Food Sovereignty Ghana Opposes Monsanto

For too long, Monsanto has been the benefactor of corporate subsidies and political favoritism. Organic and small farmers suffer losses while Monsanto continues to forge its monopoly over the world’s food supply, including exclusive patenting rights over seeds and genetic makeup.

Food Sovereignty Ghana, a food advocacy movement, hereby serves notice to embark on a public march as part of a worldwide event comprising millions of marchers. This march is being organized in collaboration with the Kanyan Akuafuo Kuo Society, and is scheduled to take place in two locations: Accra and Goaso.
There are currently over 300 marches scheduled to take place around the world.
Out of respect to the Ga Traditional Council annual ban on drumming and noise making, which always precedes the Homowo festival, we have decided to organize a silent march in Accra and a more animated one in Goaso.


MISSION STATEMENT
On May 23, 2015, activists around the world will, once again, unite to March Against Monsanto.
 
WHY DO WE MARCH?
Research studies have shown that Monsanto’s genetically-modified foods can lead to serious health conditions such as the development of cancer tumors, infertility and birth defects. In the United States, the FDA, the agency tasked with ensuring food safety for the population, is steered by ex-Monsanto executives, and we feel that’s a questionable conflict of interest and explains the lack of government-led research on the long-term effects of GMO products. Recently, the U.S. Congress and President collectively passed the nicknamed “Monsanto Protection Act” that, among other things, bans courts from halting the sale of Monsanto’s genetically-modified seeds.
 
For too long, Monsanto has been the benefactor of corporate subsidies and political favoritism. Organic and small farmers suffer losses while Monsanto continues to forge its monopoly over the world’s food supply, including exclusive patenting rights over seeds and genetic makeup. Monsanto’s GMO seeds are harmful to the environment; for example, scientists have indicated they have caused colony collapse among the world’s bee population.
 
What are solutions we advocate for?
Vote with your cedis by buying organic and boycotting Monsanto owned companies that use GMOs in their products. Labeling of GMOs so that consumers can make those informed decisions easier. Rejecting the UPOV-compliant Plant Breeders' Bill Calling for further scientific research on the health effects of GMOs. Holding Monsanto executives and Monsanto-supporting politicians accountable through direct communication, grassroots journalism, social media, etc. Continuing to inform the public about Monsanto’s secrets. Taking to the streets to show the world and Monsanto that we won’t take these injustices quietly. We will not stand for cronyism. We will not stand for poison. That’s why we March Against Monsanto.
 
We will not stand for cronyism. We will not stand for poison.
For Life, the Environment and Social Justice!

from here

SEEDS: The Source Of Sustenance

“My mother gave me some seeds to plant. And I’m also giving those seeds to my children to plant. So that is ongoing, every time we transfer to our children.  And that is how all the women are doing it. We don’t buy, we produce it ourselves.” 

Sitting together in the heat of the Ghanaian sun, Esther Boakye Yiadom explained to me the importance of seeds in her family and the transfer of knowledge between the different generations of women.
Esther continues to explain the role of the community in sharing and preserving seeds: “I am having tomatoes and I don’t have okro. And another woman has okro. I’ll go to her and then beg for some of her okro seeds to plant. And then if another person also needs tomatoes from me and I have it, I’ll have to give to the person. Because you know every season changes, because maybe mine will not do well. But that person’s will do well. So next season we can get to plant. That’s why we [ex]change them.”

The ability to save and exchange seeds, after each growing season is an age-old practice that ensures that small scale farmers have seeds to sow the following year. The seeds are free for the farmer and they have the knowledge of what seed is required, for what conditions and the different tastes that complement the food they cook. Where they do not have a particular seed, they can ask other farmers in the community to share seeds.

This ‘freedom’ is essential for sustainable livelihoods as well as ensuring communities have access to nutritious and culturally relevant food. But this is all under threat by a proposed bill – dubbed the ‘Monsanto Law’ - in Ghana that would bolster the power of multinational seed companies whilst restrict the rights of small farmers to keep and swap their seeds. 
This attack on the way of life to so many farmers in Ghana is one of the commitments that the Ghanaian government has made to be part of the G7’s New Alliance. At the end of last year we exposed the role of the UK government in the New Alliance and their complicity in this attack which led to a series of questions in our parliament as well as a parliamentary petition (Early Day Motion).

