto the public.
........some economists now openly argue that consumers in the developed world no longer need their own farmers because countries can import food from poorer countries more cheaply."*

The alternative to this crazy system is to cut these corporations out of the loop, and for us, the customer/consumer to deal direct with local farmers. This action would also benefit populations in the developing world who should be able to decide about their own food needs and the farming system they want to use.

*Quotes from 'Food Wars', Tim Lang and Michael Heasman.

Organic Farming-Small Farms versus Large Farms.

"Food, Trade And US Power Politics In Latin America." Toni Solo. 2004.

He quotes a statement by Columbian Senator Jorge Robledo Castillo:"A nation whose food supply was located somewhere else in the world stands to lose if for some reason it cannot be made available for domestic consumption......"

Toni Solo points out that "people at all levels across Latin America see this very clearly. A spokesperson for the Movement of Landless Workers in Brazil, states, "The principal base for forging a free, sovereign people is that it has the conditions to produce its own food. If a country becomes dependent on another in order to feed its people it becomes a dependent nation politically, economically, and ideologically."

Solo continues.........."Within the broader concern in Latin America about food sovereignty, anxiety about genetically manipulated foods is acute. Writers like Elizabeth Bravo of Equador's Accion Ecologica, have analized what the FTAA would mean in terms of the ability of the US multinationals like Monsanto and Dupont to penalise local agriculture by enforcing Intellectual Property Rights on plants and seeds through patents and related ownership rights. She argues this will introduce monopoly rights into the food production system, limit the free movement of seeds, increase erosion of genetic resources and force farmers to pay royalties on the seed they use, thus generally increasing food prices.

She goes on to point out that, "even without broaching the the ethical monstrosity of patenting life forms, these attempts to prioratise the agenda of the agribusiness multinationals will lead to monocultivation and eliminate small farmers. Latin America agriculture will become more insecure the more it comes to rely on foreign, especially United States, technology. Looking further afield, one has only to consider a country like Honduras to see where the "free trade" model leads: abject dependency, widespread poverty, massive unemployment"

Farming-Small Farms Produce More.

I provide some quotes below from a policy brief by Peter M Rosset, Ph.D. Executive Director Food First/The Institute for Food and Development. The policy brief was prepared for "Cultivating Our Futures" the FAO/Netherlands Conference on the Multifunctional Character of Agriculture and Land,12-17 September1999, Maastricht, The Netherlands.

.."In this policy brief I challenge the conventional wisdom that small farms are backward and unproductive. Using evidence from Southern and Northern countries I demonstrate that small farms are "multi-functional"-more productive, more efficient, andcontribute more to economic development than large farms. Small farmers can also make better stewards of natural resources, conserving biodiversity and safe-guarding the future sustainability of agricultural production.

....Small Farm Productivity

How many times have we heard that large farms are more productive than small farms? Or that they are more efficient? And that we need to consolidate land holdings to take advantage of that productivity and efficiency? The actual data shows exactly the reverse for productivity: that smaller farms produce far more per unit area than larger farms. Part of the problem lies in the confusing language used to compare the performance of different farm sizes. As long as we use crop yield as the measure of productivity, we will be giving an unfair advantage to larger farms.

Total Output versus Yield.

If we are to fairly evaluate the relative productivity of small and large farms, we must discard "yield" as our measurement tool.Yield means the production per unit area of a single crop, like "metric tons of corn per hectare." One can often obtain the highest yield of a single crop by planting it alone on a field--in a monoculture. But while a monoculture may allow for a high yield of one crop, it produces nothing else of use to the farmer. The bare ground between the crop rows..."empty niche space" in ecological terms...invites weed infestation. The presence of weeds makes the farmer invest labour in weeding or capital in herbicide.

Large farmers tend to plant monocultures because they are the simplest to manage with heavy machinary. Small farmers on the other hand, especially in the Third World are much more likely to plant crop mixtures--intercropping---where the empty niche space that would otherwise produce weeds instead is occupied by other crops. Thet also tend to combine or rotate crops and livestock, with manure serving to replenish soil fertility.

Such integrated farming systems produce far more per unit area than do monocultures. Though the yield per unit area of one crop-corn, for example- may be lower on a small farm than on a large monoculture, the total output per unit area, often composed of more than a dozen crops and various animal products, can be far, far higher. Therefore if we are to compare large and small farms, we should use 'total output' rather than yield. Total output is the sum of everything a small farm produces: various grains, fruits, vegetables, fodder, animal products etc. While 'yield' almost always biases the results towards large farms, total output allows us to see the true productivity advantage of small farms.

