Harry Collins with Delta & Pine Land asserts that "protection systems" (the terminator seed) will "…help farmers in all areas of the world gain access to the most technologically advanced tools and products" allowing them to produce "more profitable crops" (Shand, 3). Collins goes on to insist that "traditional farming practices" -- using saved seeds to plant next season's crops -- brings "a gross disadvantage to Third World farmers" because they get "locked into obsolete varieties" (Shand, 4). However, Shand explains that farmers that are "resource-poor" are unlikely to buy terminator seeds and yet they may well wind up with "sterile seed after exchanging or buying seed from better-off farm neighbors." Neth Dano of the Southeast Asian Institute for Community Education (SEARICE) believes that these revolutionary seeds "…could drive millions of farmers out of plant breeding and, since no one else will breed for their needs, out of agriculture altogether" (Shand, 5).
Defending & questioning genetically engineered seeds and crops
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) seems on the side of GM seed expansion -- with some qualifications -- in general, and asserts that genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are "here to stay" (Fresco, 2001, p. 1). That said, Fresco adds that while scientists in the private and public sectors see GMOs as "a major new set of tools" and industry views an "opportunity for increased profits" -- the public in many parts of the world "distrusts GMOs" and views them as part of "globalization and privatization" (Fresco, 1). Moreover, citizens and conservationists approach GMOs as being "anti-democratic" and they see the GMO movement as "meddling with evolution," Fresco explains on page 1. In addition, many governments have not as yet developed and put in place regulatory infrastructures, the author goes on.
At the time of this report (2001, eleven years ago) the number of hectares that had been planted in GM crops was 44.2 million (up from 11 million hectares in 1998). The FAO believes that there is a need to "guarantee access" to farmers and breeders in the developing world. Too few challenges vis-a-vis GM seeds have been addressed in developing worlds, Fresco continues. Also, the FAO states that genetic modification "is not a good in itself," but rather it is a "tool integrated into a wider research agenda" (Fresco, 2).
How will Third World countries benefit or be harmed by GM food?
How do the policies of the WTO support the transnational corporations' grip on the food market? An article in the Third World Quarterly takes the position that because developing countries have not engaged in deep research in the area of biotechnology, and hence these Third World countries have "had no need to introduce domestic legislation to allow the patentability of life forms" (Plahe, 2003, p. 31). And so the fate of developing countries with regards to their ability to protect their plant genetic resources and their right "…to control and enjoy the benefits of their traditional knowledge" will be in the hands of the World Trade Organization, Plahe explains. There is another glaring example of how poor countries are being stepped on in the entire GMO milieu and it is a result of actions by the International Union of the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) -- the group that "harmonises international standards on plant-breeders' rights (PBRS) (Plahe, 32). The UPOV grants "exclusive rights to plant breeders to produce, offer for sale, and market propagated material of a new variety" (Plahe, 32).
There are however numerous food rights and farmers groups in developing countries that believe the UPOV convention "…has been a lobbying vehicle used by rich countries" in order to shove down the throats of poor countries the adoption of "patent like" exclusive rights over new plant varieties. In fact the UPOV has not "generally been endorsed by developing countries," Plahe continues, because Third World nations believe the UPOV -- through the introduction of "private property rights" -- would introduce legal and economic restrictions on the livelihoods of poor farmers in their countries (32). In addition, the developing nations' view is that in any event, small farmers "would be the last to benefit from a private system of rights," which would only assure exclusive rights to those farmers (think corporate-owned farms) that could produce a "stable, distinct and uniform variety" (Plahe, 32).
Still on the subject of GM food and the poor, Ian Scoones writes that due to exploding populations, urban sprawl, and rising incomes, by the year 2020, there will be "a 40% escalation of demand for cereals" (Scoones, 2002,...
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