John Varty wouldn't look too out of place in many rural communities in the Maritimes. There are still experienced farmers who think nothing of driving the tractor to the nearest village to get goods. What sets Varty apart is that he'll be pulling a small bunkhouse behind him, and his plan is to travel across the country, meeting farmers both big and small and documenting how they're feeling, how they're doing. I suspect he'll get a very mixed message. Farmers in the Maritimes with their higher costs of production, and smaller local customer base continue to struggle, while farmers in Western Canada (those that aren't flooded out) are enjoying a boom time with grains and oilseed prices soaring. Quebec (as in many other fields) marches to its own drummer. Farmers there have a unique provincially funded income support program (started by the PQ when sovereignty was a real possibility), and a thriving organic farming sector. Ontario and BC are unique as well, with huge fruit and vegetable industries that are very weather dependent, but generally thriving.
I think what Varty is doing is very important. Urban Canadians need a more realistic feel of what's going on out there in rural Canada, and as an academic (as opposed to a journalist), and with a very smart partner on board, he can do that. It will be interesting to see what kind of attention he gets (or doesn't) as he swings through the larger urban communities ("quirky prof on a trip to nowhere", or "academic tries to get close to people we don't often hear from"). I wish him good luck and a safe trip.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/professor-sets-out-to-harvest-the-truth-about-the-canadian-farm/article2079542/
Professor sets out to harvest the truth about the Canadian farm
by JESSICA LEEDER — GLOBAL FOOD REPORTER • June 29, 2011 •
John Varty will fire up a donated tractor on Friday in Prince Edward Island, pulling a mobile farmhouse behind him. So will begin a cross-country journey designed to probe the soul of the Canadian farmer.
A professor of history at McMaster University in Hamilton, he hopes to cut a swath through the debate that has reduced food production in Canada to warring stereotypes: the good guy (a plaid-shirted, organic-loving yeoman) and the bad guy (a grain-slinging, technology-wielding market conqueror).
Prof. Varty thinks the reality is far more complex, and his odyssey – coming at a crucial time in the world of food – will form the basis of a video documentary aimed at shedding light on the true state of our farms, which he argues has been obscured by emotional interest groups promoting an outdated, romanticized notion of farming.
“The alarm for the loss of the family farm has been out there for a long time,” he said. “The question is what part of [the country] looks like the alarmist material and which parts don’t?”
The foodscape is certainly in profound flux. At home, an unprecedented 75 per cent of Canada’s farmers will look to retire over the next decade and a half. About $50-billion worth of land could change hands during this period, setting the foundation for a dramatic shift in Canada’s agricultural landscape.
Globally, the United Nations’ top food official said this week that food prices are likely to remain high and volatile for years to come. G20 leaders are in the midst of negotiations on what, if anything, ought to be done to dampen the volatility, which has its most direct effect on underdeveloped nations but sends ripples into the global marketplace.
Accompanied on his tractor trip by partner Molly Daley, Prof. Varty will explore the landscape of the Canadian farmer. For years, political economists have debated whether farming is an inherently capitalist venture or something more sacred. The professor’s theory?
“It’s not one or the other.”
People have lost sight of the fact that in modern society large corporations have always been involved with food production in one way or another, Prof. Varty said. Historic consumer demand for cheap food laid the foundation for the current system, which he suspects will reveal itself to be more of a mix between small and large farm operations than the average Canadian envisions.
While hobby farms catering to local and organic foodies are one of the fastest growing segments of Canadian agriculture, farmers are increasingly choosing to incorporate and operate on a large scale – some Prairie farms run 40,000 acres. Family members being groomed for succession might still start out operating equipment at a young age, but now they go on to earn commerce and agriculture degrees before taking over the farm.
“The one thing [Prof. Varty] will find is people running their farms more like a business. They’re dealing with such huge dollars now,” said Liz Robertson, executive director of the Canadian Association of Farm Advisors, a non-profit organization. She added: “Young farmers nowadays, they don’t want to be called farmers. They want to be called businessmen.”
As such, the unpredictable market spikes and dives that characterize periods of volatility represent an opportunity for Canadian farmers to step up in global markets. Federal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz has been working to smooth this process by brokering trade deals around the world for Canadian farms, most of which have remained family enterprises.
“Canadian farms are still run by Canadian farming families – that includes most of the really big ones,” said David Sparling, chair of agri-food innovation and regulation at the Richard Ivey School of Business. “The skill level is increasing, no doubt about that. Farming is more complex than it was a decade ago. They understand global markets better … that’s become a more significant factor for them.”
The longevity of that mixture, farm advocates say, will determine the future of food production in Canada.
“We’ll have quarter-acre farms and 15,000-acre farms and we’re going to need them all,” said Christie Young, executive director of FarmStart, a national non-profit that works to train young and second-career farmers and support their enterprises.
“We need to make sure the system isn’t just set up for the consolidation of farming. … We won’t have the farmers to do what the local food movement is talking about,” she warned, adding: “People are starting to understand that if we’re … reconnecting with our food, we’ll see a healthier future.”.
Wednesday, 29 June 2011
Monday, 27 June 2011
When Did This Happen
I'm not much of a shopper, I certainly go out and buy stuff when I need it, but the idea of browsing stores, or even the weekly fliers gives me a headache. (spoiled I know, I've always worked and had a reasonable income). As well I spent most of my professional life covering the people and industries that produce stuff, not consume it. However, somewhere after the big free trade debates in the mid-eighties the measuring stick for how well the economy is doing began to seriously tilt towards measuring and understanding consuming, and away from producing. This was fed by politicians (many many more consumers out there than producers), and the media. I can understand why. The consumer side continues to be much more relevant to reporters and others, the price of things is there for everyone to see (who knows how much it costs to catch a lobster or grow a potato), Statistics Canada monthly produces all kinds of data on the consumer price index, inflation measures what consumers pay for things, and the media (we all) loves things with numbers (temperatures, sports scores, the stock market, political polls) because it's something we can all understand, and that's important, BUT it's not all that matters.
(OK now I'm getting cranky) I blame a lot of this on Walmart, and that dreadful smiling thing that continues to knock back prices. Every time it knocks a few cents off of something, you know some producer somewhere (almost always in some developing country with a labour force paid pennies an hour) has been squeezed a little harder to produce it for less. It certainly isn't that Walmart is cutting its profit margin. Several members of the Walton family continue to be in the top ten richest people in the world. The Arkansas county where Walmart is headquartered has more millionaires than anywhere else. The trick here is that it controls more shelf space than anyone, and if you're a producer it's where you have to be, so when the Walmart buyer comes to town and says you've got to cut your price, you do it and take it out of someone else's hide to cut your costs. There has been the odd rumbling that U.S. states' Attorneys General should launch a combines/competition investigation into Walmart, but politicians know anyone who messes with a company that champions giving consumers cheaper prices won't get re-elected.
When I took economics at university (back in the Dark Ages) there was well-established economic theory that when producers are fairly paid (the people at the ground floor of the production cycle) that everyone benefits (more of a trickle up theory), because primary producers spend money to make more money, on lawyers, accountants, machinery shops, boat builders etc, and all get a piece of the action, and the money circulates (multiplies really, gets spent again and again) within a local economy. The trouble with trickle down is that the wealthy put their money into hedge funds or off-shore bank accounts, and it often disappears from the local economy very quickly.
Primary producers now aren't making any money, so spend less, and what money they do spend comes out of their equity (always a chance that things will get better, right??). It also supported manufacturing jobs (usually with unions), and a much larger middle class, which most agree offers the best social and economic stability. But those days are disappearing if not gone. And it gives the Walmart little smiley face all the more inmpact with people struggling to pay their bills.
For what it's worth, a little insight to our pals at Walmart (and I haven't fact-checked everything):
(OK now I'm getting cranky) I blame a lot of this on Walmart, and that dreadful smiling thing that continues to knock back prices. Every time it knocks a few cents off of something, you know some producer somewhere (almost always in some developing country with a labour force paid pennies an hour) has been squeezed a little harder to produce it for less. It certainly isn't that Walmart is cutting its profit margin. Several members of the Walton family continue to be in the top ten richest people in the world. The Arkansas county where Walmart is headquartered has more millionaires than anywhere else. The trick here is that it controls more shelf space than anyone, and if you're a producer it's where you have to be, so when the Walmart buyer comes to town and says you've got to cut your price, you do it and take it out of someone else's hide to cut your costs. There has been the odd rumbling that U.S. states' Attorneys General should launch a combines/competition investigation into Walmart, but politicians know anyone who messes with a company that champions giving consumers cheaper prices won't get re-elected.
When I took economics at university (back in the Dark Ages) there was well-established economic theory that when producers are fairly paid (the people at the ground floor of the production cycle) that everyone benefits (more of a trickle up theory), because primary producers spend money to make more money, on lawyers, accountants, machinery shops, boat builders etc, and all get a piece of the action, and the money circulates (multiplies really, gets spent again and again) within a local economy. The trouble with trickle down is that the wealthy put their money into hedge funds or off-shore bank accounts, and it often disappears from the local economy very quickly.
Primary producers now aren't making any money, so spend less, and what money they do spend comes out of their equity (always a chance that things will get better, right??). It also supported manufacturing jobs (usually with unions), and a much larger middle class, which most agree offers the best social and economic stability. But those days are disappearing if not gone. And it gives the Walmart little smiley face all the more inmpact with people struggling to pay their bills.
For what it's worth, a little insight to our pals at Walmart (and I haven't fact-checked everything):
| ||
Saturday, 25 June 2011
Two Stories Well Told
The writers couldn't be any different, one a Wall Street banker, the other a Buddhist monk, and both on today's (Saturday) editorial page of the New York Times. The banker writes about, in my mind, one of the most critical farm/food fiascoes: corn (and don't forget that ethanol can/should be made from other crops, and hopefully soon from cellulose, see other posts). The Buddhist reflects on climate change from the top of the world, and his story is very unsettling.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/25/opinion/25Rattner.html?ref=opinion
June 24, 2011
The Great Corn Con
By STEVEN RATTNER
FEELING the need for an example of government policy run amok? Look no further than the box of cornflakes on your kitchen shelf. In its myriad corn-related interventions, Washington has managed simultaneously to help drive up food prices and add tens of billions of dollars to the deficit, while arguably increasing energy use and harming the environment.
Even in a crowd of rising food and commodity costs, corn stands out, its price having doubled in less than a year to a record $7.87 per bushel in early June. Booming global demand has overtaken stagnant supply.
But rather than ameliorate the problem, the government has exacerbated it, reducing food supply to a hungry world. Thanks to Washington, 4 of every 10 ears of corn grown in America — the source of 40 percent of the world’s production — are shunted into ethanol, a gasoline substitute that imperceptibly nicks our energy problem. Larded onto that are $11 billion a year of government subsidies to the corn complex.
Corn is hardly some minor agricultural product for breakfast cereal. It’s America’s largest crop, dwarfing wheat and soybeans. A small portion of production goes for human consumption; about 40 percent feeds cows, pigs, turkeys and chickens. Diverting 40 percent to ethanol has disagreeable consequences for food. In just a year, the price of bacon has soared by 24 percent.
To some, the contours of the ethanol story may be familiar. Almost since Iowa — our biggest corn-producing state — grabbed the lead position in the presidential sweepstakes four decades ago, support for the biofuel has been nearly a prerequisite for politicians seeking the presidency.
Those hopefuls have seen no need for a foolish consistency. John McCain and John Kerry were against ethanol subsidies, then as candidates were for them. Having lost the presidency, Mr. McCain is now against them again. Al Gore was for ethanol before he was against it. This time, one hopeful is experimenting with counter-programming: as governor of corn-producing Minnesota, Tim Pawlenty pushed for subsidies before he embraced a “straight talk” strategy.
Eating up just a tenth of the corn crop as recently as 2004, ethanol was turbocharged by legislation in 2005 and 2007 that set specific requirements for its use in gasoline, mandating steep rises from year to year. Yet another government bureaucracy was born to enforce the quotas.
To ease the pain, Congress threw in a 45-cents-a-gallon subsidy ($6 billion a year); to add another layer of protection, it imposed a tariff on imported ethanol of 54 cents a gallon. That successfully shut off cheap imports, produced more efficiently from sugar cane, principally from Brazil
Here is perhaps the most incredible part: Because of the subsidy, ethanol became cheaper than gasoline, and so we sent 397 million gallons of ethanol overseas last year. America is simultaneously importing costly foreign oil and subsidizing the export of its equivalent.
That’s not all. Ethanol packs less punch than gasoline and uses considerable energy in its production process. All told, each gallon of gasoline that is displaced costs the Treasury $1.78 in subsidies and lost tax revenue.
Nor does ethanol live up to its environmental promises. The Congressional Budget Office found that reducing carbon dioxide emissions by using ethanol costs at least $750 per ton of carbon dioxide, wildly more than other methods. What is more, making corn ethanol consumes vast quantities of water and increases smog.
Then there’s energy efficiency. Studies reach widely varying conclusions on that issue. While some show a small saving in fossil fuels, others calculate that ethanol consumes more energy than it produces.
Corn growers and other farmers have long exercised outsize influence, thanks in part to the Senate’s structural tilt toward rural states. The ethanol giveaway represents a 21st-century add-on to a dizzying patchwork of programs for farmers. Under one, corn growers receive “direct payments” — $1.75 billion in 2010 — whether they grow corn or not. Washington also subsidizes crop insurance, at a cost of another $1.75 billion last year. That may have made sense when low corn prices made farming a marginal business, but no longer.
At long last, the enormity of the nation’s budget deficit has added momentum to the forces of reason. While only a symbolic move, the Senate recently voted 73 to 27 to end ethanol subsidies. That alone helped push corn prices down to $7 per bushel. Incredibly, the White House criticized the action — could key farm states have been on the minds of the president’s advisers?
Even farm advocates like former Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman agree that the situation must be fixed. Reports filtering out of the budget talks currently under way suggest that agriculture subsidies sit prominently on the chopping block. The time is ripe.
Steven Rattner has spent nearly 30 years on Wall Street as an investor and investment banker and is a contributing writer to Op-Ed.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/24/opinion/global/24iht-june24-ihtmag-ricard-30.html?ref=ihtGlobalAgendaSummer2011
June 23, 2011
The Future Doesn't Hurt. Yet
By MATTHIEU RICARD
When, in the early morning, I sit in the little meadow in front of my hermitage on a quiet hilltop, two hours’ drive from Katmandu in Nepal, my eyes take in hundreds of miles of lofty Himalayan peaks glowing in the rising sun. The serenity of the scenery blends naturally and seamlessly with the peace within. It is a long way indeed from the frantic city life I once lived.