Surveying the data we indeed find that small farms almost always produce far more agricultural output per unit area than larger farms. This holds true whether we are talking about an industrial country like the United States, or any country in the Third World.".......

Pesticide Pollution,Farming, the Environment, and Gordon Brown's plans.

This is really about the lack of Gordon Brown's plans for the future of agriculture and the agricultural environment. Given the urgency of the need to create strategies for energy, efficiency and production in all fields(excuse the pun), there is almost a deafening silence from government. There are the occasional suggestions for using low energy light bulbs, but that's about the extent of their creative thinking. Let's have some concerted planning and incentives for really moving away from our dependence on oil!
In relation to farming I wonder if Gordon is going to opt for the environmentally sustainable option, or whether he will cave in to the agri business ,or the GM biotechnology industry.
It's a sobering thought that 75% of the UK is agricultural land and 31,000 tons of pesticides are sprayed on UK land every year......" The toxicity of pesticides used in agriculture has increased by an estimated factor of 10-100-fold since 1975.Despite this, resistence is spreading; POPS (persistant organic pollutants)are becoming less effective: they accumulate in the food chain, persist in the environment and travel by being bioaccumulated (as animals eat each other, so the POP is stored in fat and thus consumed and stored).Pesticides are a key route for POPS,, notably through aldrin, chlordane,DDT, dieldrin, endrin and heptachlor. 1000 species of insects, plant diseases and weeds are now resistant, an environmental impact known as the 'treadmill effect'."
Rain water in parts of Europe contains such high levels of dissolved pesticides it would be illegal to supply it as drinking water.
So, Gordon, what's it to be? Give us a clue.

Text in blue is information taken from 'Food Wars' by Tim Lang and Michael Heasman.

No Synthetic Fertilizers, No Pesticides in Cuban Organic Agriculture.

There is an interesting article by Megan Quinn called 'The Power of Community:How Cuba Survived Peak Oil.' It features on the website of Global Public Media.
I'll just quote a little bit about farming in Cuba, but her article is well worth reading for other aspects of cuban life.

....."Havana, Cuba--At the Organiponico de Alamar, a neighborhood agriculture project, a workers collective runs a large urban farm, a produce market and a restuarant. Hand tools and human labour replace oil-driven machinary. Worm cultivation and composting create productive soil. Drip irrigation conserves water, and the diverse, multi-hued produce provides the community with a rainbow of healthy foods.
In other Havana neighborhoods, lacking enough land for such large projects, residents have installed raised garden beds on parking lots and planted vegetable gardens on their patios and roof tops.
Since the early 1990's an urban agriculture movement has swept through Cuba, putting this capital city of 2.2 million on a path toward sustainability.
A small group of Australians assisted in this grass-roots effort, coming to this Caribbean island nation in 1993 to teach permaculture, a system based on sustainable agriculture which uses far less energy.
This need to bring agriculture into the city began with the fall of the Soviet Union and the loss of more than 50% of Cuba's oil imports, much of its food and a percent of its trade economy.Transportation halted, people went hungry and the average Cuban lost 30 pounds.....
....Cubans are also replacing petroleum-fed machinary with oxen, and their urban agriculture reduces food transportation distances. Today an estimated 50% of Havana's vegetables come from inside the city, while in other Cuban towns and cities urban gardens produce from 80% to more than 100% of what they need......"

Please read the rest of the article, it's interesting.

Pesticides versus Set-asides.

Setasides are being scrapped next year to make way for the crazy rush to grow biofuel crops. Biofuel crops are also displacing food crops. Truly crazy in a country as small as Britain.

Setasides are not an escape into bygone times-just the opposite. They have been recognized as vital green arteries for wildlife and biodiversity, which are buffers against the burgeoning pressures of intensive farming and pesticide use. They support a critical eco system for the maintainance of food crops and nature.

Georgina Downs, anti pesticide campaigner, points out that 'despite the increasing costs involved in this process and the decreasing number of active substances on the market, actual consumption and use of pesticides in the EU has not decreased within the last ten years. At the same time, the percentage of food and feed samples where residues of pesticides exceed maximum regulatory limits is not declining, but remains around 5%. In addition,certain pesticides are commonly found in the aquatic environment at concentrations well above the regulatory limit, and there is no sign of any decrease'.

