The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Symposium on
Agricultural Biotechnologies was held at the FAO headquarters in Rome between 15th
and 17th Feb 2016. This particular symposium was conducted in the
aftermath of the celebrated success of the Agroecology symposium organized by
FAO in 2014. That the agribusiness industry was disconcerted by the euphoria
surrounding agroecology and hence strong-arming the FAO to organize a similar
event on agricultural biotechnology is no secret. Hence there was a strong
undercurrent that the FAO was losing its proclaimed ‘neutral’ position in
agriculture.
The conference took off on a note of FAO considering ‘every
possible alternative’ to end world hunger and malnutrition, given population
growth and climate change. The Director General José Graziano da Silvarepeatedly
stressed that agricultural biotechnology was not limited to Genetically
Modified Organisms (GMO) alone. Though this is true, GMOs dominate the global
agri-biotech industry, and are extremely controversial, to say the least.
Almost every speaker who spoke afterward stressed the same point so much so
that even an unbiased delegate became suspicious of the speaker’s ulterior
intentions.
The plenary session consisted of the following Keynote
addresses:
1. The state of knowledge in biotechnology, by Louise
Fresco, President, Executive Board of Wageningen UR, Wageningen, The
Netherlands
2. Towards ending the misplaced global debate on
biotechnology, by GebisaEjeta, Distinguished Professor, Purdue University, West
Lafayette, United States of America
3. Biotechnologies in action in Brazil, by Maurício Lopes,
President, EmpresaBrasileira de PesquisaAgropecuária, Brasília, Brazil
4. Breakthroughs in resource productivity, by Gunter Pauli,
Founder, Zero Emissions Research and Initiatives Network, Japan
Out of the 4 speakers, 3 were pro biotech (read GMO) and only the
last one, Gunter Pauli, spoke about creating systems and processes that used
natural synergies and much more productive than agri-biotech. The same pattern
was repeated over the entire conference, with civil society getting only one
speaker slot out of more than 80 invited speakers. Of course this was expected
as FAO intended it to portray the latest advances in agri-biotech. But what was
not expected was the blatant advertising that the industry indulged in. From
CropLife International to DuPont Pioneer, Borlaug Institute to IFPRI, they were
all there to proclaim that the notorious agri-biotech industry is the only
solution to end world hunger and help agriculture adapt to climate change. (Climate
change is now the latest excuse these entities are giving to continue selling
their extremely climate non-resilient technologies.)
As the conference concluded, there was a call to bridge
agricultural biotechnology with agroecology. Anybody who knows anything about
agriculture knows this is not possible. Agricultural biotech promotes
monoculture, industrial farming, sky-rocketing input costs, concentration of
seeds in the hands of a few elite companies, widening of the IPR net and
resulting in the farmer becoming a mere pawn in this racket. Agroecology on the
other hand is based on mixed cropping, low input costs, family owned farms and
seeds, and is dedicated to conserving the fertility of the soil, the natural
environment and the sovereign rights of the farmer. How can the twain meet? And why is FAO being
forced to build this impossible and dangerous bridge?
If a bridge must be built, it is the one between farmers of
different countries, suffering corporate and many times their Governments’ biased
policies. Small farmers practicing Agro-ecology is the best bet we have to feed
and cool the planet.
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