As I travelled around Ghana this last couple of weeks, I met many farmers and communities who echoed Esther’s sentiments around seeds and the paramount role that seeds play for farmers and their communities.
When I met Patricia Dianon, president of the for Rural Women's Farmers Association of Ghana, she also articulated some of the spiritual and cultural aspects of seeds: "We use them when we have funerals, we put the seeds around the funeral sites, that is the last respect for the dead". She explained to me how you send off your loved ones with seeds so that they have them for the afterlife – underscoring the importance of seeds being the source of sustenance.
Yet the corporate agenda for seeds, as pushed through by the New Alliance, is one where farmers are treated as passive consumers of corporate-controlled seed. Ignoring the cultural importance of seeds and the economic impact on small rural farmers who have to spend money on purchasing seeds year after year and instead of enjoying a wide variety of seeds free of charge, becoming dependent on big seed companies.

This agenda is being challenged in Ghana and on my trip I also met different civil society groups, unions and farmers networks that are actively fighting to protect the rights to their own seeds and the freedom to protect their way of life. Their relentless organising, protesting and petitions led to a halt on the legislation. But it’s not over yet and any day the bill could come back on the agenda of the Ghanaian parliament, so the movement remains vigilant. We will continue to stand in solidarity with the food sovereignty movement in Ghana and challenge the complicity of the UK government.


 from here

Monsanto's Claims Found To Be Unsubstantiated

African Centre for Biodiversity, 17 March, 2014
Source:http://www.acbio.org.za/index.php/media/64-media-releases/454-monsanto-forced-to-withdraw-unsubstantiated-and-misleading-adver

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) of South Africa has today ordered Monsanto to withdraw its advertisement on Radio 702 with immediate effect, wherein Monsanto claims the benefits of GM crops. According to ASA, Monsanto’s claims were found to be unsubstantiated.

The African Centre for Biosafety (ACB) lodged a complaint to the ASA following an advertisement on Radio 702 by Monsanto wherein Monsanto claims that GM crops “enable us to produce more food sustainably whilst using fewer resources; provide a healthier environment by saving on pesticides; decrease greenhouse gas emissions and increase crop yields substantially.” The ACB was supported in its complaint by Ms Judith Taylor from Earthlife Africa.

Monsanto was given an opportunity by ASA to respond to the ACB’s complaint. According to the ASA, they were only able to provide the ASA with links to documents on its website, but were unable to provide, (as it is required to in terms of South African law governing advertising) inputs from an independent and credible expert confirming the various studies that Monsanto relied upon showing the ostensible benefits of GM crops.

“We are elated with this decision. Monsanto has already been warned by the ASA as far back as 2007, that it needs to substantiate its claims from an independent and credible expert in the matter of GM Food/M Wells/ 8739 (18 June 2007) regarding its claims of the so called benefits of GM crops. However, it appears Monsanto does not have much regard for South African law as it is hell bent on disseminating false information to the South African public,” said Mariam Mayet, Executive Director of the ACB.

The ASA has warned Monsanto that “it should ensure that it holds proper substantiation for its advertising claims” or risk attracting further sanctions.
Link to Ruling:
http://www.acbio.org.za/index.php/media/64/453-ruling-of-the-asa-directorate

Food Is A Weapon - Ghanaians Fight Against GMOs

Food Sovereignty Ghana is calling for an open debate on the issue of GMOs to set the record straight as well as to generate answers and questions in order to inform the Ghanaian public, instead of attempting to impose GMOs on people without their knowledge or consent
 
Our attention at Food Sovereignty Ghana has been drawn to an article in the online edition of the Daily Graphic of 20 September, 2013, ‘GM crop production making progress’, by Jojo Sam. In the said article, the objections of Food Sovereignty Ghana to the GM technology were summarized as follows:

‘But there are some in the country, including Food Sovereignty Ghana, an advocacy movement, who see the introduction of GM crops as a risky venture for the country considering that a majority of farmers who are illiterates would find it difficult if not impossible to cultivate modified crops.’ This is a complete distortion and an unconscionable misrepresentation of our movement in its objections to the imposition of GMOs on Ghanaians by some civil servants at the Ministry of Environment, Science, and Technology.