But the peace I know is no escape from the world below — or the science I once studied. I work with the toughest problems of the real world in the 30 clinics and schools that Karuna-Shechen, the foundation I created with a few dedicated friends and benefactors, runs in Tibet, Nepal and India. And now, after 40 years among these majestic mountains, I have become acutely aware of the ravages of climate change in the Himalayas and on the Tibetan plateau. From where I sit in my little meadow, it is especially sad to witness the Himalayan peaks becoming grayer and grayer as glaciers melt and snows recede.
The debate about climate change is mostly conducted by people who live in cities, where everything is artificial. They don’t actually experience the changes that are taking place in the real world. The vast majority of Tibetans, Nepalese and Bhutanese who live on both sides of the Himalayas have never heard of global warming, as they have little or no access to the news media. Yet they all say that the ice is not forming as thickly as before on lakes and rivers, that winter temperatures are getting warmer and the spring blossoms are coming earlier. What they may not know is that these are symptoms of far greater dangers.
In the beautiful kingdom of Bhutan, where I spent nine years, recent investigations by the only glaciologist in the country, Kharma Thoeb, have shown that a natural moraine dam that separates two glacial lakes in the Lunana area is today only 31 meters deep, in comparison to 74 meters in 2003. If this wall gives way, some 53 million cubic meters of water will rush down the valley of Punakha and Wangdi, causing immense damage and loss of life. Altogether there are 400 glacial lakes in Nepal and Bhutan that may break their natural dams and flood populated areas lower in the valleys. If these floods occur, the glaciers will increasingly shrink. This will cause drought, since the streams and rivers will not be fed by melting snow.
Chinese climatologists have called the Himalayan glaciers and other major mountains located in the Tibetan plateau the “third pole” of our ailing planet. There are 40,000 large and small glaciers on the Tibetan plateau and this area is melting at a rate three to four times faster than the North and South Poles. The melting is particularly accelerated in the Himalayas by the pollution that settles on the snow and darkens the glaciers, making them more absorbent to light.
According to international development agencies, about half of the populations of China, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, India and Pakistan depend on the watershed from the rivers of the Tibetan plateau for their agriculture, general water supply, and, therefore, survival. The consequences of the drying up of these great rivers will be catastrophic.
When I was 20, I was hired as a researcher in the cellular genetics lab of François Jacob, who had just been awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine. There, I worked for six years toward my doctorate. Life was far from dull, but something essential was missing.
Everything changed in Darjeeling in northern India in 1967, when I met several remarkable human beings who, for me, exemplified what a fulfilled human life can be. These Tibetan masters, all of whom had just fled the Communist invasion of Tibet, radiated inner goodness, serenity and compassion. Returning from this first journey, I became aware that I’d found a reality that could inspire my whole life and give it direction and meaning. In 1972, I decided to move to Darjeeling, in the shadow of the Himalayas, to study with the great Tibetan masters Kangyur Rinpoche and Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche.
In India and then in Bhutan, I lived a beautiful and simple life. I came to understand that while some people may be naturally happier than others, their happiness is still vulnerable and incomplete; that achieving durable happiness as a way of being requires sustained effort in training the mind and developing qualities like inner peace, mindfulness and altruistic love.
Then one day in 1979, shortly after our monastery in Nepal had been equipped with a phone line, someone called me from France to ask if I would like to engage in a dialogue with my father, the philosopher Jean-François Revel. I said “of course,” but thought that I would never hear from the person again, as I did not believe that my father, a renowned agnostic, would ever want to dialogue with a Buddhist monk, even one who was his son. But to my surprise, he readily accepted and we spent a wonderful 10 days in Nepal, discussing many issues about the meaning of life. That was the end of my quiet, anonymous life and the beginning of a different way of interacting with the world. The book that followed, The Monk and the Philosopher, became a bestseller in France and was translated into 21 languages.
It dawned on me that much more money than I had ever envisioned having would be coming my way. Since I could not see myself acquiring an estate in France or somewhere else, it seemed to me that the most natural thing to do would be to donate all the proceedings and rights of that and subsequent books to helping others. The foundation I created for that purpose is now called Karuna-Shechen, and it implements and maintains humanitarian and educational projects throughout Asia.
Humanitarian projects have since become a central focus of my life and, with a few dedicated volunteer friends and generous benefactors, and under the inspiration of the abbot of my monastery, Rabjam Rinpoche, we have built and run clinics and schools in Tibet, Nepal and India where we treat about 100,000 patients a year and provide education to nearly 10,000 children. We have managed to do this spending barely 4 percent of our budget on overhead expenses.
My life has definitely become more hectic, but I have also discovered over the years that trying to transform oneself to better transform the world brings lasting fulfillment and, above all, the irreplaceable boon of altruism and compassion.
Imagine a ship that is sinking and needs all the available power to run the pumps to drain out the rising waters. The first class passengers refuse to cooperate because they feel hot and want to use the air-conditioner and other electrical appliances. The second-class passengers spend all their time trying to be upgraded to first-class status. The boat sinks and the passengers all drown. That is where the present approach to climate change is leading.
Whether people realize it or not, their actions can have disastrous effects — as the environmental changes in the Himalayas, the Arctic circle and many other places are showing us. The unbridled consumerism of our planet’s richest 5 percent is the greatest contributor to the climate change that will bring the greatest suffering to the most destitute 25 percent, who will face the worst consequences. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, on average an Afghan produces 0.02 tons of CO2 per year, a Nepalese and a Tanzanian 0.1, a Briton 10 tons, an American 19 and a Qatari 51 tons, which is 2,500 times more than an Afghan.
Unchecked consumerism operates on the premise that others are only instruments to be used and that the environment is a commodity. This attitude fosters unhappiness, selfishness and contempt upon other living beings and upon our environment. People are rarely motivated to change on behalf of something for their future and that of the next generation. They imagine, “Well, we’ll deal with that when it comes.” They resist the idea of giving up what they enjoy just for the sake of avoiding disastrous long-term effects. The future doesn’t hurt — yet.
An altruistic society is one in which we do not care only for ourselves and our close relatives, but for the quality of life of all present members of society, while being mindfully concerned as well by the fate of coming generations.
In particular, we need to make significant progress concerning the way we treat animals, as objects of consumption and industrial products, not as living beings who strive for well-being and want to avoid suffering. Every year, more than 150 billion land animals are killed in the world for human consumption, as well as some 1.5 trillion sea animals. In rich countries, 99 percent of these land animals are raised and killed in industrial farms and live only a fraction of their life expectancy. In addition, according to United Nations and FAO reports on climate change, livestock production is responsible for a greater proportion of emissions (18 percent) of greenhouse gases than the entire global transportation sector. One solution may be to eat less meat!
As the Dalai Lama has often pointed out, interdependence is a central Buddhist idea that leads to a profound understanding of the nature of reality and to an awareness of global responsibility. Since all beings are interrelated and all, without exception, want to avoid suffering and achieve happiness, this understanding becomes the basis for altruism and compassion. This in turn naturally leads to the attitude and practice of nonviolence toward human beings and animals — and toward the environment.
Matthieu Ricard was a scientist in cell genetics 40 years ago when he decided to live in the Himalayas and become a Buddhist monk. He is a photographer and the author of several books, including “Happiness: How to Cultivate Life’s Most Important Skill.” He lives in Nepal and has been involved in more than 100 humanitarian projects.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/25/opinion/25Rattner.html?ref=opinion
June 24, 2011
The Great Corn Con
By STEVEN RATTNER
FEELING the need for an example of government policy run amok? Look no further than the box of cornflakes on your kitchen shelf. In its myriad corn-related interventions, Washington has managed simultaneously to help drive up food prices and add tens of billions of dollars to the deficit, while arguably increasing energy use and harming the environment.
Even in a crowd of rising food and commodity costs, corn stands out, its price having doubled in less than a year to a record $7.87 per bushel in early June. Booming global demand has overtaken stagnant supply.
But rather than ameliorate the problem, the government has exacerbated it, reducing food supply to a hungry world. Thanks to Washington, 4 of every 10 ears of corn grown in America — the source of 40 percent of the world’s production — are shunted into ethanol, a gasoline substitute that imperceptibly nicks our energy problem. Larded onto that are $11 billion a year of government subsidies to the corn complex.
Corn is hardly some minor agricultural product for breakfast cereal. It’s America’s largest crop, dwarfing wheat and soybeans. A small portion of production goes for human consumption; about 40 percent feeds cows, pigs, turkeys and chickens. Diverting 40 percent to ethanol has disagreeable consequences for food. In just a year, the price of bacon has soared by 24 percent.
To some, the contours of the ethanol story may be familiar. Almost since Iowa — our biggest corn-producing state — grabbed the lead position in the presidential sweepstakes four decades ago, support for the biofuel has been nearly a prerequisite for politicians seeking the presidency.
Those hopefuls have seen no need for a foolish consistency. John McCain and John Kerry were against ethanol subsidies, then as candidates were for them. Having lost the presidency, Mr. McCain is now against them again. Al Gore was for ethanol before he was against it. This time, one hopeful is experimenting with counter-programming: as governor of corn-producing Minnesota, Tim Pawlenty pushed for subsidies before he embraced a “straight talk” strategy.
Eating up just a tenth of the corn crop as recently as 2004, ethanol was turbocharged by legislation in 2005 and 2007 that set specific requirements for its use in gasoline, mandating steep rises from year to year. Yet another government bureaucracy was born to enforce the quotas.
To ease the pain, Congress threw in a 45-cents-a-gallon subsidy ($6 billion a year); to add another layer of protection, it imposed a tariff on imported ethanol of 54 cents a gallon. That successfully shut off cheap imports, produced more efficiently from sugar cane, principally from Brazil
Here is perhaps the most incredible part: Because of the subsidy, ethanol became cheaper than gasoline, and so we sent 397 million gallons of ethanol overseas last year. America is simultaneously importing costly foreign oil and subsidizing the export of its equivalent.
That’s not all. Ethanol packs less punch than gasoline and uses considerable energy in its production process. All told, each gallon of gasoline that is displaced costs the Treasury $1.78 in subsidies and lost tax revenue.
Nor does ethanol live up to its environmental promises. The Congressional Budget Office found that reducing carbon dioxide emissions by using ethanol costs at least $750 per ton of carbon dioxide, wildly more than other methods. What is more, making corn ethanol consumes vast quantities of water and increases smog.
Then there’s energy efficiency. Studies reach widely varying conclusions on that issue. While some show a small saving in fossil fuels, others calculate that ethanol consumes more energy than it produces.
Corn growers and other farmers have long exercised outsize influence, thanks in part to the Senate’s structural tilt toward rural states. The ethanol giveaway represents a 21st-century add-on to a dizzying patchwork of programs for farmers. Under one, corn growers receive “direct payments” — $1.75 billion in 2010 — whether they grow corn or not. Washington also subsidizes crop insurance, at a cost of another $1.75 billion last year. That may have made sense when low corn prices made farming a marginal business, but no longer.
At long last, the enormity of the nation’s budget deficit has added momentum to the forces of reason. While only a symbolic move, the Senate recently voted 73 to 27 to end ethanol subsidies. That alone helped push corn prices down to $7 per bushel. Incredibly, the White House criticized the action — could key farm states have been on the minds of the president’s advisers?
Even farm advocates like former Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman agree that the situation must be fixed. Reports filtering out of the budget talks currently under way suggest that agriculture subsidies sit prominently on the chopping block. The time is ripe.
Steven Rattner has spent nearly 30 years on Wall Street as an investor and investment banker and is a contributing writer to Op-Ed.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/24/opinion/global/24iht-june24-ihtmag-ricard-30.html?ref=ihtGlobalAgendaSummer2011
June 23, 2011
The Future Doesn't Hurt. Yet
By MATTHIEU RICARD
When, in the early morning, I sit in the little meadow in front of my hermitage on a quiet hilltop, two hours’ drive from Katmandu in Nepal, my eyes take in hundreds of miles of lofty Himalayan peaks glowing in the rising sun. The serenity of the scenery blends naturally and seamlessly with the peace within. It is a long way indeed from the frantic city life I once lived.
But the peace I know is no escape from the world below — or the science I once studied. I work with the toughest problems of the real world in the 30 clinics and schools that Karuna-Shechen, the foundation I created with a few dedicated friends and benefactors, runs in Tibet, Nepal and India. And now, after 40 years among these majestic mountains, I have become acutely aware of the ravages of climate change in the Himalayas and on the Tibetan plateau. From where I sit in my little meadow, it is especially sad to witness the Himalayan peaks becoming grayer and grayer as glaciers melt and snows recede.
The debate about climate change is mostly conducted by people who live in cities, where everything is artificial. They don’t actually experience the changes that are taking place in the real world. The vast majority of Tibetans, Nepalese and Bhutanese who live on both sides of the Himalayas have never heard of global warming, as they have little or no access to the news media. Yet they all say that the ice is not forming as thickly as before on lakes and rivers, that winter temperatures are getting warmer and the spring blossoms are coming earlier. What they may not know is that these are symptoms of far greater dangers.
In the beautiful kingdom of Bhutan, where I spent nine years, recent investigations by the only glaciologist in the country, Kharma Thoeb, have shown that a natural moraine dam that separates two glacial lakes in the Lunana area is today only 31 meters deep, in comparison to 74 meters in 2003. If this wall gives way, some 53 million cubic meters of water will rush down the valley of Punakha and Wangdi, causing immense damage and loss of life. Altogether there are 400 glacial lakes in Nepal and Bhutan that may break their natural dams and flood populated areas lower in the valleys. If these floods occur, the glaciers will increasingly shrink. This will cause drought, since the streams and rivers will not be fed by melting snow.
Chinese climatologists have called the Himalayan glaciers and other major mountains located in the Tibetan plateau the “third pole” of our ailing planet. There are 40,000 large and small glaciers on the Tibetan plateau and this area is melting at a rate three to four times faster than the North and South Poles. The melting is particularly accelerated in the Himalayas by the pollution that settles on the snow and darkens the glaciers, making them more absorbent to light.
According to international development agencies, about half of the populations of China, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, India and Pakistan depend on the watershed from the rivers of the Tibetan plateau for their agriculture, general water supply, and, therefore, survival. The consequences of the drying up of these great rivers will be catastrophic.
