All That Glitters Is Not Gold: Biotechnology Has Failed Us, So Why Promote It Abroad?

The head of the World Food Program announced on Friday that an additional 105 million more people have become hungry in 2009, adding to the one billion plus who were already food insecure. The day before, Secretary Clinton gave a speech about hunger in the world, speaking in broad strokes: "[H]unger belies our planet's bounty. It challenges our common humanity and resolve. We do have the resources to give every person in the world the tools they need to feed themselves and their children."

In the next sentences, she gives a clue about what "tools" she might be referring to by praising the Green Revolution -- without noting the depleted water table, reduced soil fertility, massive farmer debts and increased rates of farmer suicides left in the wake of the failed experiment in India.

The Green Revolution was a product of a biotechnological approach to feeding people, the thinking being that we could create ways of tricking nature in a lab: ridding ourselves of pests and weeds, increasing yields and efficiency. Unfortunately pests and weeds have become more virulent in these systems, as they evolve to withstand higher and higher doses of chemicals. These "monocultures" -- field plantings of a single crop, usually corn, cotton or soy -- have relied heavily on oil and resource inputs the third world can't afford. Furthermore, these systems have yet to actually improve yields. Efficiency has been the greatest achievement of biotechnology; however, as Michael Pollan and others point out, redundancy, though counter-intuitive, is the only way to ensure food safety. But biotechnology companies like Monsanto have a huge lobbying presence in Washington, and corporate shills like Nina Federoff have the ear of Secretary Clinton. So its no surprise that in the name of philanthropy, the US has begun to adopt the "feeding the world" mantra of Big Ag.

The focus has been mostly on Africa, where a third of the population is malnourished, and where groups like the Gates Foundation are among the newcomers trying to renew the idea of creating a "Green Revolution for Africa," using many of the same methods that have been so bad for India.

Meanwhile, here in the US, 36 million people are food insecure, and yet we are one of the biggest agricultural producers in the world. Given the fact that these commodity crops cannot be eaten until processed, it turns out that what Big Ag is feeding us is not nourishing us. So it seems that hunger is not just a function of yield, but involves distribution, concentrations of power, and policy.

At the end of the day, do we actually seek to feed these hungry people, or to feed our bottom line? Because in this instance, we can't do both.

Raj Patel put it succinctly in a recent email exchange:

Everyone agrees that African farmers need support. But this story is like the vacuum cleaner salesman who dumps dirt on your floor to show you how his product can pick some of it up. In Africa's case, the dirt was dumped in the 1980s, when US-led economic policy from the World Bank actively prevented African governments from investing in their farmers. The results were, the Bank now admits, a disaster. Into this disaster now steps biotechnology, offering to fix the problem. Actually, it's a bad metaphor. This makes it sound as if GE crops can actually increase yields. The problem of hunger in Africa today has very little to do with seed quality, and a great deal to do with poverty, chronic underinvestment in agriculture, and an active stamping-out of the agroecological alternatives that have proved so successful in fighting hunger. Why are these alternatives being suppressed in US government policy? Because they're not profitable for the US biotech industry, and the US government has, since Vice President Dan Quayle shepherded legislation in the US to support the industry, been an aggressive supporter of genetic engineering.

Patel is co-author, with Eric Holt-Giménez, of the forthcoming book, Food Rebellions: Crisis and the Hunger for Justice, which outlines the conditions which led to the global food crisis of 2008, and some of the many steps we can take to solve hunger. The book ties the issue of hunger to a growing dependence on our imports:

The profits and concentration of market power in the industrial North mirror the import dependence, food deficits and the loss of control over food systems in the global South. Fifty years ago, developing countries had yearly agricultural trade surpluses of $1 billion. Today, after decades of development and the global expansion of the industrial agrifoods complex, the Southern food deficit has ballooned to U.S.$11 billion/year (FAO 2004). The cereal import bill for Low Income Food Deficit Countries reaching over U.S.$ 38 billion in 2007/2008 (De Schutter 2008). The FAO predicts it will grow to $50 billion by 2030.

Instead of teaching poor countries to fish, so to speak, we are selling them the fish with the hook still in its mouth.

