This past weekend I went to the National Heirloom Expo in Santa Rosa. I was honored to hear Vandana Shiva speak. I read a few of Vananda Shiva's books while studying international food systems and gender in university. I'd love to share with you some of the thoughts that Dr. Shiva shared with us at the expo. This is a bio of Dr. Shiva:
Dr. Shiva combines sharp intellectual enquiry with courageous activism, and her work spans teaching at universities worldwide to working with peasants in rural India. Time Magazine identified Dr. Shiva as an environmental ‘hero’ in 2003, and Asia Week has called her one of the five most powerful communicators in Asia. In November 2010, Forbes Magazine identified Dr. Shiva as one of the Seven Most Powerful Women on the Globe.
Dr. Shiva has contributed in fundamental ways to changing the practice and paradigms of agriculture and food. Her books The Violence of the Green Revolution and Monocultures of the Mind pose essential challenges to the dominant paradigm of non-sustainable, industrial agriculture. Through her books Biopiracy, Stolen Harvest and Water Wars, Dr. Shiva has made visible the social, economic and ecological costs of corporate-led globalisation. Dr. Shiva chairs the Commission on the Future of Food set up by the Region of Tuscany in Italy, she is a Board member of the International Forum on Globalisation (IGF), and a member of the Steering Committee of the Indian People’s Campaign Against the WTO. Source
Monsanto's need to control the seed is driven by the fear of diversity, the fear of life, and the fear of self-organization
A seed is naturally inexhaustive and abundant with life, so Monsanto creates technology to make seeds dead
The Green Revolution was not created to feed people - it was created to introduce chemicals into agriculture
Monsanto created hunger because it created scarcity by killing the seed (by making seeds unable to reproduce)
Mexico's ban on GMO corn is a direct result of people coming out and saying "We are the corn. You cannot separate us from the corn"
As citizens seeking freedom, many of us have resign ourselves to monoculture activism (ex "I'll just be an activist for the rainforest") when infact we area all connected
All movements for freedom are dependent on each other
You are not free until everyone is free
90% of corn in the soil is being grown for biofuels - it is no longer a "food" system
- Hybrid crops are designed not to breed true, so farmers become dependent on coming back to the seed companies every year
What has been passed off as "development" is actually neo-colonialism guised as technology that is meant to better the lives of "underdeveloped" populations
To patent seeds is an attack on the rights of the farmer to grow food and the rights of the seeds to continue its life freely to the next generation
- Patented seeds are a war against abundance, because abundance in the hands of the people allows for sovereignty
- Our economy is based on companies thinking "how can we make people dependent on us so that they have to keep giving us money without choice"
To try and kill weeds through mono-extermination creates a superweed that is immune to that extermination method
The same principle applies to the revolutions and resistance movements that those in power attempt to monoexterminate
We just become stronger. We are stronger than Monsanto.
Anything that comes from fear will never have the same power as that which comes from life and love
nice post @anwenbaumeister
i want to try durain :)
large variety of natural foods. What a nice weekend.
I wish nice hikes could lead to these haha.
Lucky you to have such opportunity. Diversity is the key! Therefore I am also happy to see so many different languages on steemit. Esperanto estas nur unu inter multaj diversaj lingvoj. Bonan tagon al vi!
nice.
Monsanto can not compete with small orfanic farm
nice post
amazing post @anwenbaumeister
You do content post and enjoy reading. Thanks for always coming my way.
Very interesting post, thank you.