When I was 20, I was hired as a researcher in the cellular genetics lab of François Jacob, who had just been awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine. There, I worked for six years toward my doctorate. Life was far from dull, but something essential was missing.
Everything changed in Darjeeling in northern India in 1967, when I met several remarkable human beings who, for me, exemplified what a fulfilled human life can be. These Tibetan masters, all of whom had just fled the Communist invasion of Tibet, radiated inner goodness, serenity and compassion. Returning from this first journey, I became aware that I’d found a reality that could inspire my whole life and give it direction and meaning. In 1972, I decided to move to Darjeeling, in the shadow of the Himalayas, to study with the great Tibetan masters Kangyur Rinpoche and Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche.
In India and then in Bhutan, I lived a beautiful and simple life. I came to understand that while some people may be naturally happier than others, their happiness is still vulnerable and incomplete; that achieving durable happiness as a way of being requires sustained effort in training the mind and developing qualities like inner peace, mindfulness and altruistic love.
Then one day in 1979, shortly after our monastery in Nepal had been equipped with a phone line, someone called me from France to ask if I would like to engage in a dialogue with my father, the philosopher Jean-François Revel. I said “of course,” but thought that I would never hear from the person again, as I did not believe that my father, a renowned agnostic, would ever want to dialogue with a Buddhist monk, even one who was his son. But to my surprise, he readily accepted and we spent a wonderful 10 days in Nepal, discussing many issues about the meaning of life. That was the end of my quiet, anonymous life and the beginning of a different way of interacting with the world. The book that followed, The Monk and the Philosopher, became a bestseller in France and was translated into 21 languages.
It dawned on me that much more money than I had ever envisioned having would be coming my way. Since I could not see myself acquiring an estate in France or somewhere else, it seemed to me that the most natural thing to do would be to donate all the proceedings and rights of that and subsequent books to helping others. The foundation I created for that purpose is now called Karuna-Shechen, and it implements and maintains humanitarian and educational projects throughout Asia.
Humanitarian projects have since become a central focus of my life and, with a few dedicated volunteer friends and generous benefactors, and under the inspiration of the abbot of my monastery, Rabjam Rinpoche, we have built and run clinics and schools in Tibet, Nepal and India where we treat about 100,000 patients a year and provide education to nearly 10,000 children. We have managed to do this spending barely 4 percent of our budget on overhead expenses.
My life has definitely become more hectic, but I have also discovered over the years that trying to transform oneself to better transform the world brings lasting fulfillment and, above all, the irreplaceable boon of altruism and compassion.
Imagine a ship that is sinking and needs all the available power to run the pumps to drain out the rising waters. The first class passengers refuse to cooperate because they feel hot and want to use the air-conditioner and other electrical appliances. The second-class passengers spend all their time trying to be upgraded to first-class status. The boat sinks and the passengers all drown. That is where the present approach to climate change is leading.
Whether people realize it or not, their actions can have disastrous effects — as the environmental changes in the Himalayas, the Arctic circle and many other places are showing us. The unbridled consumerism of our planet’s richest 5 percent is the greatest contributor to the climate change that will bring the greatest suffering to the most destitute 25 percent, who will face the worst consequences. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, on average an Afghan produces 0.02 tons of CO2 per year, a Nepalese and a Tanzanian 0.1, a Briton 10 tons, an American 19 and a Qatari 51 tons, which is 2,500 times more than an Afghan.
Unchecked consumerism operates on the premise that others are only instruments to be used and that the environment is a commodity. This attitude fosters unhappiness, selfishness and contempt upon other living beings and upon our environment. People are rarely motivated to change on behalf of something for their future and that of the next generation. They imagine, “Well, we’ll deal with that when it comes.” They resist the idea of giving up what they enjoy just for the sake of avoiding disastrous long-term effects. The future doesn’t hurt — yet.
An altruistic society is one in which we do not care only for ourselves and our close relatives, but for the quality of life of all present members of society, while being mindfully concerned as well by the fate of coming generations.
In particular, we need to make significant progress concerning the way we treat animals, as objects of consumption and industrial products, not as living beings who strive for well-being and want to avoid suffering. Every year, more than 150 billion land animals are killed in the world for human consumption, as well as some 1.5 trillion sea animals. In rich countries, 99 percent of these land animals are raised and killed in industrial farms and live only a fraction of their life expectancy. In addition, according to United Nations and FAO reports on climate change, livestock production is responsible for a greater proportion of emissions (18 percent) of greenhouse gases than the entire global transportation sector. One solution may be to eat less meat!
As the Dalai Lama has often pointed out, interdependence is a central Buddhist idea that leads to a profound understanding of the nature of reality and to an awareness of global responsibility. Since all beings are interrelated and all, without exception, want to avoid suffering and achieve happiness, this understanding becomes the basis for altruism and compassion. This in turn naturally leads to the attitude and practice of nonviolence toward human beings and animals — and toward the environment.
Matthieu Ricard was a scientist in cell genetics 40 years ago when he decided to live in the Himalayas and become a Buddhist monk. He is a photographer and the author of several books, including “Happiness: How to Cultivate Life’s Most Important Skill.” He lives in Nepal and has been involved in more than 100 humanitarian projects.
Friday, 24 June 2011
A Teachable Moment
Agriculture ministers from the G20 met in Paris this week to talk about the impact of speculation on rising food prices. As so often happens the interests of various countries takes precedence over just doing the right thing. Britain and the United States are big players in global financial markets (and just how is that going anyway), so are reluctant to see limits on speculative market playing. Many other countries including France are prepared for strict limits. It's been hard to decern just where Canada stands on this, but here's a quote from one report, and I'd beet a lot that Canada is with the U.S., Australia group.
"France has made limiting speculation and reining in markets a centrepiece of its G20 presidency and said it will accept no fudges on key issues.
Paris wants changes such as limits on the participation of purely financial actors in the agricultural commodity markets.
Countries such as the United States, Britain, Australia and Brazil however are concerned that such limits could crimp futures and derivatives markets, which are increasingly vital to farmers and processors."
Just to highlight the "beliefs and values" the media bring to their reporting (hence the teachable moment) here are two that presnt vastly different takes on what went on. The first is from the Voice of America news, and the second the British Guardian newspaper (one of the best in my view).
http://www.voanews.com/english/news/economy-and-business/G20-Farm-Ministers-Take-Steps-to-Control-Food-Prices-124463639.html
G20 Farm Ministers Take Steps to Control Food Prices
June 23, 2011 •
Steve Baragona | Washington
The world's top 20 economic powers agreed Thursday on measures aimed at controlling high and volatile food prices.
Farm ministers from the G20 group of leading and emerging economies met for the first time in Paris Wednesday and Thursday. Following nearly a year of difficult negotiations, French agriculture minister Bruno Le Maire described the agreement as a remarkable accomplishment.
"It was not just based on the questions of national interest of the countries concerned. It took into account the absolute necessity to fight against world hunger and to put an end to this scandal which is world hunger for hundreds of thousands of people," he said.
The agriculture ministers called for more regulation of financial markets. Many experts say an increase in speculation in these markets has contributed to dramatic price swings in recent years. But there were few details in the agreement. G20 finance ministers will likely have more to say about this.
Farm ministers also agreed to set up a new system to share information on global food stocks and usage. World Bank President Robert Zoellick says this is a lesson learned from the previous price spike three years ago.
"What we saw -- when prices started to surge in 2008 -- was that a lack of information about stocks, about availability, can lead to panic in markets. And panic is what leads to price spikes. So uncertainty feeds volatility," he said.
The Paris agreement includes plans for small, regional emergency food reserves to be managed by the UN World Food Program. And the ministers agreed to exempt food aid from export restrictions like those imposed by Russia and other countries last year following a major drought.
Experts say export restrictions aimed at protecting one nation's food security worsen global price spikes.
A new rapid response forum is to meet when crises occur that threaten food supplies. But there is no agreement to end export bans.
Shenggen Fan, head of the International Food Policy Research Institute, says with high food prices creating global instability, it was important for the agriculture ministers to find common ground.
"They have achieved that common position. But I wanted to see more meat, more commitment, more concrete actions," Fan said.
Fan says for one thing, there was little concrete language about how to improve productivity of small farmers in the developing world, where hunger problems are greatest.
And the G20 ministers said little about the use of food crops to produce biofuels, which many experts say is a major contributor to high food prices.
"I would have rather seen some stronger language saying that we should curtail biofuel production by reducing or eliminating subsidies," Fan said.
The UN food price index has been hovering around record highs this year as bad weather has cut supplies of maize and wheat. Demand from a growing and increasingly affluent world population, as well as high energy costs and slowing global productivity gains are expected to keep prices relatively high for years to come.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/jun/23/g20-ministers-dodge-big-questions-food
G20 agriculture ministers dodge the big questions on food prices
by Felicity Lawrence • June 23, 2011 •
The action to curb rising food prices agreed by the G20 ministers on Thursday is far weaker than aid agencies hoped and displays a predictable retreat to national interests over any real structural reform – but perhaps the most significant fact is that negotiations have taken place at all. This was the first time the agriculture ministers of the group of leading world economies have held a summit. The contribution of soaring prices to uprisings in the Arab world has reminded global leaders that without action there could be a repeat of the riots that accompanied spikes in 2008 – food inflation and political unrest have been bedfellows throughout history. But there was less agreement on causes of price rises and how to tackle them.
The case that mandates and subsidies for biofuels have contributed to price rises by diverting huge volumes of food crops to fuel is compelling and widely accepted. (Around 40% of the US corn crop now goes to petrol tanks.) Both the FAO and the World Bank have called for the G20 to stop promoting biofuels. But the two big ethanol producers, the US and Brazil, blocked agreement. American geopolitical interest lies in using its vast agricultural surplus to wean itself off Middle Eastern oil; Brazil's growth, meanwhile, is driven by its agroexports. So the biofuels issue has been kicked into the long grass of "more studies needed".
France with its big farming interests and the G20 presidency has pushed hard for an ambitious agreement that would protect producers and consumers from excessive commodities speculation and market volatility. (Banks won deregulation of commodities markets in 2000, allowing them to develop new derivative products such as commodity index funds, which offer investors a chance to track changes in a spread of commodity prices including key agricultural commodities.) There have been huge flows of capital into agricultural commodities in the last decade, and the UN rapporteur on food, Olivier de Schutter, is one of many experts along with aid agencies such as Christain Aid, Oxfam and the World Development Movement, concluding that excessive speculation has been a significant factor in food price rises and volatility.
However, the UK – whose recovery depends on its dominant financial sector – opposed deregulation of markets. The position of its coalition government's Conservative agriculture minister, Caroline Spelman, is that the evidence is inconclusive. Unable to agree, the G20 action plan ducks the issue, choosing to send it back to finance ministers and central banks to deal with as part of reform of the financial system generally. Instead, the communique on action stresses that transparency rather than new regulation is the best guarantee of efficient commodities markets. That will be seen as an ineffectual response by development campaigners.
The deal does commit to a new global agriculture market information system (Amis) so that governments can share better data about the state of food stocks and global production, but the FAO, already short of funds, will have to run it without new money. Private sector players, such as the large grain traders for whom knowledge of stocks and harvests represent a key competitive advantage, are simply "urged" to participate.
There is no deal either on giving up export bans when prices spike. Several countries stopped exports of key crops during that last food price crisis to keep the cost of staples in check at home, but added to anxiety about global supplies, and fuelled further price rises by doing so. Emerging economy governments, perhaps not surprisingly, were not keen to give up one of the few tools they have to keep the lid on urban unrest in times of food inflation. However, there is agreement that exports for humanitarian aid will not be caught up in export bans in future.
The most glaring omission from the action plan is climate change. The impact of extreme climate events has been one of the major drivers of food price volatility in the last few years. It gets just one short paragraph, two sentences long, saying the G20 supports the UN convention on climate change – that failed to make significant progress on controlling greenhouse gas emissions in Copenhagen in 2009. So although there is mention of the need for more sustainable agriculture and more responsible use of water resources, the challenge of meeting growing demand for food just when global warming impacts on agricultural productivity is reduced to little more than business as usual.
"France has made limiting speculation and reining in markets a centrepiece of its G20 presidency and said it will accept no fudges on key issues.
Paris wants changes such as limits on the participation of purely financial actors in the agricultural commodity markets.
Countries such as the United States, Britain, Australia and Brazil however are concerned that such limits could crimp futures and derivatives markets, which are increasingly vital to farmers and processors."
Just to highlight the "beliefs and values" the media bring to their reporting (hence the teachable moment) here are two that presnt vastly different takes on what went on. The first is from the Voice of America news, and the second the British Guardian newspaper (one of the best in my view).
http://www.voanews.com/english/news/economy-and-business/G20-Farm-Ministers-Take-Steps-to-Control-Food-Prices-124463639.html
G20 Farm Ministers Take Steps to Control Food Prices
June 23, 2011 •
Steve Baragona | Washington
The world's top 20 economic powers agreed Thursday on measures aimed at controlling high and volatile food prices.
Farm ministers from the G20 group of leading and emerging economies met for the first time in Paris Wednesday and Thursday. Following nearly a year of difficult negotiations, French agriculture minister Bruno Le Maire described the agreement as a remarkable accomplishment.
"It was not just based on the questions of national interest of the countries concerned. It took into account the absolute necessity to fight against world hunger and to put an end to this scandal which is world hunger for hundreds of thousands of people," he said.
The agriculture ministers called for more regulation of financial markets. Many experts say an increase in speculation in these markets has contributed to dramatic price swings in recent years. But there were few details in the agreement. G20 finance ministers will likely have more to say about this.
Farm ministers also agreed to set up a new system to share information on global food stocks and usage. World Bank President Robert Zoellick says this is a lesson learned from the previous price spike three years ago.
"What we saw -- when prices started to surge in 2008 -- was that a lack of information about stocks, about availability, can lead to panic in markets. And panic is what leads to price spikes. So uncertainty feeds volatility," he said.
The Paris agreement includes plans for small, regional emergency food reserves to be managed by the UN World Food Program. And the ministers agreed to exempt food aid from export restrictions like those imposed by Russia and other countries last year following a major drought.
Experts say export restrictions aimed at protecting one nation's food security worsen global price spikes.
A new rapid response forum is to meet when crises occur that threaten food supplies. But there is no agreement to end export bans.
Shenggen Fan, head of the International Food Policy Research Institute, says with high food prices creating global instability, it was important for the agriculture ministers to find common ground.