That hook infers dependence, but there is also another catch: depleted resources. Biotechnology as it is used right now cannot be sustainable. It relies heavily on three things that are waning: surplus water, cheap oil and a stable climate. As much as biotech proponents claim their technologies could be used for sustainable aims, we don't have decades to wait while the technology is perfected. And what if it is never perfected? In addition, in putting all of our eggs in one basket with biotech, the problem is misrepresented, and solutions that are already out there are being ignored.

It seems, therefore, that the only real solution to hunger is to transform the food system from the ground up. In Africa, 80% of the population is rural, and there are 33 million small farms (those farming less than 2 hectares), which produce 90% of the continent's food (Patel and Giménez, 2009). Why don't we, then, instead of promoting an intensive agriculture that is ruining our environment, our health and is lining the pockets of a few corporations, increase aid to agriculture? There is plenty of fertile land in Africa, much of which is being snatched up in massive land grabs by the Chinese and other countries foreseeing their own imminent food insecurity. Perhaps its time to invest in agriculture for Africans, before it's too late.

This was the recommendation of the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge Science, and Technology for Development, or IAASTD, which was a joint project of the World Bank, FAO and UNDP that determined in 2008 that a complete overhaul of the food system was necessary. 61 countries signed onto the findings of the panel. Patel and Gimenez sum up the IAASTD thusly:

IAASTD's four-year analytical exercise started with a collective framing of the core problems of hunger and environmental destruction. Scientists then identified and evaluated the most appropriate actions and solutions to these problems, locally, nationally and internationally.

The IAASTD team found that the limiting factors to production, equitable distribution and environmental sustainability were overwhelmingly social, rather than technological in nature. Further, many proven agroecological practices for sustainable production increases were already widespread across the global South, but unable to scale up because they lacked a supportive trade, policy, and institutional environment. This is why IAASTD recommends improving the conditions for sustainable agriculture, rather than just coming up with technological fixes.

Somehow this gets swept under the rug of policy in the US. But if we are committed to actually helping, it would behoove Secretary Clinton, and others in this administration, to read the findings of the IAASTD and consider it before making policy.

Again, from Patel and Giménez:

Who improves African agriculture, how, under what agreements and by what means, will determine whether the efforts to end hunger in Africa succeed or fail. Lack of attention to these issues runs the risk that the long-overdue support to African agriculture will be used as prop for a flawed global food system when what is needed is a thorough transformation of agriculture.

Will Africans be a cog in our capitalist machine, or will we follow through with our promises to end hunger?

Originally published on Civil Eats

Follow Paula Crossfield on Twitter: www.twitter.com/civileater

Comments

[sl2561]

If you're interested in agricultural investments and food insecurity, look at

http://www.flypmedia.com/issues/31/#2/1

[RMankovitz]

The diet that I follow does not include annual monocrops such as wheat, corn, or soy, so I am able to avoid GM Frankenfoods. GM fans claim yield improvement for what my research has shown to be an unsustainable agricultural model - farming. Modern diets rely heavily on annual monocrops such as grains and beans that depend on artificial fossil-based fertilizer and pesticide, destroy the topsoil, and are nutritionally deficient. When the oil runs out, so will these foods, GM or not.

For some background and references on these issues, see Michael Pollan's books, "The Vegetarian Myth" by Lierre Keith, "Against the Grain" by Richard Manning, "The Whole Soy Story" by Kaayla Daniel, and "Plows, Plagues and Petroleum" by William Ruddiman.

I choose not to eat any foods that require a plow to produce. In the plant world, I do not eat any annuals, only renewable portions of certain perennials. I do not eat any food that contains more than one ingredient or requires human processing. The only animal products I eat are from grass or grub-fed free range animals raised in a humane environment. Grass is an annual that requires no cultivation, no pesticides, and no artificial fertilizer. From my Nature-based research, I consider this diet the only sustainable one on the planet, and which fed our ancestors until recently. For background and references, ask your librarian for a copy of my book "The Original Diet - The Omnivore's Solution".

Roy Mankovitz, Director
www.MontecitoWellness.com

[econ1]

I don't know.

The US has perhaps the most intensive farming in the world and we produce a lot of food....enough to convert some to fuel. US farmers are doing very well, even without the government subsidies, some of which still pay them not to produce.

So perhaps extending the same techniques would help elsewhere.

On the other hand I am a big supporter of population control so I am conflicted.

