Crop biotechnology – who benefits?

02 September 2010

Blog

According to recent headlines, new research revealing the genetic code for wheat will pave the way for cheaper bread. The story sounds similar to the biblical miracle of Jesus multiplying loaves of bread to feed the hungry.

Unfortunately the reality is not quite like that. If it were so simple, then shortages in rice and corn would have ceased after the discovery of the complete genetic code of these staples.

The problem is that scientific research into food engineering is financed and controlled by corporations like Monsanto, which have sole property rights on the seeds which have been created in laboratories. These seeds are used to grow food that is sold, or in some cases given as aid, to developing countries where rice and maize have been their main staples for centuries. In other words, people in the developing world are forced to buy the very staples that they themselves have been growing for years.

The news also doesn’t report that thanks to corporate control of seeds and biodiversity in developing countries, millions of small farmers and women are no longer able to use traditional seeds and have lost the know-how to prevent plagues, to store their seeds for future harvests and how to yield crops that do not destroy the earth or “Pachamama”, as the people from the Andes refer to it. And even if small-scale farmers in the developing world are able to produce new varieties of maize, corn, potato, cassava, or wheat, they will have to spend most of their money on insecticides and fertilisers for these new seeds.

I witnessed how small farmers were introduced to new varieties of maize and cassava, while working in Colombia with internally displaced people who were returning to their lands and trying to cultivate crops after their homes and crops were burnt by paramilitaries. The new seeds were distributed as part of a government agricultural plan, a present that came wrapped with the promise of increased production.

These communities of farmers were not told that they would be unable to store these new varieties of seeds for the next season, as they used to do with their traditional seeds. Nor were they told that they would have to buy special chemicals to combat the plagues, since these artificial inputs were immune to natural plague control. Two years later these small farmers had not only lost most of their traditional seeds, but were left with a new bill to pay for seeds, fertilisers and chemicals.

It’s hardly a surprise that companies such as Monsanto monopolise these agricultural inputs. With these kinds of seeds and other corporate “gifts”, entire communities in developing countries have lost their ability to produce their own food and have been lured into production systems imposed by big corporations.

It’s short-sighted, and misleading, when news outlets disseminate the idea that scientific advances in mapping the genetic code of wheat and other crops benefits the people and the planet. In fact, these developments simply add to the coffers of a few multinationals that already control the entire food supply chain. As Raj Patel commented in his book Stuffed and Starved, “Corporations are the first to admit that they’re in business not for any wider social goal, but for profit. Although there’s sometimes talk of ‘wider social good’, it’s always done with a wink to the investors. News from the public relation department is to be trusted a great deal less that news from investor relations.”