"They have achieved that common position. But I wanted to see more meat, more commitment, more concrete actions," Fan said.
Fan says for one thing, there was little concrete language about how to improve productivity of small farmers in the developing world, where hunger problems are greatest.
And the G20 ministers said little about the use of food crops to produce biofuels, which many experts say is a major contributor to high food prices.
"I would have rather seen some stronger language saying that we should curtail biofuel production by reducing or eliminating subsidies," Fan said.
The UN food price index has been hovering around record highs this year as bad weather has cut supplies of maize and wheat. Demand from a growing and increasingly affluent world population, as well as high energy costs and slowing global productivity gains are expected to keep prices relatively high for years to come.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/jun/23/g20-ministers-dodge-big-questions-food
G20 agriculture ministers dodge the big questions on food prices
by Felicity Lawrence • June 23, 2011 •
The action to curb rising food prices agreed by the G20 ministers on Thursday is far weaker than aid agencies hoped and displays a predictable retreat to national interests over any real structural reform – but perhaps the most significant fact is that negotiations have taken place at all. This was the first time the agriculture ministers of the group of leading world economies have held a summit. The contribution of soaring prices to uprisings in the Arab world has reminded global leaders that without action there could be a repeat of the riots that accompanied spikes in 2008 – food inflation and political unrest have been bedfellows throughout history. But there was less agreement on causes of price rises and how to tackle them.
The case that mandates and subsidies for biofuels have contributed to price rises by diverting huge volumes of food crops to fuel is compelling and widely accepted. (Around 40% of the US corn crop now goes to petrol tanks.) Both the FAO and the World Bank have called for the G20 to stop promoting biofuels. But the two big ethanol producers, the US and Brazil, blocked agreement. American geopolitical interest lies in using its vast agricultural surplus to wean itself off Middle Eastern oil; Brazil's growth, meanwhile, is driven by its agroexports. So the biofuels issue has been kicked into the long grass of "more studies needed".
France with its big farming interests and the G20 presidency has pushed hard for an ambitious agreement that would protect producers and consumers from excessive commodities speculation and market volatility. (Banks won deregulation of commodities markets in 2000, allowing them to develop new derivative products such as commodity index funds, which offer investors a chance to track changes in a spread of commodity prices including key agricultural commodities.) There have been huge flows of capital into agricultural commodities in the last decade, and the UN rapporteur on food, Olivier de Schutter, is one of many experts along with aid agencies such as Christain Aid, Oxfam and the World Development Movement, concluding that excessive speculation has been a significant factor in food price rises and volatility.
However, the UK – whose recovery depends on its dominant financial sector – opposed deregulation of markets. The position of its coalition government's Conservative agriculture minister, Caroline Spelman, is that the evidence is inconclusive. Unable to agree, the G20 action plan ducks the issue, choosing to send it back to finance ministers and central banks to deal with as part of reform of the financial system generally. Instead, the communique on action stresses that transparency rather than new regulation is the best guarantee of efficient commodities markets. That will be seen as an ineffectual response by development campaigners.
The deal does commit to a new global agriculture market information system (Amis) so that governments can share better data about the state of food stocks and global production, but the FAO, already short of funds, will have to run it without new money. Private sector players, such as the large grain traders for whom knowledge of stocks and harvests represent a key competitive advantage, are simply "urged" to participate.
There is no deal either on giving up export bans when prices spike. Several countries stopped exports of key crops during that last food price crisis to keep the cost of staples in check at home, but added to anxiety about global supplies, and fuelled further price rises by doing so. Emerging economy governments, perhaps not surprisingly, were not keen to give up one of the few tools they have to keep the lid on urban unrest in times of food inflation. However, there is agreement that exports for humanitarian aid will not be caught up in export bans in future.
The most glaring omission from the action plan is climate change. The impact of extreme climate events has been one of the major drivers of food price volatility in the last few years. It gets just one short paragraph, two sentences long, saying the G20 supports the UN convention on climate change – that failed to make significant progress on controlling greenhouse gas emissions in Copenhagen in 2009. So although there is mention of the need for more sustainable agriculture and more responsible use of water resources, the challenge of meeting growing demand for food just when global warming impacts on agricultural productivity is reduced to little more than business as usual.
Wednesday, 22 June 2011
New GMO Research: Should We Be Thinking Harder?
I've written (as have many, many others) a fair amount about the dreaded Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO's.. there's a search button at the bottom of the page). There were two well-written stories this week that really challenge our desire to make this a "right or wrong" issue and be done with it. In one case the development isn't linked to simply increasing the sales of one company's pesticides (all those Monsanto round-up ready crops for example), but seems to have genuinely thought through a way to cut down the use of very toxic aphicides, without risking native flora or fauna. (there will be something wrong with it I know, but the researchers have taken a very novel approach). The second story is quite long but worth the read, how one South American country is well aware of its precious bio-diversity, and the huge risk of giving multinational corporations control over the seed business, but also reflects the challenges of feeding a hungry world. South American political and civil society leaders who for so long were dumped in a "banana republic" box, have really come to the fore on the big environmental issues of the day (climate change, GMO's, etc.) We need to pay more attention to what they're saying.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jun/21/gm-wheat-trial-aphid-crops
Trial of anti-aphid GM wheat awaits government green light
June 21, 2011 •
A controversial field trial of an experimental GM wheat will begin in March next year if government officials give the go-ahead for the crop to be planted.
One of the UK's leading plant research centres has applied for permission from the government to begin the trial of the GM crop, which is modified to resist attack by aphids. If approved, it would be only the third GM field trial running in Britain; the others, at the John Innes Centre in Norfolk and at Leeds University, are testing different varieties of GM potato. The project will require expensive 24hr security to prevent anti-GM protesters destroying the crop.
No GM crops are currently grown commercially in the UK, although GM varieties are grown extensively in other parts of the world – notably the US, South America, China and India.
The proposed trial is scheduled to run from March 2012 to October 2013. Anyone can submit an objection to the proposals up to 19 August this year.
Prof Maurice Moloney, the director of Rothamsted Research, which has applied for permission to conduct the trial, said the institute's chemical ecologists – who study the natural link between plants and pests – had discovered a way to prevent aphids landing on wheat and destroying it.
"When aphids are under stress, they release a pheromone that is a signal to other aphids to get out of the locality," Moloney explained. "It turns out that pathway exists in plants, for example in mint. When this pathway is activated, the aphids don't land on that plant."
The chemical, known as (E)-beta-farnesene (EBF), is also found in beer because it occurs naturally in hops. Documentation submitted to the Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment (Acre) (the advisory body for the secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs) lists over 300 varieties of plants in which EBF is known to occur naturally. Common mint is one of those plants.
The new genes are similar to the versions that appear in peppermint; however, they were not taken directly from another species but chemically synthesized to function like wheat genes. The GM variety also contains two other genes that originate in bacteria.
"Everybody thinks the wheat will now taste like mint, but it won't, because it's only a very small part of the plant," Moloney said.
Dr Shawn Mcguire, a food security scientist at University of East Anglia who was not involved in the work, called GM wheat a "fairly new development". He said that because wheat is self-pollinating, the risk of cross-pollination was much smaller than in other GM crops.
"There are no wild relatives [of wheat] in this country, so it doesn't have a biodiversity risk in any sense. Wheat is far less promiscuous than oilseed rape and canola, so the issues of pollen flow and gene flow are less pronounced," Mcguire said.
According to Mcguire, as the pheromone only affects aphids the risks are very different from those represented by more brutish GM crops such as Bt wheat. "I cannot think of major reasons for alarm over this," he said.
Rothamsted Research emphasised that the project is at the proposal stage and subject to approval. "As required by law, a public notice appeared in today's Times and this initiates Acre's deliberations," a statement said. "We do not want to give the impression that we assume the trial will get the go-ahead without any question. We cannot be sure what Acre will or will not permit."
Prof Dale Sanders, director of the John Innes Centre, noted that the GM component of the wheat was already common in nature. "Although these are test crops, which will never be eaten, EBF is produced by a variety of plants, such as peppermint and hops, so the product is something that people are commonly eating," he said.
Moloney dismissed concerns over GM trials, particularly in reference to accidental cross-contamination of genetic material.
"The species barriers don't allow gene jumping to occur on anything other than an evolutionary timescale," he said. "If we get something from mint and we move that into wheat, it will not move into things other than wheat. If that could have happened without GM, then it would have already happened."
Claire Oxborrow, a foods campaigner at Friends of the Earth, questioned the value of the research, saying that there was no demand for GM wheat. "Given the fact that wheat is a staple crop, the development of GM varieties is particularly controversial. We're concerned that public money is being spent on research where there's no public acceptance or market," she said.
http://www.truth-out.org/gmos-and-peru-debate-comes-head/1308491458
GMOs and Peru: The Debate Comes to a Head
•
by: Carrie Burggraf , Council on Hemispheric Affairs | News Analysis
The use of transgenic or genetically modified organisms (GMOs) is an increasingly prevalent practice throughout the world that has pitted complex policy issues against one another. On one side of the debate is the ability of GMOs to feed the world’s increasingly large and diverse population and to allow developing countries to economically advance via transgenic crops. The other side of the dispute focuses on the unknown health and environmental risks posed by GMOs, along with potential monopolistic practices in which large multinational corporations (MNCs) involve themselves.
In Peru, the debate over the introduction of GMOs into the country has been very public, involving a plethora of participants such as scientists, chefs, farmers, restaurant owners, politicians, and far-ranging members of civil society. Several Peruvian regions, including Cusco, Lambayeque, Huánuco, Ayacucho, and San Martín, were the first to declare themselves “GMO-free zones.”[i] Lima soon joined as the newest GMO-free zone in late April.[ii] This move came just days after President Alan García and former Peruvian Minister of Agriculture Rafael Quevedo had signed Supreme Decree 003-2011-AG on April 15.[iii]. The decree, which was actually drawn up two years ago, set up an agency to regulate the research, production, and trade of GMOs.[iv] Rafael Quevedo, who has since resigned from office due to intense criticism surrounding his stance on GMOs, claimed that the order was merely “a regulation which tries to eliminate errors, control the use of genetically modified organisms, and make sure they don’t come into the country if they are found to be a risk.”[v] However, many citizens felt that the decree paved the way for a flood of transgenic products into the country, which could hurt its rich biodiversity and its growing market for high quality organic products. The immediate backlash against the signing of the decree indicated that there, indeed, existed widespread support for a GMO-free Peru. Such indications were soon confirmed, as Peru’s Congress recently repealed the decree on June 8 by a 56 to 0 vote, with two abstentions.[vi] The bill has placed a “10-year moratorium on the entrance of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) for cultivation and breeding or any other type of transgenic products.”[vii] However, the transgenic battle in Peru is far from decidedly won, as the moratorium simply puts the heated spar on a temporary hold.
So What do GMOs Got to do With it?
GMOs result from a process of genetic engineering (GE) that transfers “specific traits, or genes, from one organism into a different plant or animal.”[viii] The result is a genetically altered product, which has enhanced traits not inherent to the plant or animal. “The majority of genetically modified crops grown today are engineered to be resistant to pesticides and/or herbicides so that they can withstand being sprayed with weed killer while the rest of the plants in the field die.”[ix] The added genes can also increase a food’s nutritional value or its resistance to natural disasters and pests, traits that are especially appealing to developing nations that often face food shortages or increasingly unpredictable weather.
The Malthusian Fallacy Makes its Comeback
Thomas Malthus, the legendary nineteenth century political economist, predicted that population growth would occur at such a rate that food supply would be unable to keep pace.[x] Therefore, overpopulation and the lagging food supply would result in widespread famine and poverty. Many economists have criticized this theory, claiming that Malthus left out important factors like innovation and system efficiency. However, the fear of not being able to feed the world’s population remains a major concern today, thus adding to the interest in advanced technology like GMOs.
In 2009, the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) reported that the world’s population was expected to increase by 2.3 billion by 2050, with most of the growth taking place in developing countries.[xi] The FAO claimed that in order to feed this population, world food production would need to increase by 70 percent, with around 90 percent of the increase ideally coming “from higher yields and increased cropping intensity.”[xii] GMOs have been lauded for their ability to increase yields and to use less land, while also decreasing the risk of crop destruction by pests and natural disasters. The resulting improvement in food security, as well as the provision of a more complete diet, makes GMOs a popular solution to be explored. If production and exports increase in tandem, developing countries could also see a promising increase in their standards of living.
An Apple a Day …
“An apple a day keeps the doctor away” is an old adage that highlights the importance of eating healthily in order to ward off physical ailments. Of course, we all know that eating an apple does not magically make us healthy, but could it actually bring on disease? GMOs have been integrated into a variety of foods, including corn, potatoes, fruits, rice, and soybeans.[xiii] Often, genes are added from other species to increase yield or to make certain foods healthier. However, the long-term health risks involved with GMO consumption remain unknown, as their use and consumption have only recently become widespread.
Proponents of transgenic foods claim that there are very few health risks involved with GMOs, a position that has been strengthened by several medical trials. However, the International Journal of Biological Sciences notes that a recent study has linked some varieties of GM corn to kidney and liver damage in laboratory rats.[xiv] Such mixed results make it difficult to identify the long-term health risks involved with the consumption of transgenic foods, while scientists also remain split over their short-to-medium run risks. This presented an important health dilemma in Peru: should GMOs have been introduced to increase food security and to provide a more well-rounded diet to its citizens, or was the Peruvian Congress wise to support further research on the long-term effects of GMOs before their introduction was entertained?
If a Butterfly Flaps its Wings …
The debate surrounding the introduction of GMOs in Peru also begged the age-old philosophical question, “If a butterfly flaps its wings…” The theory, known as the “Butterfly Effect,” takes this seemingly insignificant event and compounds it multiple times over. Disasters such as tsunamis or the massive eruption of a volcano have been attributed to this delicate little butterfly that dared to flap its wings in China several decades before. Following this theory, the introduction of GMOs into Peru’s environment could be like the flap of the butterfly’s wings, setting off a chain reaction of events that may prove disastrous in the future.
