Five GMO Myths Debunked by Vandana Shiva

By Dr. Vandana Shiva

Global Research, August 22, 2015

EcoWatch 17 August 2015

Region: Asia

Theme: Biotechnology and GMO

1. Myth of the Green Revolution
I wrote a book for the United Nations University, “The Violence of the Green Revolution,” (1991) which has been republished by many publishers globally:

“As the agricultural systems of many countries are poised, as a result of the recent advances in biotechnology for what may soon come to be called the Second Green Revolution, this book is particularly appropriate. Vandana Shiva examined the impact of the first Green Revolution on the breadbasket of India. In a cogent empirical argument, she shows how the ‘quick fix’ promise of large gains in output pushed aside serious pursuit of an alternative agricultural strategy grounded in respect for the environmental wisdom of peasant systems and building an egalitarian, needs-prientated agriculture consistent with the village-based, endogenous political traditions of Gandhism. Dr Shiva documents the destruction of genetic diversity and soil fertility that resulted and in highly original fashion shows how the Green Revolution also contributed to the acute social and political conflicts now tearing the Punjab apart.

Set in the context of a sophisticated critique of the privileged epistemological position achieved by modern science, whereby it both aspires to provide technological solutions for social and political problems while at the same time disclaiming responsibility for the new problems which it creates in its wake, the author looks to the future in an analysis of a new project to apply the latest Gene Revolution technology to India and warns of the further environmental and social damage which will ensue.” Amazon.

My study was reinforced by the study done by Dr. Jatindar Bajaj, with whom I did MSc Hons in Physics from Punjab University in 1973. His study comparing pre and post Green Revolution performance showed that the rate of growth of aggregate crop production was higher in the years before the Green Revolution was introduced (1967-68) than after it.

Aggregate crop production was higher before the introduction of the Green Revolution in 1967-68. Photo credit: Dr. Vandana Shiva

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 The Green Revolution did not save India from famine, as the proponents of Industrial Agriculture and GMO technology would argue, in fact the Green Revolution reduced India’s production. For more information about the Green Revolution read, Nothing Green in the Green Revolution in India Today.
2. Myth of GMO Golden Rice as a Solution to Malnutrition
Here is our analysis establishing that our indigenous biodiversity and knowledge is far superior than Golden Rice to address malnutrition. Syngenta owns Golden Rice. It’s promotion as the fruits of public sector research are a blatant lie and an attempt to mislead people across the world.
Further, the Golden Rice paper had to be retracted, any fabricated claims made based on the paper do not stand.
3. Myth that Obesity is the Only Disease Related to Food
The epidemic of cancer has affected the farmers of Punjab because of pesticides. It has affected farmers of West UP. In a single village, our recent field survey revealed that there were 100 cancer victims. The farmers are getting into debt and committing suicide buying the pesticides and the citizens are dying of cancer because of the same poisons.
This is why we started the Anna Swaraj Abhiyan 2020 from Meerut, the sacred land of our first movement of independence.
Our book Health Per Acre shows we can feed two India’s with nourishing, poison free food through organic.
Our book Wealth Per Acre, for which the Forward was written by the Hon Agriculture Minister, Shri Radha Mohan Singh, shows how the negative externalities of farming with poisons are costing the country $1.26 trillion annually.
4. Myth of Safety 
While the literature on biosafety is vast and I was appointed as a member of the expert group on biosafety by UNEP to create the framework for the International Law on Biosafety, two recent publications show that the assumption of safety and “substantial equivalence” is false.
One study is from the Norwegian Government, another by an Indian scientist from MIT who invented email.
New research is showing that there is no evidence of GMO safety.
Research is also showing the falseness of the assumption of substantial equivalence.
5. Myth of the GMOs Story as One of Science
The GMO story is not one of science, but of an unscientific and illegal takeover of our seeds and food.
Dr. Vandana Shiva is trained as a Physicist and did her Ph.D. on the subject “Hidden Variables and Non-locality in Quantum Theory” from the University of Western Ontario in Canada. She later shifted to inter-disciplinary research in science, technology and environmental policy, which she carried out at the Indian Institute of Science and the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore, India. In 1991, she founded Navdanya, a national movement to protect the diversity and integrity of living resources, especially native seed, the promotion of organic farming and fair trade. For last two decades Navdanya has worked with local communities and organizations serving more than 5,00,000 men and women farmers. For more information, visit www.navdanya.org.