[jmpurser]

Thank you. That's exactly what I thought when I read Ms. Clinton's article. When a Clinton claims they want to help the downtrodden hold onto your wallet.

[GardenerNorCal]

What African farmers are really talking about when it comes to GM crops:

http://africanagriculture.blogspot.com/2008/05/biotech-companies-up-gmo-campaign-in.html

[toxicbrainpoison]

biotech kills. they caused the starvation in the first place. they cant be that ignorant. they must intentionally want to destroy everything they touch and make money cleaning it up.

[JCont]

I can assure you that this article is neither ill-informed or scientifically naive for its skepticism of biotech.

If one is going to read Paarlberg, one should also read Patel's Stuffed and Starved (and http://stuffedandstarved.org/drupal/frontpage). You can't dismiss Patel & Holt-Giménez as naive; both have worked extensively with farmers across the world for decades. And the fact that most farmers carry huge debts is a matter of record -- even a cursory examination of the evidence confirms this. It's not because they're poor businesspeople but rather they are surrounded by monopolies and monopsonies (their suppliers & purchasers). To "invest" in biotech and industrial = equipment requires more money than most have, and the return almost never ends up canceling the debt. Thus even farmers in the US have one of the highest rates of suicide of all professions.

Production (yield) is NOT the cause of most hunger in the world. Around 70% of the countries in Africa facing the most hunger produce enough food to feed their people, but for a variety of reasons a lot ends up exported. Read Amartya Sen, and the newspaper article "Poor in India starve while Surplus Wheat Rots." Poverty is the prime cause of hunger, and biotech does not directly address that.

Also read Badgley et al 2007 and the IAASTD report, www.agassessment.org. Disagree with Crossfield if you choose, but she's on solid ground whether or not you like what she says.

[efrainstacy]

What you mean is "Not all that glitters is gold". "All that glitters is not gold" implies that gold does not glitter.

[wietog]

Why do we keep trying to fight Mother Nature? And why can't we admit that it's an overpopula­tion/distr­ibution issue anyway. Basically, even if the crops are available, if we can't distribute the food, we are overpopulated. PS: Capitalism may be many things, but sustainable it apparantly is not.

[iheartbio]

Paula Crossfield references Hilary Clinton’s June 12th speech about hunger, but Crossfield obviously didn’t read the speech that acknowledged the work of 2009 World Food Prize Laureate Dr. Gebisa Ejeta who has dedicated his life to helping farmers in Africa.
Ejeta developed a crop resistant to Striga, a parasitic weed that crippled African farmers and destroyed the region’s staple crop. With the help of biotechnology, Ejeta helped once-impoverished farmers feed their communities.
Crossfield is either scientifically naive or has a broader agenda to prevent scientists like Dr. Ejeta from working to fight global hunger. In fairness, we’ll assume it’s simply scientific naiveté. Too few people are aware of the benefits of agricultural biotechnology.
The environmental challenges Crossfield mentions are legitimate, but biotech crops require less water and reduced tilling, which means nutrients stay in the soil. According to a study released last month, biotech crops have helped reduce the global release of greenhouse gas emissions from agricultural practices. In 2007, this was equivalent to removing nearly 6.3 million cars from the road for one year.
The same study reports that biotechnology has contributed to increased farmer income. This is evident by the record 13.3 million farmers in 25 countries that are using agricultural biotechnology today. Ninety percent (12.3 million) of these are resource-poor farmers in 15 developing countries.
If a technology is based in science, has been deemed safe, is environmen­tally-frie­ndly, and helps farmers feed the world's growing population, isn’t it worth pursuing?

[GardenerNorCal]

You fail to mention the massive crop failures of some GM crops. For those farmers and their consumers their was no harvest or profits.

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/270101
http://www.genecampaign.org/Publication/Article/BT%20Cotton/BTCOTTON-Monsanto%20pay.pdf
http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl2011/stories/20030606005912300.htm
http://archive.greenpeace.org/geneng/reports/gmo/intrgmo5.htm


How many failures do there have to be before it's not worth pursuing? I think some of the benefits of GM crops have been exagerated and promoted prematurely in some cases, fraudulently in others.

[FunkyP]

Thank you sales rep from Monsanto.

[bacq]

This post is so ill-informed, it's laughable. The Indian farmer suicides are completely false, have PROVEN to be such, yet are propagated by the anti-science luddites out there.

