73.
GMO ‘Food” - The Last Nail in Our Food’s Coffin
A Ticking Time Bomb, A Disaster Waiting To Happen
Agenetically modified organism (GMO) is an organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques. Organisms that have been genetically modified include micro-organisms such as bacteria and yeast, insects, plants, fish, and mammals. Few health topics are more hotly debated than the GM food issue and for good reason.
Genetic modification involves the insertion or deletion of genes. When genes are inserted, they usually come from a different species, which is a form of horizontal gene transfer.
Genetic modification involves the insertion or deletion of genes. When genes are inserted, they usually come from a different species, which is a form of horizontal gene transfer.
Scorpion Genes In Your Corn
The scorpion toxin gene put into corn and oilseed rape allows the plant to make its own pesticide. Caterpillars eating this corn die of the toxin. And what happens when pests become resistant to the in-bred toxin?
Of course it doesn’t stop there. Genetic experiments are being carried out all over the world. Frog genes have been put into potatoes to help them resist infection. Human genes have been put into pigs and fish to make them grow faster. Pigs are also being bio-engineered to provide organs for transplanting into humans. The list goes on and on and on.
Of course it doesn’t stop there. Genetic experiments are being carried out all over the world. Frog genes have been put into potatoes to help them resist infection. Human genes have been put into pigs and fish to make them grow faster. Pigs are also being bio-engineered to provide organs for transplanting into humans. The list goes on and on and on.
“Seeds have the power to preserve species, to enhance cultural as well as genetic diversity, to counter economic monopoly and to check the advance of conformity on all its many fronts.”
~Michael Pollan, Second Nature: A Gardener's Education
Monsanto - Playing With Life On The Planet
Monsanto is heading up this sinister biotechnological revolution. They created Agent Orange used in the Vietnam war. Among other things, they’ve developed ’round-up ready soy’ which is resistant to their own herbicide ’roundup’. So, farmers can now destroy all plant-life on a field except the soy. The impact on wildlife is disastrous. This is a nightmare vision of mono culture… a landscape of human crops devoid of all other life. Whilst these companies can spin their compassionate message of how they are helping poor people with their products, the truth is that third world farmers are getting locked into deals with the powerful companies. Once they’re in, they can’t get out.
Monsanto - A Humanitarian Organization?
Companies like Monsanto proudly justify their dangerously insane schemes. Their publicly stated aim is ‘to feed an ever growing population with limited arable land…’
Only a brain dead person will buy into their ridiculous humanitarian justifications. They are merchants of death and their motivation is money and destruction.
Only a brain dead person will buy into their ridiculous humanitarian justifications. They are merchants of death and their motivation is money and destruction.
“Half of all broccoli grown commercially in America today is a single variety- Marathon- notable for it's high yield. The overwhelming majority of the chickens raised for meat in America are the same hybrid, the Cornish cross; more than 99 percent of turkeys are the Broad-Breasted Whites.”
~Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto
It’s truly frightening to see the lengths some organisations will go in the name of profit.
The most authoritative evaluation of agriculture, the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development, determined that the current GMO’s have nothing to offer towards the goals of reducing hunger and poverty, improving nutrition, health and rural livelihoods, and facilitating social and environmental sustainability.
The report was a three-year collaborative effort with 900 participants and 110 countries, and was co-sponsored by all the majors, e.g. the World Bank, FAO, UNESCO, WHO. In reality, GMO’s reduce yield, increase farmers’ dependence on multinationals, reduce biodiversity, increase herbicide use, and take money away from more successful and appropriate methods.
The most authoritative evaluation of agriculture, the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development, determined that the current GMO’s have nothing to offer towards the goals of reducing hunger and poverty, improving nutrition, health and rural livelihoods, and facilitating social and environmental sustainability.
The report was a three-year collaborative effort with 900 participants and 110 countries, and was co-sponsored by all the majors, e.g. the World Bank, FAO, UNESCO, WHO. In reality, GMO’s reduce yield, increase farmers’ dependence on multinationals, reduce biodiversity, increase herbicide use, and take money away from more successful and appropriate methods.
