THE COUNTRY THAT WE DREAM: FOOD SOVEREIGNTY OR TRANSGENIC

The 2008 Constitution declared Ecuador Free of GE crops and seeds. Now they want to review this decision.

Elizabeth Bravo
2-SEP-2012

In an interview to the media in August 2012, the President of Ecuador expressed regrets for the incorporation into the Constitution a ban on GM crops and seeds, because it missed a historic opportunity to build the country we dream. This is coupled with the statements made in the Citizen Link # 287, where the President addressed the issue of GMOs and said he should relax the constitutional ban, and calls for a national debate on this subject.

These declarations were made two weeks after the justice of Argentina sentenced a transgenic soybean producer and aero-fumigator to three years in prison for the crime of pollution. Remember that GM soy is genetically manipulated to make it resistant to the herbicide glyphosate. This allows producers to control weeds associated with soy monoculture through aerial spraying. The problem is that the drift carried the poison to the towns surrounding the crops, causing serious health problems.

The farmer sentenced had soybean fields near a suburban neighbourhood in the city of Córdoba (called Ituzaingó Annex), in which it was found, after a house to house survey, 169 cancer cases and more 30 deaths  from the disease, and than other pollution-related diseases such as lupus, skin, birth defects and unwanted abortions. This story is repeated in thousands of villages and neighbourhoods surrounded by transgenic soybeans resistant to glyphosate herbicide in Argentina.

Ironically, Argentina is often given as the example to be followed by other countries, as this was the first Latin American nation, in the Menem administration, when this technology was massively adopted.

This raises the following question: Is our dream to build a Transgenic Republic in our country?. To answer this question, we must know what are GMOs.

There are many myths and false promises around GMOs. You can tell a farmer that sowing transgenic lima-beans he will not lose the crop if there is a frost, but this affirmation would not be adjusted to reality. Why? Because there are no seeds of lima-beans resistant to frost. In fact, there are no transgenic lima-beans seeds at all, nor are there any transgenic seeds resistant to frost circulating in the global market.

A review of the approvals granted by the competent authorities on the subject in the countries that produce GM commercial scale, can show us that there are basically only two types of GM crops commercially successful: herbicides tolerant and insect resistant (Bt).

70% of GM crops in the world are soybeans resistant to glyphosate, and a high percentage of the remainder have incorporated herbicide resistance genes, i.e. that GMOs have been designed primarily to be used with herbicides. In this regard, we must remember that Ecuador refused the aerial spraying with glyphosate, when the government established a Scientific Committee, which pointed out the serious problems caused by this herbicide on human health, the environment and biodiversity, which was reaffirmed by the United Nations Rapporteur on the Right to Health. Soon after, Ecuador placed Colombia in The Hague International Court, to stop the glyphosate aerial spraying on the shared border of the two countries.

Furthermore, globally, there are seed sold for only 4 crops: soybeans, corn, cotton and canola. All these crops require a phase of industrial transformation before being used. 50% are for the poultry industry. The remainder is used in the production of oils and food additives, the textile industry (in the case of cotton), and every day it increases its use as fuel. 

This leads us to unravel another myth of GM crops: they are intended to solve hunger. No, GMOs are destined to swell the coffers of the four companies that control the world market for cereals and grains (Cargill, ADM, and Bunge Dryfuss), and the five companies that control the patents of GM seeds and the pesticides which accompanying its technology package (Monsanto, DuPont, Bayer, Syngenta and Dow Chemical).

It is important to recall that the Ecuadorean Constitution determines that Food Sovereignty is a State obligation, it is built by "strengthening diversification and the introduction of environmentally friendly technologies and organic agricultural production, promoting the preservation and recovery of agro-biodiversity and ancestral knowledge linked to it, as well as the use, conservation and free exchange of seeds." (Art. 281. 3 and 6)

It is from peasant production that we want to trust our food and through food sovereignty we want to build the country we dream.