So, I enclose some pictures of fields and wild plants/flowers which are due to disappear forever from Britain.

Farming and Food Supply, Who Owns It?

All the big players are jostling for control of the land and control over how it is farmed. The combined power of agri-business and government has taken away a fundamental human right of the international population to make choices about foods grown in our own nations, geographical regions, and local communities.

They deprive us of choice as to whether we have pesticide residues in our food, or whether our food is genetically modified. Remote corporations tell us that the 'free market' provides consumer choice-but giant corporations have deep pockets and their marketing practices manipulate consumer choice. Supermarkets demand strict 'cosmetic' specifications of colour size and shape of produce from the farmer, which forces the farmer to use even more unnecessary chemicals, harmful to human health and animals and the environment.....Agribusiness refers to this system as 'productive, highly efficient, market focused agriculture.'

Foot and Mouth Disease

With this latest outbreak, hopefully things will be handled more efficiently and more humanely than the previous attempts which I described in my previous posts. When this foot and mouth outbreak is over, the arguments for moving to more sustainable, less intensive farming systems becomes even more important. Even in 2007, it is better to work with nature, rather than trying to squeeze every last drop of economic gain out of an exhausted land. Sustainable systems are undoubtedly the best way forward. DEFRA is responsible for critical decisions which have to be made in agriculture, but what are their priorities?

Shambo, and hundreds more.

"The next day there was no dawn chorus"

Shambo hit the headlines.He seemed to symbolize something very dysfunctional with the way DEFRA manages crisis in farming.On the radio this morning a farmer related his experience; he lost hundreds of cattle when they were slaughtered by DEFRA in the last foot and mouth outbreak. He described how his cattle were left in a huge pile,after the slaughter, waiting to be disposed of. DEFRA informed him that the carcasses might have to be left there for a week, in his field. The farmer and his family were expected to live for a week with the piled carcasses of the animals they had cared for, lying nearby. He rightly described this as 'not decent', and described DEFRA as incompetent.

These animals were ,like us, capable of feeling pain, and fear. They were treated as lumps of meat even whilst they were alive, in a country which is supposed to be civilized.

The farmer described how the next day there was "no dawn chorus, everything was totally silent.....there were no birds....the birds disappeared....for weeks"

The return to smaller farms,or farms where acres are divided into smaller units to incorporate more diversity, where animal husbandry, ecology and environmental issues are easier to manage, would provide a sustainable way forward. A system that regularly expects hundreds of animals to be slaughtered because of disease is a brutal and in the end brutalising system,which requires people to shut out of their minds the reality behind the packaged food we buy at the supermarket.

Shambo has gone,-do we feel better now?-problem solved?

Shambo held up a mirror to DEFRA and will remain as a symbol against the 'maximum production at all costs' policies of DEFRA.

Farmers call to scrap set-aside a year early.Set-asides give way to more pesticides.

Set-asides are due to make way for yet more pesticides all over again!

Quote from the Press and Journal:-"cereal farmers are demanding set-aside is scrapped early as floods at home and severe droughts elsewhere in the world increase the prospect of more poor harvests-and potential food shortages."

Ironic isn't it, when it is 'intensive' farming which helps contribute to climate change, and causes soil degradation, which further contributes to the whole environmental problem. But they refuse to abandon the short term policies, and rush towards more environmental destruction-. ".....European farmers' organization Copa-Cogeca now wants a decision on set-aside by September so that growers can plan their 2008 cropping, and bring the land back into production to ensure more grain supplies and resolve problems created by surging demand for wheat to convert into bioethanol for fuel."

There are already big doubts by the experts that bioethanol is going to solve the problem of fuel supply, infact they fear that bio ethanol crops will add to environmental problems, but you can see why farmers and businesses will want to jump on the band wagon.

So, the tiny little vestige of effort that agriculture and DEFRA temporarily made towards stemming the damaging effects of pesticides on the environment and wildlife and livestock, by introducing set-asides, is now going to be abandoned.