Peru possesses one of the world’s richest environments, housing segments of both the Andes Mountains and the Amazon Rainforest, in addition to an extraordinarily extensive range of biodiversity and natural resources.[xv] Many members of Peru’s civil society were concerned that introducing a new species into such a fecund natural environment could have damaging and irreversible consequences, raising questions such as: how will transgenic crops react with Peru’s naturally occurring flora and fauna? how might the existing ecosystem be affected? how will the food chain be protected from disturbance in certain areas? And, of particular concern, what effect will GMOs have on Peru’s illustrious potato cultivation? If GM potatoes or other transgenic crops react poorly with Peruvian potato species, competition amongst the crops might ensue, resulting in the disappearance of naturally occurring species.[xvi]
The second main concern was that damage to the environment is almost always irreversible. Just as with ozone depletion and the melting ice caps, environmental changes are hard to combat and sometimes impossible to completely eradicate. Recent studies have shown that farmers, not surprisingly, end up using more pesticide when planting pesticide-resistant GM crops, as weeds become resistant along with their crops.[xvii] Such increased pesticide use creates extensive environmental damage and health risks due to expanded consumption and exposure. Also, many GMOs have been tested in nothing more than a laboratory setting or in another country’s natural environment, so it is possible that transgenic seeds could react differently in Peru than they have in other areas. Therefore, much of Peruvian civil society sought the moratorium on GMOs, advocating a more complete diagnosis of possible risks prior to introducing transgenic seeds/crops.
Exploitation by Any Other Name (Might be Monsanto)
Putting aside the potential economic and health benefits that GMOs pose, it is important to consider the role of producers of GM seeds and products, such as the multinational corporation (MNC) Monsanto, which specializes in agricultural biotechnology. It is no secret that MNCs, such as Coca-Cola and Chiquita, do not always uphold the lofty ethical standards that some would expect. If demand and production of transgenic food continue on an upward slope, farmers could become dependent on GM seed to sustain their competitive edge in a market flooded with these controversial products.
Additionally, more and more farmers will have to buy GM seed from the major manufacturers that hold the intellectual property rights to transgenic patents for certain genome combinations. For example, until 2014, Monsanto has the rights to its Roundup Ready seed, which is resistant to the pesticide Roundup and makes it easier to spray crops en masse.[xviii] However, Monsanto is coming out with a new seed, called Roundup Ready 2 Yield, which contains a slightly different structural arrangement that will increase yields but still provide resistance to pesticides.[xix] Some believe that this timing is not coincidental, and critics claim that Monsanto is trying to pressure farmers into switching to the newer version before its patent on the original seed runs out.[xx] This would extend Monsanto’s monopolistic advantage over other seed companies and allow the firm to essentially set prices in this field.
Such a situation seems eerily similar to privatization of the water industry in Bolivia in the late 1990s. After privatization became a condition for aid, many countries pushed to bring down barriers to water services and to allow foreign MNCs to break into the industry. The result has been “steep and sudden price hikes,” along with, in some instances, no access to the water supply, adversely affecting the poorest inhabitants in the country. These economic concerns led to both the Cochabamba and El Alto revolts, which eventually ousted industry giants like Bechtel and Suez from their sites of operation.[xxi]
Can a parallel be drawn, and perhaps even expected, between Bechtel and Monsanto? Transgenic seeds, like water, may become necessary for farmers to stay competitive in both domestic and foreign markets. When a product becomes a necessity and only large companies hold the intellectual rights to it, potentially perilous situations can result. Monsanto already has made re-planting its seeds during the next planting season illegal, and farmers have witnessed price hikes in recent years.[xxii] Just ask Kansas farmer Luke Ulrich, whose Monsanto seed costs have increased by almost 50 percent from 2008 to 2009.[xxiii] Allowing these MNCs to exercise major control over seed production and price setting, and thus their production and exports, could become a slippery slope in any country.
What You Don’t Know Won’t Necessarily Fail to Kill You
Another major issue regarding GM food is that it is hard to know which foods are transgenic, which contain traces, and which are GM-free. The labeling system, which has been enacted in Peru via its Consumer Code, is a novel idea.[xxiv] After all, consumers have the right to know what they are buying and consuming. However, the process of labeling can be complicated and often involves obfuscation due to difficulties with tracing items to their origins and figuring out just what percentage of a product is transgenic.[xxv] In fact, an effective labeling system can incur large administrative costs, especially if the system is not uniform across borders.
Furthermore, the question could be raised as to whether it is even possible to properly label GM foods. After all, the system seems much like the Kimberley Process for diamonds, which was put in place because of serious concerns over the trade in “blood diamonds.” The process tracks the origin and transit of diamonds in order to ensure that they were neither mined using slave labor nor obtained as a result of resource conflict.[xxvi] Yet the process is not flawless, and many blood diamonds still end up being sold as “conflict-free”. This also occurs with GMOs. Just recently, “the Peruvian Association of Consumers and Users (ASPEC) tested 13 products purchased in major supermarkets and shops in Lima. Ten of the 13 showed the presence of GMOs.”[xxvii]
The Birds and the Bees … and the Pollen and the Wind
The mislabeling of GMOs is not the only means by which transgenic products could cross Peruvian borders without consent. Even with the newly enacted moratorium on GMOs, there is still no guarantee that such products will not enter the country. After all, Peru shares a border with Brazil, one of the world’s top GMO growing countries.[xxviii] Cross-pollination has been noted in numerous countries, and GM seeds already have shown up in nations that had previously banned their import. The first report of cross-fertilization in South America occurred this past March, involving GM and non-GM maize in Uruguay.[xxix] Therefore, even though Peru has banned transgenic products, GMOs could still potentially cross borders by such carriers as the wind and bees.
Additionally, farmers would have to devise an intricate system of planting in order to keep their GM and organic crops separate, as products of both are increasingly popular in the current market. Cross-pollination can also occur accidentally between fields, or genetically engineered traits can transfer into organic crops that were planted in a field that contained GM crops the season before. This may also increase implementation costs and further confuse whatever labeling system is in place.
The (Not so) Long Arm of the International Law
International environmental law is a relatively new field and does not contain much concrete law regarding binding constraints or a robust system of penalties. The main treaty regarding GMOs and the environment is the Cartagena Protocol, which was enacted in 2003 and signed by Peru the following year.[xxx] The protocol “enables a Party to ban the import of a LMO (living modified organism) if the importing Party determines that insufficient scientific information and knowledge are available about the GMO, about the receiving environment, or about the potential interaction between them.”[xxxi] The protocol allows the importing country to make up its own mind about LMOs based on the available evidence and decide whether to allow or deny their entry.
Also, the Cartagena Protocol emphasizes the precautionary principle, or Principle 15 of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development (1992), which states that “where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.”[xxxii] The principle calls for risk analysis and proper mechanisms in order to reduce the uncertainty of the potential impact of GMOs on the environment. The Codex Alimentarius Commission provides such a framework for developing food standards and undertaking risk analysis on the safety of biotech foods.[xxxiii]
To be Transgenic or Not to be Transgenic?
Peru’s thriving ecosystem and its hugely important organic sector have provided viable arguments against the introduction of GMOs into the country. In addition, the research regarding health and environmental risks posed by transgenic foods remain both immature and limited, particularly regarding the long-term effects of GMOs. In light of so many unknown factors, it is only sensible that Peruvians have demanded further testing before these products are introduced into their daily environment. It also remains an individual’s right to choose what to put into their body, a right that could be severely undermined due to the mislabeling of products.
However, one must also imagine a world in which every technological advancement must wait in prolonged limbo before being implemented, while, in the meantime, other countries are taking advantage of such an innovation. Should a country forgo every technological advancement that is not 100 percent safe based on possible risks? Will Peru fall behind during the moratorium, stepping aside to allow others to take advantage of the increased production, food security, and trade that GMOs offer? Or is Peru ahead of the curve, realizing that opening its country to further control by foreign MNCs is a slippery slope, and that environmental and health risks are often irreversible? Will Peru be lauded as the prophet or exposed as the fool? The next ten years will surely forecast the role that GMOs will play in the future of Peru. In the meantime, the issue will remain in limbo, lying dormant until the next grand, transgenic debate.
[i] Elie Gardner, “Peru allows GM food imports, and protests grow,” Living in Peru, (May 11, 2011), <http://www.livinginperu.com/news-14842-food-peru-allows-gm-food-imports-and-protests-grow>.
[ii] Ibid.
[iii]25 Ibid.
[iv] Gaspar E. Nolte, “GAIN Report: Peru Approves Biosafety Regulation,” USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, (April 19, 2011), <http://gain.fas.usda.gov/Recent%20GAIN%20Publications/Peru%20Approves%20Biosafety%20Regulation_Lima_Peru_4-19-2011.pdf>.
[v] “Lima, Peru to declare itself a GMO-free zone,” GM Watch, (April 28, 2011), <http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13104-lima-peru-to-declare-itself-a-gmo-free-zone>.
[vi] Elie Gardner, “10-year moratorium approved on entrance of GMOs to Peru,” Living in Peru, (June 8, 2011), <http://www.livinginperu.com/news-15173-food-10-year-moratorium-approved-entrance-gmos-peru>.
[vii] Ibid.
[viii]27 “The Issues: Genetic Engineering,” Sustainable Table, <http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/ge/>.
[ix] Ibid.
[x] “Historic Figures: Thomas Malthus,” BBC History, (2011), <http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/malthus_thomas.shtml>.
[xi] “High Level Expert Forum: How to Feed the World in 2050,” United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), (October 12-13, 2009), <http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/wsfs/docs/Issues_papers/HLEF2050_Global_Agriculture.pdf>.
[xii]28 Ibid.
[xiii]29 “The Issues: Genetic Engineering”
[xiv]30 Katherine Goldstein and Gazelle Emami, “Monsanto’s GMO Corn Linked to Organ Failure, Study Reveals,” The Huffington Post, (January 12, 2010), <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/12/monsantos-gmo-corn-linked_n_420365.html>.
[xv] “Peru Travel Guide: Nature and Biodiversity,” Go 2 Peru, (2000), <http://www.go2peru.com/peru_nature.htm>.
[xvi]31 “Peru allows GM food imports, and protests grow”
[xvii]32 “The Issues: Genetic Engineering”
[xviii]33 Frank Morris, “Monsanto GMO Ignites Big Seed War,” National Public Radio (NPR), (January 12, 2010), <http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122498255>.
[xix]34 Ibid.
[xx] Ibid.
[xxi]35 Ibid.
[xxii]36 “Monsanto GMOS Ignites Big Seed War”
[xxiii]37 Ibid.
[xxiv]38 Dan Flynn, “Peru to Begin Labeling GM Food,” Food Safety News, (April 23, 2010), <http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2010/04/labeling-for-gm-approval-system-in-peru/>.
[xxv]39 “Genetically Modified Food and Organisms,” Human Genome Program – United States Department of Energy, (November 5, 2008), <http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/elsi/gmfood.shtml>.
[xxvi]40 “The Kimberley Process,” Global Witness, <http://www.globalwitness.org/campaigns/conflict/conflict-diamonds/kimberley-process>.
[xxvii]41 “Peru allows GM food imports, and protests grow”
[xxviii]42 Greg Traxler, “The GMO Experience in North and South America – where to from here?”Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology – Auburn University, <http://www.fas.usda.gov/icd/stconf/event5/GTraxler.pdf>.
[xxix]43 “Peru allows GM food imports, and protests grow”
[xxx]44 “About the Protocol,” Convention on Biological Diversity – United Nations Environment Programme, (June 28, 2010), <http://bch.cbd.int/protocol/background/>.
[xxxi]45 “Text of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety,” Convention on Biological Diversity – United Nations Environment Programme, (April 27, 2011), <http://bch.cbd.int/protocol/text/>.
[xxxii]46 “Rio Declaration on Environment and Development,” United Nations Environment Programme, <http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=78&ArticleID=1163&l=en>.
[xxxiii]47 “FAO/WHO Food Standards: Codex Alimentarius,” UN FAO and the World Bank, 2011, <http://www.codexalimentarius.net/web/index_en.jsp>.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jun/21/gm-wheat-trial-aphid-crops
Trial of anti-aphid GM wheat awaits government green light
June 21, 2011 •
A controversial field trial of an experimental GM wheat will begin in March next year if government officials give the go-ahead for the crop to be planted.
One of the UK's leading plant research centres has applied for permission from the government to begin the trial of the GM crop, which is modified to resist attack by aphids. If approved, it would be only the third GM field trial running in Britain; the others, at the John Innes Centre in Norfolk and at Leeds University, are testing different varieties of GM potato. The project will require expensive 24hr security to prevent anti-GM protesters destroying the crop.
No GM crops are currently grown commercially in the UK, although GM varieties are grown extensively in other parts of the world – notably the US, South America, China and India.
The proposed trial is scheduled to run from March 2012 to October 2013. Anyone can submit an objection to the proposals up to 19 August this year.
Prof Maurice Moloney, the director of Rothamsted Research, which has applied for permission to conduct the trial, said the institute's chemical ecologists – who study the natural link between plants and pests – had discovered a way to prevent aphids landing on wheat and destroying it.
"When aphids are under stress, they release a pheromone that is a signal to other aphids to get out of the locality," Moloney explained. "It turns out that pathway exists in plants, for example in mint. When this pathway is activated, the aphids don't land on that plant."
The chemical, known as (E)-beta-farnesene (EBF), is also found in beer because it occurs naturally in hops. Documentation submitted to the Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment (Acre) (the advisory body for the secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs) lists over 300 varieties of plants in which EBF is known to occur naturally. Common mint is one of those plants.
The new genes are similar to the versions that appear in peppermint; however, they were not taken directly from another species but chemically synthesized to function like wheat genes. The GM variety also contains two other genes that originate in bacteria.
"Everybody thinks the wheat will now taste like mint, but it won't, because it's only a very small part of the plant," Moloney said.
Dr Shawn Mcguire, a food security scientist at University of East Anglia who was not involved in the work, called GM wheat a "fairly new development". He said that because wheat is self-pollinating, the risk of cross-pollination was much smaller than in other GM crops.
"There are no wild relatives [of wheat] in this country, so it doesn't have a biodiversity risk in any sense. Wheat is far less promiscuous than oilseed rape and canola, so the issues of pollen flow and gene flow are less pronounced," Mcguire said.
According to Mcguire, as the pheromone only affects aphids the risks are very different from those represented by more brutish GM crops such as Bt wheat. "I cannot think of major reasons for alarm over this," he said.
Rothamsted Research emphasised that the project is at the proposal stage and subject to approval. "As required by law, a public notice appeared in today's Times and this initiates Acre's deliberations," a statement said. "We do not want to give the impression that we assume the trial will get the go-ahead without any question. We cannot be sure what Acre will or will not permit."