In Developing Nations, GMO’s Can Be Catastrophic.
In India, for example, Monsanto convinced hundreds of thousands of farmers to take out high interest loans to pay for expensive GM cotton seeds and associated chemicals. Inconsistent yields left desperate farmers unable to even pay back their loans. In last 10 years, more than 2,50,000 farmers have committed suicide.
Playing God Is Not An Option
Unbelievably, crops are purposely being developed that don’t produce viable seeds. These are called the ‘Terminator Genes.’ This prevents farmers using the traditional methods of saving some seed for next years sowing. How is this ‘helping’ feed the world? Folks really wanting to help feed the world would be pushing with all their might for sustainable farming. In any case, starving populations are about governments, politics and distribution, not actual lack of food. (Mike Kinnaird)
Higher Residues Of Poisonous Herbicide
The primary reason crops are engineered is to allow them to drink poison. They’re called herbicide tolerant, and are inserted with bacterial genes that allow them to survive otherwise deadly doses of toxic herbicide.
Biotech companies sell the seed and herbicide as a package. Monsanto sells Roundup Ready crops and Roundup herbicide. Bayer CropScience sells Liberty Link crops and Liberty herbicide.
Between 1996 and 2008, US farmers sprayed an extra 383 million pounds of herbicide on these poison drinking GMO’s.
Because weeds are becoming resistant to the overused herbicide, farmers are spraying considerably more each year. The last 2 years of the 13-year study alone accounted for 46 percent of the increased herbicide use.
Biotech companies sell the seed and herbicide as a package. Monsanto sells Roundup Ready crops and Roundup herbicide. Bayer CropScience sells Liberty Link crops and Liberty herbicide.
Between 1996 and 2008, US farmers sprayed an extra 383 million pounds of herbicide on these poison drinking GMO’s.
Because weeds are becoming resistant to the overused herbicide, farmers are spraying considerably more each year. The last 2 years of the 13-year study alone accounted for 46 percent of the increased herbicide use.
Your Intestinal Bacteria Into Living Pesticide Factories
GM genes can convert your intestinal bacteria into living factories that continuously produce pesticides or other harmful products.
The ONLY published GMO human feeding study (that’s right, there’s only one) confirmed that genes transfer from GM soybeans into the DNA of bacteria living inside our small intestines and continue to function. [Netherwood et al, “Assessing the survival of transgenic plant DNA in the human gastrointestinal tract]
Human subjects that ate Roundup Ready soybeans ended up with “Roundup Ready gut bacteria”—unkillable with Roundup. If the pesticide-producing Bt gene in corn chips were also to transfer, it could turn your intestinal flora into living pesticide factories— possibly for the long term. (Jeffrey M. Smith)
The ONLY published GMO human feeding study (that’s right, there’s only one) confirmed that genes transfer from GM soybeans into the DNA of bacteria living inside our small intestines and continue to function. [Netherwood et al, “Assessing the survival of transgenic plant DNA in the human gastrointestinal tract]
Human subjects that ate Roundup Ready soybeans ended up with “Roundup Ready gut bacteria”—unkillable with Roundup. If the pesticide-producing Bt gene in corn chips were also to transfer, it could turn your intestinal flora into living pesticide factories— possibly for the long term. (Jeffrey M. Smith)
saka-mulamisa-ksaudra
phala-puspasti-bhojanah
anavrstya vinanksyanti
durbhiksa-kara-piditah
Harassed by famine and excessive taxes, people will resort to eating leaves, roots, flesh, wild honey, fruits, flowers and seeds. Struck by drought, they will become completely ruined.
~ Srimad Bhagavatam 12.2.9
Gaining Ground
America’s supermarkets are awash in genetically modified foods. Over the past decade, biotech companies have dominated dinner tables with crops like corn, soybeans and canola modified to survive lethal doses of herbicides, resulting in increased herbicide use, a surge in herbicide-resistant weeds, and the contamination of organic and conventional crops. According to the Center for Food Safety, more than half of all processed food in U.S. grocery stores—items like cereals, corn dogs and cookies—contain GMO ingredients.