Bovine TB

With the intensive farming system it is difficult to track the source of food. An American farming report which I read the other day, stated that hamburger meat may contain the meat of as many as 1000 cows!! We might be able to trace our own food produced in the UK, but do we know what sort of conditions the animal was reared under? Remember Bernard Mathews and his factory farmed turkeys and the avian flu outbreak? There are overwhelming arguments for buying local,organic and free range,not least the need for humane treatment of animals, and the avoidance of inflicting stress and pain on them.To talk round and round in circles about whether or not to cull or to vaccinate seems to be missing the point. Questioning our own behaviour and attitudes towards food and the farming systems which produce it for us would be good all round, for humans and animals I think,- but I know a lot of people disagree-usually for cheap food reasons.

Intensive Farming,and Factory Farming of Livestock. Culling, killing and slaughter.

The devastating effects of
livestock diseases which have

occurred in the UK are difficult to forget;
There is a correlation between livestock diseases and farming practice, including movements of cattle around the country.
The point of industrial agriculture is lower cost products to create greater productivity. When epidemics and mass culling happen, all farms and their livestock(even healthy animals) can be effected, whether their agricultural practice is intensive farming or sustainable farming.
The question I'd like to raise in this post is how many repeated mass slaughters are we, the food consumer ,prepared to accept in the quest for cheap food. I haven't discussed various farming systems, the effects on health and the environment, or animal husbandry here. I do not mean to imply that individual farmers who have suffered the devastating effects of culls on their farms were in any way responsible.
SE(bovine spongiform encephalopathy)- In November 1986 scientists first became aware of the disease. Up to the end of Jan 1998 approximately 170,000 cases were confirmed in the UK. 100,000 cattle were culled.
The human form of the disease, CJD, killed 165 people in Britain.

Foot and Mouth Disease,Spring and Summer 2001.There were 2,000 cases of the disease in farms in most of the British countryside. Around seven million sheep and cattle were killed in attempting to control the disease. This involved concentrating on a cull & then burning all animals located near an infected farm.
Avian Influenza. Feb 2007.160,000 turkeys were killed at a Suffolk 'farm' owned by Bernard Mathews.
Cattle TB. In 2005, 3,300 cattle were thought to be infected with bovine tuberculosis, with the figure rising at 18% each year. Badgers have long been blamed for the spread of TB in UK herds and the government has threatened a cull if further studies back this up. Other research has found that cattle movements are the biggest single factor in TB transmission. This same analysis threw up several issues of farm management, with hedges being particularly prominent; TB was markedly less likely in farms with abundant hedgerows and ungrazed strips of land along fences; but markedly more likely where hedges had lots of gaps. (Dr Fiona Mathews, Oxford University) calculates that "hedge-poor" farms are 60% more likely than "hedge-rich" ones to experience an outbreak.

ECONOMIC COSTS of OUTBREAKS

BSE- Farmers were offered a one-off compensation of £85 million pounds.

FOOT AND MOUTH DISEASE.-By April 2001, the UK government had announced the following compensation packages;

*£247 million compensation for slaughtered animals.

*£156 million 'agrimonetry' compensation of the sheep, beef and dairy sectors(over the £15 million compulsory aid.) .

*£200 million compensation for 'welfare' slaughter of livestock.

*£40 million payment of the pig industry restructuring fund brought forward to 2001.

*Rates relief for businesses affected by FMD., eg tourism.

*Rates relief for small businesses in rural areas affected by FMD, eg food shops pubs, garages with a rateable value under £9000.

* Unemployment benefits to people whose ability to work is effected by MD.

AVIAN INFLUENZA-Bernard Mathews was told by government he would receive £600,000 in compensation for healthy birds slaughtered in the bird flu outbreak, (despite health safety precautions having been breached)

CATTLE TB- No figures for yearly compensation are yet available here.£35m was spent on a government-funded study on potential culling of badgers, known as the 'Krebs Trial'.

Sustainable Farming v. Intensive Farming Systems

One third of everything we eat is pollinated by bees; this includes all fruit and most vegetables. According to many scientists working in this area, we have taken the process of pollination in agriculture forgranted. They say that even in this country, the uk, we have had a narrow vision of agriculture, which has been driven by the economic goal of quick, cheap food.
Quick, cheap food has led to mono-crops, and pesticide use. 31,000 tons of pesticides are sprayed on UK land every year.The photograph shown here is not smoke rising up above the trees, it is pesticide spray.