Prof Dale Sanders, director of the John Innes Centre, noted that the GM component of the wheat was already common in nature. "Although these are test crops, which will never be eaten, EBF is produced by a variety of plants, such as peppermint and hops, so the product is something that people are commonly eating," he said.
Moloney dismissed concerns over GM trials, particularly in reference to accidental cross-contamination of genetic material.
"The species barriers don't allow gene jumping to occur on anything other than an evolutionary timescale," he said. "If we get something from mint and we move that into wheat, it will not move into things other than wheat. If that could have happened without GM, then it would have already happened."
Claire Oxborrow, a foods campaigner at Friends of the Earth, questioned the value of the research, saying that there was no demand for GM wheat. "Given the fact that wheat is a staple crop, the development of GM varieties is particularly controversial. We're concerned that public money is being spent on research where there's no public acceptance or market," she said.
http://www.truth-out.org/gmos-and-peru-debate-comes-head/1308491458
GMOs and Peru: The Debate Comes to a Head
•
by: Carrie Burggraf , Council on Hemispheric Affairs | News Analysis
The use of transgenic or genetically modified organisms (GMOs) is an increasingly prevalent practice throughout the world that has pitted complex policy issues against one another. On one side of the debate is the ability of GMOs to feed the world’s increasingly large and diverse population and to allow developing countries to economically advance via transgenic crops. The other side of the dispute focuses on the unknown health and environmental risks posed by GMOs, along with potential monopolistic practices in which large multinational corporations (MNCs) involve themselves.
In Peru, the debate over the introduction of GMOs into the country has been very public, involving a plethora of participants such as scientists, chefs, farmers, restaurant owners, politicians, and far-ranging members of civil society. Several Peruvian regions, including Cusco, Lambayeque, Huánuco, Ayacucho, and San Martín, were the first to declare themselves “GMO-free zones.”[i] Lima soon joined as the newest GMO-free zone in late April.[ii] This move came just days after President Alan García and former Peruvian Minister of Agriculture Rafael Quevedo had signed Supreme Decree 003-2011-AG on April 15.[iii]. The decree, which was actually drawn up two years ago, set up an agency to regulate the research, production, and trade of GMOs.[iv] Rafael Quevedo, who has since resigned from office due to intense criticism surrounding his stance on GMOs, claimed that the order was merely “a regulation which tries to eliminate errors, control the use of genetically modified organisms, and make sure they don’t come into the country if they are found to be a risk.”[v] However, many citizens felt that the decree paved the way for a flood of transgenic products into the country, which could hurt its rich biodiversity and its growing market for high quality organic products. The immediate backlash against the signing of the decree indicated that there, indeed, existed widespread support for a GMO-free Peru. Such indications were soon confirmed, as Peru’s Congress recently repealed the decree on June 8 by a 56 to 0 vote, with two abstentions.[vi] The bill has placed a “10-year moratorium on the entrance of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) for cultivation and breeding or any other type of transgenic products.”[vii] However, the transgenic battle in Peru is far from decidedly won, as the moratorium simply puts the heated spar on a temporary hold.
So What do GMOs Got to do With it?
GMOs result from a process of genetic engineering (GE) that transfers “specific traits, or genes, from one organism into a different plant or animal.”[viii] The result is a genetically altered product, which has enhanced traits not inherent to the plant or animal. “The majority of genetically modified crops grown today are engineered to be resistant to pesticides and/or herbicides so that they can withstand being sprayed with weed killer while the rest of the plants in the field die.”[ix] The added genes can also increase a food’s nutritional value or its resistance to natural disasters and pests, traits that are especially appealing to developing nations that often face food shortages or increasingly unpredictable weather.
The Malthusian Fallacy Makes its Comeback
Thomas Malthus, the legendary nineteenth century political economist, predicted that population growth would occur at such a rate that food supply would be unable to keep pace.[x] Therefore, overpopulation and the lagging food supply would result in widespread famine and poverty. Many economists have criticized this theory, claiming that Malthus left out important factors like innovation and system efficiency. However, the fear of not being able to feed the world’s population remains a major concern today, thus adding to the interest in advanced technology like GMOs.
In 2009, the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) reported that the world’s population was expected to increase by 2.3 billion by 2050, with most of the growth taking place in developing countries.[xi] The FAO claimed that in order to feed this population, world food production would need to increase by 70 percent, with around 90 percent of the increase ideally coming “from higher yields and increased cropping intensity.”[xii] GMOs have been lauded for their ability to increase yields and to use less land, while also decreasing the risk of crop destruction by pests and natural disasters. The resulting improvement in food security, as well as the provision of a more complete diet, makes GMOs a popular solution to be explored. If production and exports increase in tandem, developing countries could also see a promising increase in their standards of living.
An Apple a Day …
“An apple a day keeps the doctor away” is an old adage that highlights the importance of eating healthily in order to ward off physical ailments. Of course, we all know that eating an apple does not magically make us healthy, but could it actually bring on disease? GMOs have been integrated into a variety of foods, including corn, potatoes, fruits, rice, and soybeans.[xiii] Often, genes are added from other species to increase yield or to make certain foods healthier. However, the long-term health risks involved with GMO consumption remain unknown, as their use and consumption have only recently become widespread.
Proponents of transgenic foods claim that there are very few health risks involved with GMOs, a position that has been strengthened by several medical trials. However, the International Journal of Biological Sciences notes that a recent study has linked some varieties of GM corn to kidney and liver damage in laboratory rats.[xiv] Such mixed results make it difficult to identify the long-term health risks involved with the consumption of transgenic foods, while scientists also remain split over their short-to-medium run risks. This presented an important health dilemma in Peru: should GMOs have been introduced to increase food security and to provide a more well-rounded diet to its citizens, or was the Peruvian Congress wise to support further research on the long-term effects of GMOs before their introduction was entertained?
If a Butterfly Flaps its Wings …
The debate surrounding the introduction of GMOs in Peru also begged the age-old philosophical question, “If a butterfly flaps its wings…” The theory, known as the “Butterfly Effect,” takes this seemingly insignificant event and compounds it multiple times over. Disasters such as tsunamis or the massive eruption of a volcano have been attributed to this delicate little butterfly that dared to flap its wings in China several decades before. Following this theory, the introduction of GMOs into Peru’s environment could be like the flap of the butterfly’s wings, setting off a chain reaction of events that may prove disastrous in the future.
Peru possesses one of the world’s richest environments, housing segments of both the Andes Mountains and the Amazon Rainforest, in addition to an extraordinarily extensive range of biodiversity and natural resources.[xv] Many members of Peru’s civil society were concerned that introducing a new species into such a fecund natural environment could have damaging and irreversible consequences, raising questions such as: how will transgenic crops react with Peru’s naturally occurring flora and fauna? how might the existing ecosystem be affected? how will the food chain be protected from disturbance in certain areas? And, of particular concern, what effect will GMOs have on Peru’s illustrious potato cultivation? If GM potatoes or other transgenic crops react poorly with Peruvian potato species, competition amongst the crops might ensue, resulting in the disappearance of naturally occurring species.[xvi]
The second main concern was that damage to the environment is almost always irreversible. Just as with ozone depletion and the melting ice caps, environmental changes are hard to combat and sometimes impossible to completely eradicate. Recent studies have shown that farmers, not surprisingly, end up using more pesticide when planting pesticide-resistant GM crops, as weeds become resistant along with their crops.[xvii] Such increased pesticide use creates extensive environmental damage and health risks due to expanded consumption and exposure. Also, many GMOs have been tested in nothing more than a laboratory setting or in another country’s natural environment, so it is possible that transgenic seeds could react differently in Peru than they have in other areas. Therefore, much of Peruvian civil society sought the moratorium on GMOs, advocating a more complete diagnosis of possible risks prior to introducing transgenic seeds/crops.
Exploitation by Any Other Name (Might be Monsanto)
Putting aside the potential economic and health benefits that GMOs pose, it is important to consider the role of producers of GM seeds and products, such as the multinational corporation (MNC) Monsanto, which specializes in agricultural biotechnology. It is no secret that MNCs, such as Coca-Cola and Chiquita, do not always uphold the lofty ethical standards that some would expect. If demand and production of transgenic food continue on an upward slope, farmers could become dependent on GM seed to sustain their competitive edge in a market flooded with these controversial products.
Additionally, more and more farmers will have to buy GM seed from the major manufacturers that hold the intellectual property rights to transgenic patents for certain genome combinations. For example, until 2014, Monsanto has the rights to its Roundup Ready seed, which is resistant to the pesticide Roundup and makes it easier to spray crops en masse.[xviii] However, Monsanto is coming out with a new seed, called Roundup Ready 2 Yield, which contains a slightly different structural arrangement that will increase yields but still provide resistance to pesticides.[xix] Some believe that this timing is not coincidental, and critics claim that Monsanto is trying to pressure farmers into switching to the newer version before its patent on the original seed runs out.[xx] This would extend Monsanto’s monopolistic advantage over other seed companies and allow the firm to essentially set prices in this field.
Such a situation seems eerily similar to privatization of the water industry in Bolivia in the late 1990s. After privatization became a condition for aid, many countries pushed to bring down barriers to water services and to allow foreign MNCs to break into the industry. The result has been “steep and sudden price hikes,” along with, in some instances, no access to the water supply, adversely affecting the poorest inhabitants in the country. These economic concerns led to both the Cochabamba and El Alto revolts, which eventually ousted industry giants like Bechtel and Suez from their sites of operation.[xxi]
Can a parallel be drawn, and perhaps even expected, between Bechtel and Monsanto? Transgenic seeds, like water, may become necessary for farmers to stay competitive in both domestic and foreign markets. When a product becomes a necessity and only large companies hold the intellectual rights to it, potentially perilous situations can result. Monsanto already has made re-planting its seeds during the next planting season illegal, and farmers have witnessed price hikes in recent years.[xxii] Just ask Kansas farmer Luke Ulrich, whose Monsanto seed costs have increased by almost 50 percent from 2008 to 2009.[xxiii] Allowing these MNCs to exercise major control over seed production and price setting, and thus their production and exports, could become a slippery slope in any country.
What You Don’t Know Won’t Necessarily Fail to Kill You
Another major issue regarding GM food is that it is hard to know which foods are transgenic, which contain traces, and which are GM-free. The labeling system, which has been enacted in Peru via its Consumer Code, is a novel idea.[xxiv] After all, consumers have the right to know what they are buying and consuming. However, the process of labeling can be complicated and often involves obfuscation due to difficulties with tracing items to their origins and figuring out just what percentage of a product is transgenic.[xxv] In fact, an effective labeling system can incur large administrative costs, especially if the system is not uniform across borders.
Furthermore, the question could be raised as to whether it is even possible to properly label GM foods. After all, the system seems much like the Kimberley Process for diamonds, which was put in place because of serious concerns over the trade in “blood diamonds.” The process tracks the origin and transit of diamonds in order to ensure that they were neither mined using slave labor nor obtained as a result of resource conflict.[xxvi] Yet the process is not flawless, and many blood diamonds still end up being sold as “conflict-free”. This also occurs with GMOs. Just recently, “the Peruvian Association of Consumers and Users (ASPEC) tested 13 products purchased in major supermarkets and shops in Lima. Ten of the 13 showed the presence of GMOs.”[xxvii]
The Birds and the Bees … and the Pollen and the Wind
The mislabeling of GMOs is not the only means by which transgenic products could cross Peruvian borders without consent. Even with the newly enacted moratorium on GMOs, there is still no guarantee that such products will not enter the country. After all, Peru shares a border with Brazil, one of the world’s top GMO growing countries.[xxviii] Cross-pollination has been noted in numerous countries, and GM seeds already have shown up in nations that had previously banned their import. The first report of cross-fertilization in South America occurred this past March, involving GM and non-GM maize in Uruguay.[xxix] Therefore, even though Peru has banned transgenic products, GMOs could still potentially cross borders by such carriers as the wind and bees.
Additionally, farmers would have to devise an intricate system of planting in order to keep their GM and organic crops separate, as products of both are increasingly popular in the current market. Cross-pollination can also occur accidentally between fields, or genetically engineered traits can transfer into organic crops that were planted in a field that contained GM crops the season before. This may also increase implementation costs and further confuse whatever labeling system is in place.
The (Not so) Long Arm of the International Law
International environmental law is a relatively new field and does not contain much concrete law regarding binding constraints or a robust system of penalties. The main treaty regarding GMOs and the environment is the Cartagena Protocol, which was enacted in 2003 and signed by Peru the following year.[xxx] The protocol “enables a Party to ban the import of a LMO (living modified organism) if the importing Party determines that insufficient scientific information and knowledge are available about the GMO, about the receiving environment, or about the potential interaction between them.”[xxxi] The protocol allows the importing country to make up its own mind about LMOs based on the available evidence and decide whether to allow or deny their entry.
Also, the Cartagena Protocol emphasizes the precautionary principle, or Principle 15 of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development (1992), which states that “where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.”[xxxii] The principle calls for risk analysis and proper mechanisms in order to reduce the uncertainty of the potential impact of GMOs on the environment. The Codex Alimentarius Commission provides such a framework for developing food standards and undertaking risk analysis on the safety of biotech foods.[xxxiii]
To be Transgenic or Not to be Transgenic?
Peru’s thriving ecosystem and its hugely important organic sector have provided viable arguments against the introduction of GMOs into the country. In addition, the research regarding health and environmental risks posed by transgenic foods remain both immature and limited, particularly regarding the long-term effects of GMOs. In light of so many unknown factors, it is only sensible that Peruvians have demanded further testing before these products are introduced into their daily environment. It also remains an individual’s right to choose what to put into their body, a right that could be severely undermined due to the mislabeling of products.
However, one must also imagine a world in which every technological advancement must wait in prolonged limbo before being implemented, while, in the meantime, other countries are taking advantage of such an innovation. Should a country forgo every technological advancement that is not 100 percent safe based on possible risks? Will Peru fall behind during the moratorium, stepping aside to allow others to take advantage of the increased production, food security, and trade that GMOs offer? Or is Peru ahead of the curve, realizing that opening its country to further control by foreign MNCs is a slippery slope, and that environmental and health risks are often irreversible? Will Peru be lauded as the prophet or exposed as the fool? The next ten years will surely forecast the role that GMOs will play in the future of Peru. In the meantime, the issue will remain in limbo, lying dormant until the next grand, transgenic debate.
[i] Elie Gardner, “Peru allows GM food imports, and protests grow,” Living in Peru, (May 11, 2011), <http://www.livinginperu.com/news-14842-food-peru-allows-gm-food-imports-and-protests-grow>.