And the "massive farmer debts"? Oh really? Do you really have such a low opinion of our farmers that you think they wouldn't be intelligent enough to run a successful business? It's not all fairytales and daisies out on the family farm, Paula. Farming is about real work, with a real bottom line, and farmers are some of the savviest businessmen I've ever known. If these seeds were really forcing farmers into breadlines, THEY WOULD STOP USING THEM. Farmers actually prefer these strains, because they produce more - often while better tolerating bad soil or drought conditions.

As for feeding Africa, biotechnology is one of the few promising areas out there - especially in our changing climate. African farmers are pleading for these seed strains, but are being cut off from them by EU mandates. Oddly, the colonialist mentality never stopped there. Instead of allowing African nations to decide for themselves, the EU has decided for them... because, once again, they clearly couldn't be trusted to make an intelligent decision for themselves. Puh-leease!

Try reading Robert Paalberg's "Starved for Science" book before you start condemning a practice you clearly know nothing about.

[GardenerNorCal]

I don't think African farmers are pleading for more Monsanto seed strains.

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/270101

Paalberg's book is pure industry propaganda.

[jjohnsondc]

I work with the biotechnology industry and there's so many things wrong in this piece it is hard to know where to start.

How about the words in title "biotechnology has failed us."

What biotechnology are you talking about. Are you talking about the same biotechnology that saves cancer patients? Are you talking about the same biotechnology that took cassava, a staple root crop, and enabled it to produce a day's worth of nutrition in a single meal? Are you talking about biotech fuels that Virgin Air is helping develop to reduce carbon emissions? You call that failure?

On the agriculture claims. Have you ever talked to an American farmer? Given this piece I suspect the answer is no. The farmers I know and grew up with were pretty skeptical, tell-it-like-it-is type of folk. And the vast majority of American farmers embrace biotech agriculture -- not because a company tells them to -- but because it produces real and sustainable results on the farm.

And you obviously don't have a very high opinion of Secretary Clinton if you think she's intent on duping the impoverished.

Personally, I think Secretary Clinton is one tough woman. But one who also cares about the world's poor. She's not alone. I suggest reading Robert Paarlberg's book "Starved for Science." Read the forward by former US President, Nobel Peace Prize winner, and farmer Jimmy Carter. His conclusion?

Biotech agriculture is exactly what the poor on this planet need.

[GardenerNorCal]

"Biotech agriculture is exactly what the poor on this planet need"? Really they need Monsanto telling them that they can't save and trade the seed of the plants they raise? And should their crops become contaminated by their neighbors' monsanto crops monsanto inspectors can come in and confiscate their crops and sue them. Good for the poor or do you mean good for Monsanto and their stock holders?

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=12309
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ah-ZeN_ghro
http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/pubs/CFSMOnsantovsFarmerReport1.13.05.pdf

I have a degree in horticulture I understand how important hybridization and some bioengineering can be, but not it is allowed to be exploited solely by those that seek to profit and the expense of societal good.. That's what's wrong with the world today.

[FunkyP]

Biotech agriculture is exactly what Monsanto and ADM need.
The poor cannot afford GE seeds which must be purchased anew each year. Monsanto, especially, has bullied farmers and others as they seek to control the world's supply of seeds.
"the vast majority of American farmers embrace biotech agriculture"
You cannot back this statement up. Big agriculture has become the enemy of the American farmer
They have sued farmers and dairy producers to prevent them from labeling their products and giving accurate information on their GE content. Monsanto has fought the disclosure of RBST in dairy products, fearing a consumer backlash. They have lobbied intensively, and fought in the courtrooms, to keep this information from the worlds' consumers.
GE corn does not sustain life, GE rice (supposedly high in vitamin A) was a bust. Roundup-ready corn and soybeans have created super weeds, and created unhealthy environments in our bodies that allow for the growth of the genetically modified bacteria in our bodies, producing the pesticides they were engineered to produce in plants, in our guts.
At the very least, we should have food items that contain GMOs identified on the label.
Even when they were starving, African nations refused food aid corn because it had been genetically modified. We should have the same informed choice.

[bunnyv]

I am going to guess another cog in our capitalist machine. If they are using tactics that have already been shown to not really work, what other conclusion can we come to?