One example amongst many, of mono-culture in this country is the use of rye grass rather than clover. Mono-crops mean lack of bio diversity for bees as well as humans, which means that their immune systems are weakened. Mites have been cited as another possible cause of ccd (colony collapse disorder)in bees,but some mites are now resistant to two different pesticides, and scientists say there are no alternatives to these two chemicals.

Scientists and others are worried because research into ccd is being carried out by scientists working for the agro-chemical companies. They say that this research should be carried out by independent scientists, for obvious reasons! The agro-chemical industries risk loosing a lot of money if their pesticides, fungicides are found to be responsible. The UK government should be doing more to finance independent research into this serious threat, before colony collapse disorder takes effect here and in Europe.

Sustainable Farming

Global trade in food isn't viable anymore. Lots of reasons why not. Even apart from the problems caused by global warming, there are important reasons for nations to meet their own food needs;
Farmers and communities in the developing world are often exploited by globalization. Deprived of their old diversity of food crops which provided a good staple diet, they have to produce huge acreages of one crop(mono-cropping, or mono-culture) for export, often using vast quantities of pesticides.
If countries were able to meet their own national needs, free from the exploitative stranglehold of supermarkets and agro chemical industries,and market forces,- farming systems would be able to adapt more easily to the changing local conditions brought about by climate change. Closer communication between farmer and consumer would bring about a more democratic system.
Independant scientists(ie independant from agro-chemical companies)make an informed hypothesis that mono-crops are partially responsible for the colony collapse disorder in bees in the United States. Another strong suspect for causing this serious state of affairs, is the use of pesticides. I discuss this in my next post.

Pesticides in Orchards.

Exposure to toxins can be by inhalation, skin contact, eyes and ingestion. The diagram(by agro-industry) at the top of the page gives the very misleading impression that spray falls neatly onto the crop, and nothing else. Nothing could be further from the truth. The spray is blasted high into the air, above tree canopies, and the vapour can be inhaled by people many hundreds of yards outside the perimeter of the orchard. This is actually the best scenario- if there is a wind the distance can be miles. Sprayed fields/orchards are a hazard to people using adjacent lanes or main roads, either on foot, cycling or in cars.

It is not safe to enter the orchard for four days after spraying, this is a defra regulation. -but unbelievably public footpaths, under council jurisdiction, often run through orchards. The government has refused to respond to the recommendation of the latest 'Royal Commission for the Environment' report, for on-site notices to warn walkers of spraying. Although it is obvious to any rational person that spraying poses a threat to the health of people who live close to sprayed crops, the government refuses to acknowledge this fact.

Pesticides- Farmers ignore safety regulations.

I often see farmers breaking safety regulations. They spray agricultural chemicals,(ie pesticides,fungicides) over public footpaths and rights of way, which traverse crops, sometimes only two or three minutes before walkers use the footpath.

These chemicals sometimes have rei's of 3or 4 days,(ie it isn't safe to enter the sprayed area for that time.) No notifications or warnings are put on site to warn walkers of the danger.

Crops are often sprayed when the wind speed is well above the 10 mph which is the legal limit for spraying.

Defra's propaganda that the UK has strict safety regulations is laughable. Defra is negligent and cavalier in the way it turns a blind eye to farmers breaking the law in this and in other ways.

Defra's main concern is overwhelmingly on financial and economic considerations rather than protecting the health of people who live or work close to agricultural land.

Genetically Modified Crops.

Shared Terrain or State Terra?

There's a lot of opposition to the use of agricultural pesticides, and the government sees this as an opportunity to promote what they claim are the benefits of genetically modified crops. There are currently two main types of genetically modified crops, those engineered to be resistant to herbicides in order to kill weeds and those engineered to produce toxins to to kill pests.


There are many concerns about introducing GM crops in the UK, and I refer here to the Soil Association for an outline of some of the issues. Coloured text below are quotes from the Soil Association website.


Health

Unlike new drugs, there is no requirement for GM foods to be routinely tested on animals or humans so scientists don't know what the effects are on health. GM food has been available in America since 1996, but no studies have been carried out to assess whether this has led to health problems.



The only known trial on humans of GM food was carried out by the University Of Newcastle in 2002 and commissioned by the Food Standards Agency.Seven people were given a meal containing GM soya and it was found that in at least three people the GM material entered their gut bacteria. The accidental contamination of many US food products with GM maize in 2000 is believed to have caused allergic reactions in over 50 Americans, some serious.