[ii] Ibid.
[iii]25 Ibid.
[iv] Gaspar E. Nolte, “GAIN Report: Peru Approves Biosafety Regulation,” USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, (April 19, 2011), <http://gain.fas.usda.gov/Recent%20GAIN%20Publications/Peru%20Approves%20Biosafety%20Regulation_Lima_Peru_4-19-2011.pdf>.
[v] “Lima, Peru to declare itself a GMO-free zone,” GM Watch, (April 28, 2011), <http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/13104-lima-peru-to-declare-itself-a-gmo-free-zone>.
[vi] Elie Gardner, “10-year moratorium approved on entrance of GMOs to Peru,” Living in Peru, (June 8, 2011), <http://www.livinginperu.com/news-15173-food-10-year-moratorium-approved-entrance-gmos-peru>.
[vii] Ibid.
[viii]27 “The Issues: Genetic Engineering,” Sustainable Table, <http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/ge/>.
[ix] Ibid.
[x] “Historic Figures: Thomas Malthus,” BBC History, (2011), <http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/malthus_thomas.shtml>.
[xi] “High Level Expert Forum: How to Feed the World in 2050,” United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), (October 12-13, 2009), <http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/wsfs/docs/Issues_papers/HLEF2050_Global_Agriculture.pdf>.
[xii]28 Ibid.
[xiii]29 “The Issues: Genetic Engineering”
[xiv]30 Katherine Goldstein and Gazelle Emami, “Monsanto’s GMO Corn Linked to Organ Failure, Study Reveals,” The Huffington Post, (January 12, 2010), <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/12/monsantos-gmo-corn-linked_n_420365.html>.
[xv] “Peru Travel Guide: Nature and Biodiversity,” Go 2 Peru, (2000), <http://www.go2peru.com/peru_nature.htm>.
[xvi]31 “Peru allows GM food imports, and protests grow”
[xvii]32 “The Issues: Genetic Engineering”
[xviii]33 Frank Morris, “Monsanto GMO Ignites Big Seed War,” National Public Radio (NPR), (January 12, 2010), <http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122498255>.
[xix]34 Ibid.
[xx] Ibid.
[xxi]35 Ibid.
[xxii]36 “Monsanto GMOS Ignites Big Seed War”
[xxiii]37 Ibid.
[xxiv]38 Dan Flynn, “Peru to Begin Labeling GM Food,” Food Safety News, (April 23, 2010), <http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2010/04/labeling-for-gm-approval-system-in-peru/>.
[xxv]39 “Genetically Modified Food and Organisms,” Human Genome Program – United States Department of Energy, (November 5, 2008), <http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/elsi/gmfood.shtml>.
[xxvi]40 “The Kimberley Process,” Global Witness, <http://www.globalwitness.org/campaigns/conflict/conflict-diamonds/kimberley-process>.
[xxvii]41 “Peru allows GM food imports, and protests grow”
[xxviii]42 Greg Traxler, “The GMO Experience in North and South America – where to from here?”Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology – Auburn University, <http://www.fas.usda.gov/icd/stconf/event5/GTraxler.pdf>.
[xxix]43 “Peru allows GM food imports, and protests grow”
[xxx]44 “About the Protocol,” Convention on Biological Diversity – United Nations Environment Programme, (June 28, 2010), <http://bch.cbd.int/protocol/background/>.
[xxxi]45 “Text of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety,” Convention on Biological Diversity – United Nations Environment Programme, (April 27, 2011), <http://bch.cbd.int/protocol/text/>.
[xxxii]46 “Rio Declaration on Environment and Development,” United Nations Environment Programme, <http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=78&ArticleID=1163&l=en>.
[xxxiii]47 “FAO/WHO Food Standards: Codex Alimentarius,” UN FAO and the World Bank, 2011, <http://www.codexalimentarius.net/web/index_en.jsp>.
Tuesday, 21 June 2011
Dog and Pony Shows: Good Policy or Public Relations
Did you see this one:
Even so, Shaff said, the yuck factor was the primary reason for the decision to drain the 8 million gallons, at a cost of less than US $8,000 to treat it as sewage.
Man caught urinating in reservoir, US city flushes 8 million gallons of water
•The Portland reservoir. (AP)
Portland (Oregon): Call it the big flush. Because a 21-year-old man was caught on a security camera urinating into a city reservoir, Oregon's biggest city is sending 8 million gallons of treated drinking water down the drain.
Portland officials defended the decision yesterday, saying they didn't want to send city residents water laced, however infinitesimally, with urine.
Public health officials say, however, that urine is sterile in healthy people and that the urine in the reservoir was so diluted perhaps a half pint in millions of gallons that it posed little risk.
Some people in the city, in the suburbs and around the world called the flush an overreaction, especially since animals such as ducks contribute waste routinely and, sometimes, die in the water.
Even so, Shaff said, the yuck factor was the primary reason for the decision to drain the 8 million gallons, at a cost of less than US $8,000 to treat it as sewage.
"Nobody wants to drink pee, and I don't want to deal with the 100 people who would be unhappy that I'm serving them pee in their water," he said. Shaff said the security cameras also showed something that's still unidentified was thrown in the water, heightening concern about potential risks.
City Commissioner Randy Leonard, who is in charge of the water bureau, defended the decision, citing a potential public health risk. He said he worried about the possibility of chlamydia or AIDS from blood in urine.
"I'm for taking the most conservative approach," he said.
The young man, Josh Seater, told KATU-TV he'd been drinking, was with friends and thought that the reservoir was a sewage treatment plant. He said he felt guilty instantly, and then security guards arrived.
Besides the sewage charge, Shaff said, the flushed water is worth US $28,000.
____________________________________________________
It was always very challenging to report on tiny little things (plant viruses for example) that had enormous consequences for people. PVYn for example was a virus who's only sin was that it killed tobacco plants (tobacco and potatoes are in the same solanacious family), but in the early '90's it cost PEI potato growers hundreds of millions of dollars in lost markets, forced some farmers into bankruptcy, hobbled the seed potato sector, and lead to the quick expansion of the french fry business on PEI. It was on a list of prohibited plant viruses in North America, mostly as a trade barrier to keep Dutch seed potatoes from competing here. It did have consequences for small tobacco growers in Kentucky, and other mid-eastern U.S. states who also grow potatoes, but the financial consequences for farmers far dwarfed the actual risk to anyone else.
As a reporter you were faced with difficult decisions every day for months. All around you saw good people being hurt financially through no fault of their own, and your instincts were to be a "homer", to go to war to get the border open again, but that wasn't your job. You tried to get the best understanding of the science at play, and of course, the more serious issue of the politics at work. The Maine potato industry certainly used its political muscle (the Senate majority leader at the time was Maine's George Mitchell) to shut down PEI exports, and Canadian agriculture officials scrambled to find the right balance of good science, public relations, and political arm twisting to get the border open again. A mistake in the testing procedures by Agriculture Canada which made it appear that thousands of more acres of potatoes had PVYn than actually did, only added to the misery.
The discovery of potato wart in a few potatoes harvested in New Annam a few years later had similar consequences. Again there was no danger to people but the fungus was on a list of prohibited diseases and once it was reported, agriculture officials had little choice but again shutdown PEI exports to the U.S., and in this case, to other Canadian provinces who wanted to trade with the U.S.
There were a few things I learned through these long and difficult stories:
1. Testing is always a probability game, and results are determined by how hard an agency is prepared to look. Nothing is ever a 100% free of anything.
2. Agriculture officials and the media insist on talking about these issues in absolutes, the need to "eradicate" a certain disease, when in the real world nothing is ever absolute, the challenge is to get disease levels down to a level that they can't be found under the testing regime that's in play.
3. Canada never resolved these disease/trade fights through "cleaning up" the problem here, it always required testing U.S. produce coming into Canada, finding something wrong with it, and then negotiating a testing regime that both countries could live with.
4. The real security for farmers on both sides of the border is the confidence the two regulatory agencies (in the U.S. and Canada) have in each other, which is pretty high right now. This should prevent the need for demanding dramatic actions like border closures if something comes up.
5. Countries often take very extreme actions (think of the thousands of cattle slaughtered and incinerated in England to control hoof and mouth disease, or tens of thousands of chickens killed in British Columbia because of H1N1) not because it's scientifically the right thing to do, but in order to maintain export markets (hence the dog and pony show).
This isn't in any way to diminish the huge challenges facing food inspection agencies all over the world, and the consequences if they get it wrong. I am saying that good science and common sense are often in short supply during these crises, and the media of course plays its part.
Remember SARS in 2003, the serious pneumonia virus that started in Asia and spread quickly wherever world travelers went, including Toronto. Night after night we saw images of sick people in hospital beds, and masked and gowned family members and medical staff doing everything they could to keep them alive. The problem was these images represented just a tiny fraction of the people, and what was going on in Toronto at the time, but from what I heard from foreign visitors afterward, the impression left was all of Toronto, heck maybe all of Canada, was in serious jeopardy, which clearly wasn't the case.
I have a theory that could be totally ridiculous, but what the hell. Mad Cow was discovered in one Alberta cow just shortly after the SARS adventure. I thought the media handled the announcement really well, sober, factual, and I often wondered if there had been some reflection on how over the top the SARS story was covered, and some resolve to treat the next crisis a little differently.
Anyway the Portland Oregon water story is, in my opinion, just one more example of taking extreme steps for public relations reasons, rather than common sense. Some city official pondered the potential headline: "Portland Water Supply Put at Risk, and Officials Did Nothing" and gave the order.. pull the plug.
Sunday, 19 June 2011
Food Speculators on Notice
Canada has been out of step at many international forums, and will be tested again this week The G20 meets in Paris to talk about the critical issue (for millions of the the world's poor) of soaring food prices. Many are convinced that it isn't simply a question of lack of supply caused by droughts and floods, but that hedge funds and other financial speculators now see food and farmland as the latest playground to get rich. As we learned the painful consequences from the unwillingness of governments to regulate increasingly speculative financial instruments over the last decade, we wait now to see if any lessons have been learned. The consequences of getting this wrong will be felt in distant lands by strangers, but surely there's good reason to make food a fairly traded commodity, and keep speculators out of the equation.
The British Guardian continues to do excellent reporting on this.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jun/17/global-food-prices-increase-united-nations
Food price explosion 'will devastate the world's poor'
by Rupert Neate • June 17, 2011 •
Food prices will soar by as much as 30% over the next 10 years, the United Nations and Organizationhttp://www.srfood.org/index.php/en/component/content/article/1394-g20-agriculture-5-priorities-to-end-food-crises for Economic Co-operation and Development have predicted.
Angel Gurría, secretary-general of the OECD, said that any further increase in global food prices, which have risen by 40% over the past year, will have a "devastating" impact on the world's poor and is likely to lead to political unrest, famine and starvation. "People are going to be forced either to eat less or find other sources of income."
The joint UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and OECD report predicted that the cost of cereals is likely to increase by 20% and the price of meat, particularly chicken, may soar by up to 30%.
World food prices are already at a near-record high as droughts and floods threaten to seriously damage this year's harvest. The report said the global harvest is in a "critical" condition and warned that prices will continue to rise until depleted stocks are rebuilt.
Global food prices hit a record high in February, prompting demonstrations across the world. The last extreme food price rise in 2008 led to riots in 20 countries across three continents.
Gurría called on world leaders to ban speculators from pushing up food prices. The G20 will meet in Paris next week to thrash out a deal aimed at imposing strict rules on trading in food commodities and policies that distort global food market.
French president Nicolas Sarkozy3 has repeatedly attacked hedge funds and specialised financial institutions for pushing up food prices. "Speculation, panic and lack of transparency have seen prices soaring," he said. "Is that the world we want? France is saying quite clearly it is not."
He compared the lack of regulation on food price speculators to lax regulation that drove financial markets to the "edge of the abyss" during the 2008 financial crisis.
The report predicted global agricultural production would grow at an annual rate of 1.7% a year over the next decade, compared with 2.6% the past 10 years. "Slower growth is expected for most crops, especially oilseeds and coarse grains," it said. "The global slowdown in projected yield improvements of important crops will continue to exert pressure on international prices."
The slowdown in production comes as new forecasts predict the global population will climb to 9.2 billion by 2050, compared with the current level of 6.9 billion. The FAO said agricultural production would have to increase by 70% to match the expected increase.
Meat exports are expected to rise by only 1.7% by 2021, compared with a 4.4% increase over the previous decade. In contrast, fish production is expected to increase by 14.7% over the same period. Most of this will come from fish farms, which are due to overtake open sea fishing by 2015.
http://www.srfood.org/index.php/en/component/content/article/1394-g20-agriculture-5-priorities-to-end-food-crises
5 priorities to end food crises
•
[17 June 2011] BRUSSELS – On June 22 and 23, the G20 Agriculture Ministers will meet in Paris to make progress on key issues such as reducing commodity price volatility, limiting financial speculation and establishing a global action plan against food crises. According to Olivier De Schutter, five priorities may give this G20 summit a vital role in improving long-term global food security. Will they be endorsed and implemented?
Op-Ed published on June 16, 2011 in The Guardian
In the fight to address global food crises, will the French presidency at the G20 summit succeed where others have failed? On the eve of the G20 Agriculture Summit on June 22-23, there is no doubt as to the urgency of adopting an ambitious plan of action. France has a decisive role to play with the other major economies of the planet: together, they must advance the priorities aimed at moving the food system out of its current impasse.
For it is indeed an impasse that we are facing. Starting from the misdiagnosis of attributing global hunger to a simple lack of food, governments have for years focused their efforts solely on increasing agricultural production by industrial methods alone, as a means to both feeding their growing cities and supplying international markets. This has become a quick fix to the "failure" of national production – increasing food supply has become a substitute for a real food security policy. The failure of these long advocated "solutions" is everywhere to be seen. The price spikes occur repeatedly. Environmental degradation accelerates. Rural poverty and malnutrition persist.
Let’s have the honesty to recognize where we have been wrong: hunger is neither the result of demographic problems nor just the result of a mismatch between supply and demand. It is primarily the result of political factors that condemn small farmers, the primary victims of hunger, to poverty. These factors include insufficient access to land, water and credit; poor organization of local markets; lack of infrastructure; and lack of bargaining power against intermediate and an increasingly concentrated agro-industrial sector. It will take G20 leaders courage to put the global food system back on track.