FALSE CLAIMS BY MINISTRY OF ENVIRONMENT, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

First of all, FSG wishes to address the false claim that our objection to GMOs is that farmers are ignorant. Nothing could be further from the truth. We rely on our farmers for nutrition and sustenance. They are key to our health and happiness. Some farmers may not be literate, but they are not ignorant, and they do know farming. Farmers are not asking for GMOs or patented seeds. The FSG objection is that the GMO lobby is trying to fool farmers and consumers into thinking that this dangerous and outdated technology is safe and benign. The GMO lobby's overarching interest in ‘farmer education’ is to intimidate them not to save seeds for replanting! The GMO lobby is trying to push through legislation and pollute the land with GMOs with no information and debate, and before Ghanaians know what is going on. There is nothing that indicates GMOs are safe, and mounting evidence points to serious dangers.

Food Sovereignty Ghana has called for a ‘moratorium on the cultivation, importation and consumption of genetically modified foods.’ Our group also called ‘for the need for Ghanaians to clearly understand the full implications associated with the cultivation of genetically modified foods before embracing the technology.’

We also sounded ‘the warning that if Africans fail to get our act together, GM patent domination of our agriculture could be far worse than the combined effects of Apartheid, Colonialism and Slavery! Remember the words of Kissinger, 'Food is a weapon!’

The food-as-weapon policy continues unabated, demonstrated by Monsanto, Syngenta, and allied multi-national corporations’ unrestrained hunger to control Africa and what and whether Africans eat.

OPEN DEBATE ON GMOS IS NEEDED

We further reiterated that ‘Ghana is a democratic and a sovereign state, and the issue of what we eat and grow affects the well-being of each and every Ghanaian. Hence there is a need for a broad consensus after a thorough, open and transparent debate before embarking on a process of gene contamination in our food chain that is absolutely irreversible. We believe that a decision of such far-reaching implications is a matter that cannot be left solely in the hands of trade negotiators, investment experts, or agricultural engineers. It is essentially a matter of political economy, public health, national security, biodiversity, and environmental sanity, in which we are all stake-holders.’

Taken from here

Is this really the future for Africa farming?

“Basically this is disaster capitalism. The disaster of hunger and drought, climate change and policy-related, is now a profit opportunity for Monsanto and Syngenta..." Joan Baxter, a journalist who has spent years reporting on climate change and agriculture in Africa. Baxter sees a problem in how GM technology is being marketed, and slowly introduced, into African countries, under the guise of ending famine. With climate change becoming an increasingly influential factor in the GM debate, Baxter said companies claiming to help are only looking for profit. "The farmers [in Africa] may lose their own seeds, perhaps be given GM seeds for a year or two, then have to purchase them and be stuck in the trap and in debt,” she said.

In recent years, donors such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have invested millions of dollars into researching, developing and promoting genetically modified (GM) technology, including drought-resistant maize, within the country — and have found a great deal of success in doing so through partnerships with local NGOs and government bodies. Researchers and lobbyists argue that in a country so frequently stricken by food shortages, scientific advancements can put food into hungry bellies. Drought-resistant seeds and vitamin-enriched crops could be agricultural game changers, they say.

The Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI), a semi-autonomous government research institution, recently announced that after years of trials, genetically modified drought-resistant maize seeds will be available to Kenyan farmers within the next five years. Trial GM drought-resistant cotton crops are already growing in Kidoko, 240 miles southeast of Nairobi. African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF), a massive NGO working on GM research and development in partnership with KARI, Regulatory Affairs Manager Dr. Francis Nang’ayo says GM crops are “substantially equivalent” to non-genetically modified foods and should be embraced as a solution to persistent drought and hunger. AATF received a $47 million grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. This partnership involved the Howard G. Buffett Foundation and American seed giant Monsanto. Gates Foundation claim that biotechnology and GM crops would help end poverty and food insecurity in sub-Saharan Africa. In 2010, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Gates Foundation had invested $27.6 million in Monsanto shares. Until 2008, South Africa had been the only country using GM technology. Now Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Mali, Zimbabwe, Nigeria and Ghana are researching GM seeds and growing trial crops of cotton, maize and sorghum.