The Environment.
A number of worrying environmental impacts are developing in countries where GM crops are grown commercially:-

Widespread contamination of crops: in America and Canada contamination has caused major problems throughout the food and farming industry in just a couple of years, including the loss of nearly the whole organic oilseed rape sector in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. Seeds that are produced to be GM-free are difficult to buy and sometimes are later found to be contaminated.Those who are successful in sourcing non-GM seeds risk having their crops contaminated by neighbouring GM fields.

Increased use of chemical sprays: Contrary to claims from the biotechnology industry, farmers are now more reliant on herbicides(weedkillers). Certain crops have been engineered to be resistant to specific herbicides to enable farmers to spray weeds without damaging crops. However, weeds (sometimes referred to as superweeds) are developing resistance to these herbicides, and rogue GM plants that grow after a harvest(volonteers) have appeared and spread widely. In particular, GM oilseed rape volonteers- the crop most likely to be introduced into the UK- have spread quickly, and some plants have become resistant to several herbicides through cross pollination. As a result, farmers are making more frequent applications and reverting to older and more toxic chemicals.

Resistant Pests: Pests are becoming resistant to some GM cotton plant crops in Australia and China (which have Bt genes inserted). There are many laboratory studies to prove this and the biotechnology companies have acknowledged that Bt resistance will develop.

The market
There is also no market for GM food as it has been rejected by all the supermarkets in their own brand food and British Sugar has said it will not buy GM sugar.

GM technology is driven by four commercial biotechnology companies(Monsanto, Syngenta,Aventis Cropscience and Dupont) none is British.

Milliband and Defra Hear no evil, See no evil, Smell no evil.

Hear no evil, see no evil, smell no evil:-

This has always been the stubborn and perverse response by successive governments to successive 'Royal Commission for The Environment' reports over the years.Scientists have produced substantial evidence that agricultural pesticides and fungicides are unsafe to be used at all, let alone anywhere near to human habitation.

Georgina Downs, leading campaigner, has been given permission by the judge to challenge Government's pesticide policy in the High Court. She is contesting the current method of assessing the dangers and risks to public health from crop-spraying, which is currently based on the model of a bystander. She explains how this is based on a predictive model, which assumes that there will be only be occasional short-term exposure from the immediate spraydrift at the time of application, and to one individual pesticide at a time. It also assumes that the person can walk away and leave the area.

Georgina Downs- "Obviously this model is not appropriate or realistic to address the long-term exposure of a resident actually living in the sprayed area, where they will be repeatedly and frequently exposed to mixtures of pesticides and other hazardous chemicals, throughout every year and in many cases, like ours, for decades. Therefore as you can see this is a completely different type of exposure scenario to that set out for a bystander."

Pollution, Pesticides, and Defra decides.

The average western adult contains between 300 and 500 traces of man-made chemicals in their bodies. Before the second world war there were none.



During the war in this country there was a need to increase food production, and so the use of pesticides and fungicides began.

After the war 4000 farmers were disposessed of their land by government because they wouldn't farm in the intensive way that government wanted them to.
The government brought in legislation- 'The 1947 Agricultural Act' to make farmers adopt the use of chemicals and technology for high crop production.

There is no longer any necessity for this sort of intensive agriculture but government persists in their mantra that the more chemicals and technology are applied in agriculture, the more food will be produced and the lower the price will be for the consumer.

The following extract from the Ecologist Magazine, 'Fatal Harvest' 1/11/02 describes the background to this policy:-

..."This myth of cheap food is routinely used by agribusiness as a kind of economic blackmail against any who point out the devestating impacts of modern food production. Get rid of the industrial system, people are told, and they won't be able to afford food. Using this 'big lie' the industry has even succeeded in portraying supporters of organic food production as wealthy eletists who don't care about how much the poor will have to pay for food. Under closer analysis the US's supposedly cheap food supply becomes monumentally expensive.

The myth of cheapness completely ignores the staggering externalised costs of the food, costs that do not appear on supermarket checkout receipts. Conventional analysis of the cost of food ignore the exponentially increasing social and environmental costs customers are currently paying and will have to pay in the future. Americans spend tens of billions of dollars in taxes, medical care, toxic clean-ups, insurance premiums and other pass-along costs to subsidise industrial food producers. Given the ever increasing health, environmental and social destruction involved in industrial agriculture, the real price of this food production for future generations is incalculable".