They will have to break the “myth” of hunger as being reducible to a technical issue or to a failure of current food systems to produce sufficient volumes. The French Presidency appears determined to act decisively on the issue of speculation on the agricultural commodities market. But beyond the question of speculation, the G20 members remain deeply divided over agricultural policy for the 21st century. The outcome of this debate will have real consequences for all humanity.
Five priorities may give this G20 summit a vital role in improving long-term global food security. As the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, I call upon our G20 leaders to endorse these priorities, and act upon them:
1. Regulate and make more transparent, the markets for agricultural products. The impact of financial speculation on food prices is now widely recognized, and this needs to be subject to control without delay. The United States legislated on derivatives nearly a year ago. The G20, under French presidency, could encourage other major economies to follow the same path.
2. Encourage the development of regional storage facilities. As we are faced with growing instability in production due to climate change, it is urgent to strengthen systems of storage at the regional level. Currently, in developing countries, 30% of crops - 40% of fruits and vegetables - are lost because of lack of adequate storage facilities. We may in fact move beyond storage facilities to the establishment of food reserves, not just to allow the humanitarian agencies to respond to emergencies, but also to reduce price volatility across seasons. Provided they are managed in a transparent and participatory way, food reserves may be capable of smoothing prices between periods of good harvests and low periods, characterized by rising prices. The G20 should encourage international institutions and cooperating agencies to further support these regional storage facilities.
3. Support the provision of public goods. To enhance the productivity of small farmers in developing countries, it is necessary to accelerate the provision of public goods such as agricultural extension services or construction of roads linking farmers to urban consumers. It is also crucial to help small producers organize themselves into cooperatives and unions in order to strengthen their positions in food chains and to collaborate with governments in designing programs that are supposed to benefit them.
4. Support the capacity of all countries to feed themselves by strategies based on the right to food. Since the early 1990s, the food bills of the least developed countries have increased five- or six-fold due to lack of investment in the production of food crops. The continued promotion of export agriculture has made these countries highly vulnerable to exchange rate volatility and price spikes in international markets. This trend can be reversed by the implementation of multi-year national strategies, designed to restore efficient subsistence agriculture. Where they are adopted in a participatory way, and where they include mechanisms for monitoring the commitments of governments, such national strategies can improve accountability of governments. The experience of some Latin American countries shows that such strategies focusing on the right to food may improve food security in a sustainable manner. The G20 should reiterate this message and recognize the importance of institutional frameworks and adequate governance in any strategy for food security.
5. Strengthen global food security governance. The Committee on World Food Security (CFS) has been reformed in the wake of the 2007-2008 food crisis to strengthen cooperation and coordination between States and international agencies. CFS is now the only forum linking governments, international institutions and civil society in improving food security policies. The G20 should affirm its support for this important step towards better coordination of efforts at international level. It is no longer acceptable that policies in trade or international investment policies, for example, contradict rural development programs in the field that are aimed at improving the situation of poor farmers.
Hunger is not a natural disaster - it is, rather, a political problem. And that is precisely why this scandal must and can be stopped. Today, France, together with its G20 partners, has the unique opportunity of contributing decisively to this end, and I am confident it will do so.
The British Guardian continues to do excellent reporting on this.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jun/17/global-food-prices-increase-united-nations
Food price explosion 'will devastate the world's poor'
by Rupert Neate • June 17, 2011 •
Food prices will soar by as much as 30% over the next 10 years, the United Nations and Organizationhttp://www.srfood.org/index.php/en/component/content/article/1394-g20-agriculture-5-priorities-to-end-food-crises for Economic Co-operation and Development have predicted.
Angel Gurría, secretary-general of the OECD, said that any further increase in global food prices, which have risen by 40% over the past year, will have a "devastating" impact on the world's poor and is likely to lead to political unrest, famine and starvation. "People are going to be forced either to eat less or find other sources of income."
The joint UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and OECD report predicted that the cost of cereals is likely to increase by 20% and the price of meat, particularly chicken, may soar by up to 30%.
World food prices are already at a near-record high as droughts and floods threaten to seriously damage this year's harvest. The report said the global harvest is in a "critical" condition and warned that prices will continue to rise until depleted stocks are rebuilt.
Global food prices hit a record high in February, prompting demonstrations across the world. The last extreme food price rise in 2008 led to riots in 20 countries across three continents.
Gurría called on world leaders to ban speculators from pushing up food prices. The G20 will meet in Paris next week to thrash out a deal aimed at imposing strict rules on trading in food commodities and policies that distort global food market.
French president Nicolas Sarkozy3 has repeatedly attacked hedge funds and specialised financial institutions for pushing up food prices. "Speculation, panic and lack of transparency have seen prices soaring," he said. "Is that the world we want? France is saying quite clearly it is not."
He compared the lack of regulation on food price speculators to lax regulation that drove financial markets to the "edge of the abyss" during the 2008 financial crisis.
The report predicted global agricultural production would grow at an annual rate of 1.7% a year over the next decade, compared with 2.6% the past 10 years. "Slower growth is expected for most crops, especially oilseeds and coarse grains," it said. "The global slowdown in projected yield improvements of important crops will continue to exert pressure on international prices."
The slowdown in production comes as new forecasts predict the global population will climb to 9.2 billion by 2050, compared with the current level of 6.9 billion. The FAO said agricultural production would have to increase by 70% to match the expected increase.
Meat exports are expected to rise by only 1.7% by 2021, compared with a 4.4% increase over the previous decade. In contrast, fish production is expected to increase by 14.7% over the same period. Most of this will come from fish farms, which are due to overtake open sea fishing by 2015.
http://www.srfood.org/index.php/en/component/content/article/1394-g20-agriculture-5-priorities-to-end-food-crises
5 priorities to end food crises
•
[17 June 2011] BRUSSELS – On June 22 and 23, the G20 Agriculture Ministers will meet in Paris to make progress on key issues such as reducing commodity price volatility, limiting financial speculation and establishing a global action plan against food crises. According to Olivier De Schutter, five priorities may give this G20 summit a vital role in improving long-term global food security. Will they be endorsed and implemented?
Op-Ed published on June 16, 2011 in The Guardian
In the fight to address global food crises, will the French presidency at the G20 summit succeed where others have failed? On the eve of the G20 Agriculture Summit on June 22-23, there is no doubt as to the urgency of adopting an ambitious plan of action. France has a decisive role to play with the other major economies of the planet: together, they must advance the priorities aimed at moving the food system out of its current impasse.
For it is indeed an impasse that we are facing. Starting from the misdiagnosis of attributing global hunger to a simple lack of food, governments have for years focused their efforts solely on increasing agricultural production by industrial methods alone, as a means to both feeding their growing cities and supplying international markets. This has become a quick fix to the "failure" of national production – increasing food supply has become a substitute for a real food security policy. The failure of these long advocated "solutions" is everywhere to be seen. The price spikes occur repeatedly. Environmental degradation accelerates. Rural poverty and malnutrition persist.
Let’s have the honesty to recognize where we have been wrong: hunger is neither the result of demographic problems nor just the result of a mismatch between supply and demand. It is primarily the result of political factors that condemn small farmers, the primary victims of hunger, to poverty. These factors include insufficient access to land, water and credit; poor organization of local markets; lack of infrastructure; and lack of bargaining power against intermediate and an increasingly concentrated agro-industrial sector. It will take G20 leaders courage to put the global food system back on track.
They will have to break the “myth” of hunger as being reducible to a technical issue or to a failure of current food systems to produce sufficient volumes. The French Presidency appears determined to act decisively on the issue of speculation on the agricultural commodities market. But beyond the question of speculation, the G20 members remain deeply divided over agricultural policy for the 21st century. The outcome of this debate will have real consequences for all humanity.
Five priorities may give this G20 summit a vital role in improving long-term global food security. As the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, I call upon our G20 leaders to endorse these priorities, and act upon them:
1. Regulate and make more transparent, the markets for agricultural products. The impact of financial speculation on food prices is now widely recognized, and this needs to be subject to control without delay. The United States legislated on derivatives nearly a year ago. The G20, under French presidency, could encourage other major economies to follow the same path.
2. Encourage the development of regional storage facilities. As we are faced with growing instability in production due to climate change, it is urgent to strengthen systems of storage at the regional level. Currently, in developing countries, 30% of crops - 40% of fruits and vegetables - are lost because of lack of adequate storage facilities. We may in fact move beyond storage facilities to the establishment of food reserves, not just to allow the humanitarian agencies to respond to emergencies, but also to reduce price volatility across seasons. Provided they are managed in a transparent and participatory way, food reserves may be capable of smoothing prices between periods of good harvests and low periods, characterized by rising prices. The G20 should encourage international institutions and cooperating agencies to further support these regional storage facilities.
3. Support the provision of public goods. To enhance the productivity of small farmers in developing countries, it is necessary to accelerate the provision of public goods such as agricultural extension services or construction of roads linking farmers to urban consumers. It is also crucial to help small producers organize themselves into cooperatives and unions in order to strengthen their positions in food chains and to collaborate with governments in designing programs that are supposed to benefit them.
4. Support the capacity of all countries to feed themselves by strategies based on the right to food. Since the early 1990s, the food bills of the least developed countries have increased five- or six-fold due to lack of investment in the production of food crops. The continued promotion of export agriculture has made these countries highly vulnerable to exchange rate volatility and price spikes in international markets. This trend can be reversed by the implementation of multi-year national strategies, designed to restore efficient subsistence agriculture. Where they are adopted in a participatory way, and where they include mechanisms for monitoring the commitments of governments, such national strategies can improve accountability of governments. The experience of some Latin American countries shows that such strategies focusing on the right to food may improve food security in a sustainable manner. The G20 should reiterate this message and recognize the importance of institutional frameworks and adequate governance in any strategy for food security.
5. Strengthen global food security governance. The Committee on World Food Security (CFS) has been reformed in the wake of the 2007-2008 food crisis to strengthen cooperation and coordination between States and international agencies. CFS is now the only forum linking governments, international institutions and civil society in improving food security policies. The G20 should affirm its support for this important step towards better coordination of efforts at international level. It is no longer acceptable that policies in trade or international investment policies, for example, contradict rural development programs in the field that are aimed at improving the situation of poor farmers.
Hunger is not a natural disaster - it is, rather, a political problem. And that is precisely why this scandal must and can be stopped. Today, France, together with its G20 partners, has the unique opportunity of contributing decisively to this end, and I am confident it will do so.
Friday, 17 June 2011
That Didn't Take Long
I was convinced the business press would link killing the wheat board with getting rid of supply management, and I wasn't disappointed (pissed off maybe). And notice how in today's (Friday) editorial the Globe calls it "dairy subsidies". In fact it's just the opposite. The consumer pays the full cost at the supermaket checkout, and that consumer dollar is spread fairly between the farmer, processors, and others in the marketing chain. I know supply management isn't perfect, but it's a damn sight better and fairer than most other marketing chains. Do you want ice cream and cheese made from cows that are run harder by bST , the dairy hormone used by most U.S. dairy farmers to increase production because they don't get paid fairly? I could go on.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/opinion/the-tories-massive-contradiction-on-supply-management/article2062286/
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/editorials/were-having-a-cow-over-dairy-subsidies/article2064207/
Were having a cow over dairy subsidies
June 17, 2011 •
The Harper government was right to promise to end the Canadian Wheat Board's export monopoly, in the Speech from the Throne, but that sits oddly with the pledge earlier in the speech to “stand up for Canadian farmers and industries by defending supply management.”
The Wheat Board is considerably less anti-competitive than supply management. As Lawrence Herman, a trade lawyer at Cassels Brock, says, it is “a single-desk seller that competes at world market prices. The supply-managed sectors are totally protected from open market competition.”
The Conservatives – a party not long ago accused of free-market dogmatism – made a similar vow to uphold supply management in the election campaign. It is difficult not to infer motives; their position on the Wheat Board attracts support from many prairie farmers, while their position on supply management is meant to win over the well-organized dairy farmers of Ontario and Quebec.
Thanks to supply management, the prices of dairy products in Canada tend to be two or three times higher than in the rest of the world. This regime is aimed at the domestic market. Consequently, the Canadian Dairy Commission (a Crown corporation intended to co-ordinate a bewildering cluster of federal and provincial policies) assigns much lower prices for dairy-product exports, which is a great help to, for example, Canadian makers of frozen pizza, who have American competitors – while makers of fresh pizza in Canada have to overpay for cheese.
This is a classic case of mercantilism; it favours exporters and hurts domestic, Canadian consumers. As Mr. Herman observes, the improvement of Canadian wine producers has shown the benefits of requiring an industry “to modernize and become internationally competitive.” The Conservatives have got their priorities reversed. They should act to end supply management first. The Canadian Wheat Board's export monopoly should end, but it does less harm than dairy protectionism.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/opinion/the-tories-massive-contradiction-on-supply-management/article2062286/
The Tories massive contradiction on supply management
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/editorials/were-having-a-cow-over-dairy-subsidies/article2064207/
Were having a cow over dairy subsidies
June 17, 2011 •
The Harper government was right to promise to end the Canadian Wheat Board's export monopoly, in the Speech from the Throne, but that sits oddly with the pledge earlier in the speech to “stand up for Canadian farmers and industries by defending supply management.”
The Wheat Board is considerably less anti-competitive than supply management. As Lawrence Herman, a trade lawyer at Cassels Brock, says, it is “a single-desk seller that competes at world market prices. The supply-managed sectors are totally protected from open market competition.”
The Conservatives – a party not long ago accused of free-market dogmatism – made a similar vow to uphold supply management in the election campaign. It is difficult not to infer motives; their position on the Wheat Board attracts support from many prairie farmers, while their position on supply management is meant to win over the well-organized dairy farmers of Ontario and Quebec.
Thanks to supply management, the prices of dairy products in Canada tend to be two or three times higher than in the rest of the world. This regime is aimed at the domestic market. Consequently, the Canadian Dairy Commission (a Crown corporation intended to co-ordinate a bewildering cluster of federal and provincial policies) assigns much lower prices for dairy-product exports, which is a great help to, for example, Canadian makers of frozen pizza, who have American competitors – while makers of fresh pizza in Canada have to overpay for cheese.
This is a classic case of mercantilism; it favours exporters and hurts domestic, Canadian consumers. As Mr. Herman observes, the improvement of Canadian wine producers has shown the benefits of requiring an industry “to modernize and become internationally competitive.” The Conservatives have got their priorities reversed. They should act to end supply management first. The Canadian Wheat Board's export monopoly should end, but it does less harm than dairy protectionism.
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