Following the announcement that Rothamsted Research will carry out a trial of GM wheat in the UK, War on Want has been invited by The Voice of Russia radio to participate in a debate about GM food.

 Meet on Sunday 27 May at 12 noon, in Rothamsted, Harpenden, Herts, to voice your opposition against GM coming back to the UK.

Thousands around the globe will be taking direct action to stop multinational corporations Monsanto, Cargill, ADM and the likes on 27 February 2012. The Global Day of Action to Occupy Our Food Supply is bringing together people to fight back corporations’ control of our food. 

The second day of the Forum started with “La Mística”, a creative activity that uncovers the human and emotional side of the process of producing food, as well as re-establishing our connection with nature, lost through the industrialisation of agriculture. “La Mística” today was a play of four acts depicting women losing control over their seeds to agribusiness. It began with the traditional practice of seed exchange and finished with the damaging repercussions of agribusiness on local people.

The President of UNAC (União Nacional de Camponeses or the National Union of Small-Scale Farmers, based in Mozambique) Augusto Mafigo and I arrived at the Nyeleni Forum at midday together with many other delegates from all over the world.

Watch the latest video from La Via Campesina to find out more about the global call for food sovereignty.

La Via Campesina in Movement... Food Sovereignty now! from La Via Campesina on Vimeo.

As part of War on Want efforts building alliances to change practices and policies around food and agriculture, we are visiting Sri Lanka with the Chair of the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Agro-ecology, Baroness Susan Miller.

The Baroness, a keen advocate for a sustainable food system that protects the environment and the economy of rural communities, has had the opportunity to meet with small farmers, women’s groups and decision makers across Sri Lanka.

Graciela Romero, War on Want International Programmes Director reports from Sri Lanka during a visit to War on Want Partner the National Movement for Land and Agrarian Reform (MONLAR).

People from around the world gathered last week in Dakar, Senegal for the 10th World Social Forum. The Forum provides a space where social movements, networks, NGOs and other civil society organizations opposed to neo-liberalism, capitalism and any form of imperialism come together to debate ideas democratically and formulate proposals for effective action. The Forum ended with the drawing up of a final declaration in which social movements state that “together, the peoples of all the continents are struggling mightily to oppose the domination of capital, hidden behind the illusory promises of economic progress and political stability . . . we declare that we, the people will no longer bear the costs of this crisis”. It goes on to outline the challenges facing social movements today and calls for solidarity actions against capitalism. For the full text please read below:

The news gets worse for Monsanto. Last month it was revealed that the agribusiness firm hired Blackwater, the notorious private military company, to infiltrate activist groups. And then last week the New York Times published a piece on how Monsanto’s stock – and its reputation – have plummeted dramatically.

The Times article fails to draw a connection between Monsanto’s approach to farming – primarily its reliance on monoculture farming and GM crops – and its declining fortunes. Contrary to the piece, Monsanto’s recent failures to improve yields are not a result of the flawed technology behind new products like SmartStax corn. Rather, the product's disappointing outputs are merely one example of the corrosive effects of the biotechnology being promoted by companies like Monsanto.

GMOs are both ineffective and hazardous. And until governments, and the media, learn the right lessons from Monsanto’s reversal of fortune, GMOs will continue to be lauded as a silver bullet in the fight against hungry. The problem is that when these GM crops inevitably fail, it will be poor farmers who will suffer the most, not Monsanto and its shareholders.