Grow More Food
"Many countries have invested quite heavily in plans to bring back into use land abandoned for hundreds of years, or land that has never been used at all. They have brought all kinds of heavy earth moving tractors and machines for land development and introduced new forms of power into their agriculture. In many cases tractors, machines and implements have been brought in without taking into account the position of the cultivator, of the man who works on the land and who must ultimately make these things pay. And frequently they have been purchased before sufficient training and maintenance facilities were available. Of course, there are also exceptions and some land development and mechanisation projects have proved successful from their inception."
The above is a quotation from 'UNESCO' Food and Agriculture organisation. The enthusiasm for tractors over other implements has not always proved successful and on many cases, as we have personal experience of some places in U.P., it has often meant false starts on scheme that on paper looked so promising and easy.
The transcendentalist however will not agree with that tractors and other agricultural implements only can solve the problem of grow more food and inadequate living standard. Besides the tractor, implements, the man who will work on the land of cultivation, there is another supreme hand in the successful termination of the productive enthusiasm. This ultimate cause is called "Daiva" or the unseen power of God inconceivable by human brain. This power can ultimately make all things null and void and conquer over all other enthusiasm and ability of the human being. In the Bhagvad Gita we have this information as follows:-
adhisthanam tatha karta
karanam ca prthag-vidham
vividhas ca prthak cesta
daivam caivatra pancamam
(Bg. 18.14)
To effect successful result in the attempt of agricultural enthusiasm there are five causes namely the situation of the land, the man who works in the field, the instruments or implements applied in the enterprise and above all the hidden hand natural forces, known as Daiva.
Whatever is attempted and done in this world physically or mentally by any man, which may be right or wrong in the estimation of the public, must have all the above mentioned five causes behind the attempt. Nobody should therefore see only the visible causes for effective result but must look into the invisible cause called the Daiva.
Above all other causes the Daiva cause is the most powerful. This Daiva cause or the Supreme cause is the ultimate control of physical nature which is the external energy of Godhead. The land, implements, the worker, the attempt all depend on the ultimate cause called 'Daiva.' It is also known as 'Prakriti.' Everything is done by the 'Prakriti' but egoistic fools think that the work is performed by them. In spite of good tilling of the land and the expert tiller, good tractors or other implements and the most sincere and accurate plan of the work it is quite possible that the whole attempt may be frustrated for want of sufficient rains. Without rains all other arrangement will stand null and void due to the reaction of the Daiva cause. This Daiva cause is made effectively favourable by the process of 'Yajna' described elsewhere in this issue.
Along with the creation of the 'Prajas' or the living being, the 'Yajnas' or sacrifices on account of Vishnu the Supreme Being was also created. By the performance of 'Yajnas' the controlling deities, who supply us light, air, heat, water etc. which are all essential factors in the matter of grow more food campaign, are satisfied. By their satisfaction only everything is produced nicely, sufficiently. When there is sufficient production by the mercy of Daiva the inadequate standard of living is mitigated. Otherwise every attempt becomes futile.
~ Srila Prabhupada (Handwritten note under the title: “add with Geeta Nagari)
“This technology is a one-trick pony,” says George Kimbrell, an attorney at the Center for Food Safety. “They don’t help us feed the world, they don’t fight climate change, and they don’t help us better the environment. They just increase pesticides and herbicides. That’s what they do.”
Companies like Syngenta, Bayer and Dow are trying hard to catch up with Monsanto and they have all created their own herbicide tolerant seeds, modified to withstand the company’s corresponding herbicide treatment.
This is a vast subject and we have only given a few glimpses of a grave crisis.
Companies like Syngenta, Bayer and Dow are trying hard to catch up with Monsanto and they have all created their own herbicide tolerant seeds, modified to withstand the company’s corresponding herbicide treatment.
This is a vast subject and we have only given a few glimpses of a grave crisis.