Copyright © Dr. Vandana Shiva, EcoWatch, 2015

MORE ON THE TIANJIN EXPLOSION: THE CONSPIRACY THEORIES BEGIN TO EMERGE

Posted on August 23, 2015 by Joseph P. Farrell • http://gizadeathstar.com/2015/08/more-on-the-tianjin-explosion-the-conspiracy-theories-begin-to-emerge/

It was inevitable that the explosion in Tianjin, China, would call forth various conspiracy theories, and indeed, so many people are tracking this story that my email box was awash in various articles about it, to such an extent that I feel compelled to comment about it. I've selected this particular version from Natural News as it seems firstly to be fairly typical of most people's thoughts regarding conspiracy, and because it contains a fairly reasonable timeline of the events:
BOMBSHELL: China and America already at war: Tianjin explosion carried out by Pentagon space weapon in retaliation for Yuan currency devaluation... Military helicopters now patrolling Beijing
Let's start at the timeline, for this contains the basic seed of the arguments that all may not be entirely above-board with the Tianjin explosion:

August 11, 2015: China devalues the Yuan by 1.9%, sending "shockwaves" around the world and setting off a "devastating" impact to the U.S. economy.
August 12, 2015: Tianjin struck by Pentagon's secret "Rod of God" weapon, a space-based top-secret kinetic weapon that can be dropped from high orbit to strike almost any land-based target. The weapon instantly destroys six city blocks on the edge of the city of Tianjin, sending a message to China that's eerily similar to the message sent by the United States in the dropping of the world's first atomic weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in World War II. (Yes, the USA is willing to drop weapons of mass destruction on civilian populations. It has already done it twice!)

...

August 16, 2015: Obama issues stern warning "...about the presence of Chinese government agents operating secretly in the United States," reports The New York Times. "And it comes at a time of growing tension between Washington and Beijing on a number of issues: from the computer theft of millions of government personnel files that American officials suspect was directed by China, to China's crackdown on civil liberties, to the devaluation of its currency."

Now, while I continue to have major doubts that this was anything more than an accidental explosion, the timeline, plus President Obama's warning, recalls the similar events of Fukushima almost to a "t": first a new Japanese government came to power. That government clearly indicated it wanted to improve relations with China, and also requested the USA close down and remove its Okinawa base. Then-US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates then issued a warning to Japan that was scarecly more than a disguised threat. Then came the earthquake, the tsunami, and the Fukushima disaster, ongoing to this day. And, for those not aware of it, former Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Catherine Austin Fitts, has made similar observations about the Indonesian tsunami: first there were inexplicable sell-offs of Indonesian sovereign securities on the markets, followed a week later by a tsunami. One could go on and on (like those earthquakes that hit the Soviet Union (Georgia, home to then Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shervednadze) during the events running up to the German reunification), but I suspect one gets the basic idea: "accidents" in the context major economic and geopolitical events, such as the Chinese yuan devaluation, should be looked at carefully.

So was this a US strike using a covert space-based kinetic weapon, the so-called "rod of God"? Perhaps, but I very much doubt it, since no one, as far as I am aware, reported seeing any trails that such a weapon would probably leave in the atmosphere, nor, to my knowledge, did anyone report hearing anything strange or mysterious prior to the explosion, such as one would most likely hear with such a weapon. As one can see from the photos on the Natural News article, there does appear to be a substantial crater at the place of the explosion, which appears to have been subsurface, and this, they argue, is the reason one does not see the typical signatures of an air-burst nuclear weapon. But again, if a "rod of God" weapon, it seems that someone, somewhere, would have seen and/or heard an atmospheric signature of such a weapon. Again, to my knowledge, these are absent.

So, we come to my high octane speculation of the day, which is revealed by this statement in the article:

"This is all fully aligned with the government policies set in motion by President Obama in 2011. "Washington will to [sic] consider using conventional weaponry in response to a cyber-attack on the United States, according a new US strategy," reported The Telegraph:

The White House's strategy statement on cybersecurity said the United States "will respond to hostile acts in cyberspace as we would to any other threat to our country". "We reserve the right to use all necessary means – diplomatic, informational, military, and economic – as appropriate and consistent with applicable international law, in order to defend our nation, our allies, our partners and our interests," the May 16 document said.

And then earlier, we have this:

Local police raids have already begun at the locations of bloggers and independent journalists who have attempted to report true stories on what really happened at Tianjin. The Chinese government is engaged in a total cover-up. Natural News has learned that the Chinese government is now setting up roadside checkpoints near and around both Tianjin and Beijing. Additional security measures now in place to control the movement of people include:
• All hotels are reporting details of visitors to the government, including passport numbers, nationalities, names and phone calls made from the rooms.
• Tourists who don't stay in hotels are now required to register with local police or risk arrest. The Chinese government has mandated that it must know the location of every person at all times.

Assuming that the reportage here is accurate, this indicates that China's government suspects something very different than "rod of God" scenarios. Indeed, such measures are more typical of a government that, for whatever reason, has ascertained that it has been the victim of a covert operation, conducted by human, on-the-ground agents within its territory, than it suspects exotic or other types of weaponry, which would clearly point the finger at the USA and/or its allies. It's that covert operations possibility that appears to have the Chinese government reacting and, one may presumel, investigating thoroughly and quietly behind the scenes. And if such a large operation could be pulled off on Chinese soil, then that government has reason to be concerned, for the network could be almost anywhere.

If this scenario is true, what really remains to be seen is what the Chinese will publish, should they bring their investigations to a successful conclusion, and if they will identify who they think the culprits are. In any case, the only Chinese proverb - "may you live in interesting times" - appears to have returned to its homeland.