Losing Control of Our Food Supply #1: What is happening to the accessibility of our seed & food?

I started this blog on another garden forum, people were interested, but the moderator suggested I not do anything political. I could still write about it, but not mention anyone or any agency in the government, I guess. I was fine with that. I guess I am more interested in writing about this than I thought. If I overstep any rules, please tell me. I like it here and do not wish to “be political”. Actually I have grown to despise politics.

Losing Control…
Over the last 2 years, I have really developed a driving interest in what is happening to the world’s food supply and who is gaining control over it. I have read a number of interesting books and articles on the subject.

In America, where our grocery stores are flowing over with food-laden shelves, it hardly appears necessary to have a concern about the food supply. However, the stuffed stores belie what is really going on behind the scenes: a fight for control over everything from seed to fruit—an even the water supply in some places.

I hope to write some good, cogent articles on this topic. I look forward to hearing from others about it as well.
Robin

Post 2- Getting Started with Information
OK, first the disclaimer: I know we are not supposed to sell anything and so forth. I am not selling anything. I am going to give the titles of some books I have read; you may do as you like. I do not wish to be controversial. I do believe people should know where their food comes from (not in the store under plastic). I am not a reactionary, I view myself as a realist, so I try to get as much information as possible before I solidify my opinion.

Survival first is the inherent push in organisms. For people, money can get you past survival into REAL LIVING: living it up, the high life, whatever you call it. Money has become a god to many. Personally, I do not like to be that far away from dirt. I do like to stay grounded and close to the beginnings of things. I have a mind that likes to know how everything works. Yes, I am female and can fix my own car (my husband can’t). I am not an idealistic teen, I am 43, and have had a great deal of struggle in my life, and frankly I am better for it. Struggle, in my opinion is a character builder. In America, SOME of us do not struggle enough and the characters of many are lost, I think. There are MANY good people here who are so busy struggling, working, and focusing on families that they do not need to be as loud, flashy, and in the public eye as those who could use come character improvement. I started college at 30 with a science-math focus, but had to switch to a course without labs because I had a sickly child. I got more classes than was necessary for my degree, but as I said, I want to know how everything works.

OK, that is an over simplified view of some of my thinking. Everyone’s opinions and thoughts come from somewhere, so better I state it flat out in front, and then people reading this blog will know where I am coming from in my thinking.

There, now let us begin with reading.

These are some of the books I have read:

The Last Harvest: The Genetic Gamble That Threatens to Destroy American Agriculture by Paul Raeburn

Enduring Seeds: Native American Agriculture and Wild Plant Conservation by Gary Paul Nabhan. Foreword By Wendell Berry

Against the Grain: Biotechnology and the Corporate Takeover of Your Food by Marc Lappe and Britt Bailey

Although I can only say what I see here in the USA, this thing is happening globally.

Here is are websites that are along this line.

Organic Consumer’s Association, Millions Against Monsanto
http://www.organicconsumers.org/monlink.cfm

If you go to this website, on the right there is a blurb titled “Monsanto Takes Ownership of Public Water Resources”

Monsanto Tries to Patent the Pig
http://www.greenpeace.org/inte...onal/news/monsanto-pig-patent-111

Global Research-Center for Research on Globalization
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=2480

On cotton farmers in India committing suicide because of defaulting on loans for GMO cotton seed)
India Farmers Accuse Monsanto of Pushing Cotton “Seeds of Death”
http://www.organicconsumers.org/ge/indiacotton012406.cfm
Daily News & Analysis
http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?NewsID=1049554
India Daily
http://www.indiadaily.com/editorial/18983.asp
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/19/world/asia/19india.html

Monsanto Seizes Bank Account of French Farmers Association, Confederation Paysanne
http://www.organicconsumers.org/ge/conpay121905.cfm

Our own farmers are in trouble:
For this one, I am just putting up the Google search since there are just so many.
http://www.google.com/search?h...+sues+american+farmer&btnG=Search

Basically, what is happening will boil down to us gardeners having to pay royalties for seeds we grow our food with including seed we keep ourselves. We could be charged with theft and fined. It sounds crazy, but that is what is being pushed.

If you do not save your own seed soon, you may have to buy new every time as some chemical companies are buying up seed houses and working on a terminator gene so that the plants will not provide the grower with more seed.

Well, food will become so expensive I can only imagine where that will lead. It costs good money to eat well. The cheap food in America is crap or “Junk Food”, and although easily accessible and cheap these are the very things that lead to disease such as heart disease, diabetes, and others as a result of obesity or bad nutrition. We have a big problem with this here in America. Plenty of people are in good shape and eat well, but that will increasingly become only those with good amounts of money.

For me, I do not run up and down the street like good old American poet Walt Whitman shouting at the crowds, but I do believe people should know where their food comes from, should have some independence in the acquisition of food, and should be informed as much as possible.

All I can do is my part: I garden organically (as much food as I can possible provide for my family), I save seed, and I try to share what I have learned. I share it with an attitude of “to each his/her own”, meaning I share the info and let go. If someone is moved by it and does something, great, if not, that’s OK because now that person knows and can make decisions with that knowledge in hand—so to speak.

I hope to continue writing on this subject, which is rather challenging. Although this was more of an information blog to look at other reading sources, I hope to move into more of my own commentary and the effects that I have seen personally.

Thanks for reading,
Robin

Post 3-Gaining Control
As for losing control of our food supply and who is behind the food takeover, I hope I can write about this problem and leave politics out of it. People can make that part of the connection themselves. I feel very moved to write about this topic so that gardeners know how important they are in maintaining some individual rights and control. The movement to “Own rights to plant & animal genes, then patent them” should be a concern of not just gardeners, but anyone who eats.

I am very interested in seed preservation & the keeping of old strains. This goes against the current movement of food takeover by big corporations whose whole interest up until recently has been chemicals and their dispersion in spite of any consequences. We have a duty, I believe, to those who have maintained and given us our great genetic diversity in gardening. Many, many strains have been lost already.

I also have a desire to start a charity seed project where seeds will be collected by generous gardeners and sent to the indigent, desperate, or needy in this area. I would like to recruit writers to create documents with growing information. This goal is still in the planning stage, but I hope it will help keep control of the food supply in the hands of the people who eat it—open to all without patent restrictions, royalties, or penalties. I plan to send them in the USA, and to other countries as well.

I hope that I may continue writing on this blog topic. If it is not in the spirit of this forum, please tell me. I will gladly stop. I like everyone I have met here very much and wish to be a part of garden tenders.

Thanks,
Robin

OK< SO that was my beginning.
My next title was something like “Strange Bedfellows: the constant swapping of high-level staff between Monsanto and the Government” too political?
Robin

-- Robin282, Zone 7, SE Coast of MA, USA