Monsanto-patented seeds are usually costly, which has led to numerous accusations of exploitation and contemporary colonialism. But how long will these particular strains of seeds last? What are the guarantees? Critics fear dependence on corporate fertilizers and pesticides, the emergence of super-weeds and pests that can no longer repel GM varieties, and terminator seeds that only last for one planting season.

AGRA Watch, a project of the Community Alliance for Global Justice, director Heather Day said  “Genetically modified crops actually haven’t been that successful,” Day added. “We’ve seen massive crop failure in South Africa, and farmers there couldn’t get financial remedies or compensation for their losses. There’s genetic resistance and super-pests, these things are happening now, and it’s not surprising. It’s what you would expect from an ecological standpoint."

In India, for example, farmers who purchased Bollgard I cotton seeds from 2007 to 2009 wound up spending four times the price of regular seeds, and paying dearly for it. It was believed that Monsanto’s patented GM seeds would be resistant to pink bollworms, which were destroying cotton crops across swaths of India, but by 2010 Monsanto officials were forced to admit that the seed had failed and a newer breed of far more aggressive pests had emerged. The solution? Bollgard II, an even stronger GM cotton seed. As of December 2011, Monsanto was actively promoting the latest Bollgard III cotton seed, stronger than ever before. Pesticide spending in India skyrocketed between 2007 and 2009, forcing thousands of farmers into crushing debt, and hundreds more into giving up their land. Some media outlets later drew a connection between the Bollgard debacle and a rash of suicides across farms that had purchased the seeds.

Agriculture dominates Kenya’s economy, although more than 80 percent of its land is too dry and infertile for efficient cultivation. Kenya is the second largest seed consumer in sub-Saharan Africa, and Nairobi is a well-known hub for agricultural research. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, farming is the largest contributor to Kenya’s gross domestic product, and 75 percent of Kenyans made their living by farming in 2006. Half of the country’s total agricultural output is non-marketed subsistence production — meaning farms where nothing (or very little) is sold and everything is consumed.

Kenya is a country where land-grabbing is all too common, be it on the coast to make way for new tourist resorts, or in Nairobi, where slum demolitions left hundreds homeless when the government bulldozed several apartment buildings to reclaim an area near the Moi Air Base.

Farmers here are skeptical of risking everything for a few seasons of higher yields.

Anne Maina, advocacy coordinator for the African Biodiversity Network (ABN), a coalition of 65 Kenyan farming organizations, said “Our public research institutions must shift their focus back to farmers’ needs,” she told The Indypendent, “rather than support the agenda of agribusiness, which is to colonize our food and seed chain. We believe that the patenting of seed is deeply unethical and dangerous.” Added to the potential problems with GM technology are health risks—the strains of maize that were illegally imported in 2010 had been deemed unsafe for children and the elderly. Maina also worries about animal feeding trials that showed damage to liver, kidney and pancreas, effects on fertility, and stomach bleeding in livestock that has consumed GM feed. A more recent study carried out on pregnant women in Canada found genetically modified insecticidal proteins in their blood streams and in that of their unborn children, despite assurances from scientists that it wasn’t possible. “Our key concern is that the development of insecticides and pesticides is primarily the emergence of companies getting farmers to buy highly toxic chemicals, which they will become totally dependent on. We don’t yet know the extent of the health risks posed, nor how we are expected to trust companies that have a record of putting small farmers out of business. It is time for sober second thought,” she said.

At the McLaughlin-Rotman Centre for Global Health in Toronto, researchers recently released a report titled “Factors in the adoption and development of agro-biotechnology in sub-Saharan Africa.”  and came to the conclusion that “poor communication is affecting agbiotech adoption,” and that “widespread dissemination of information at the grassroots level and can spread misinformation and create extensive public concern and distrust for agbiotech initiatives.” The report was financed by a grant by the Gates Foundation.

http://www.alternet.org/world/155376/frankenfoods%3A_why_is_the_gates_foundation_helping_monsanto_push_genetically_modified_food/?page=entire