Articles by Dr. Shiva

The Soil vs the Sensex
Recovering the Culture of the Sacred Earth

by Dr. Vandana Shiva

The earth, the source of all nourishment and sustenance has been seen as a mother in most cultures. She is Terra Madre and Gaia, Dharti and Vasundhara.

Even today, in parts of India not destroyed by the Green Revolution, tribals and peasants apologize to the earth at the beginning of every agriculture season, for hurting her with their plough, and promising to not take more than their need.

But the culture of the sacred earth is under severe threat, and this threat becomes a threat to the communities who depend on the land. As India grows at 9%, and the sensex becomes the measure of the state of the people and the state of the land, the rich and the privileged often forget that the majority in India depends neither on the sensex nor the State. They depend on the Mati Ma. Yet the dominant culture of the land and the earth is being marginalized. This is marginalizing our tribals and peasants, it is destroying our biodiversity and cultural diversity. But it is not just decoying our heritage, it is threatening our very future.

The war against the land is both cultural and material. The culture of the sacred earth shapes a culture of non-violence and restraint, of compassion and care for all life that the earth creates and supports. The bird and the tree, the earthworm and the elephant all have their space and their share in the gifts of the earth. We referred to this culture as Vasundhaiva Kutumbkam. I have called it Earth Democracy.

Materially a sacred earth invites us to create technologies and economies that sustain the fertility and productivity of the soil and the land. An agrarian economy is a highly evolved economy in the yardstick of the sacred earth because it is the only economy, which humans can give back to the earth. Every other economy - urban, industrial is an economy of taking. All that urban and industrial society gives back to the land is waste and pollution.

The land must be our compass and measure, not the global casino of finance. Gandhi had described the seven sins. Gambling on the sensex is the ultimate in "wealth without work". And this ill gotten wealth than destroys the honest economy of hard work and real work.

When money replaces the sacred earth many tectonic shifts take place in nature and in society.

The earth is no longer seen as the source of soil fertility. Instead synthetic fertlisers made in chemical factories are viewed as the source of soil fertility, even though they kill the soil fauna and flora, the real creators of soil fertility.

The farmers and the earth are no longer seen as the source of food. Nestle and Cargill, Lever and ITC become the "food providers". The farmer is no longer the Annadata. Food is no longer the sacred gift that creates and maintains life. It is just another commodity. Maximisation of profits not maximization of well being determines what we eat. No wonder their is increasing hunger and malnutrition of the poor who do not get enough food, and the malnutrition of the rich who live on "junk" food and processed food. India is emerging as the epicenter of the diabetes epidemic. Changes in the food cultures and diets have a lot to do with these new diseases.

The earth and the farmer is no longer seen as the source of seed - the 200,000 rices we have grown, or the 15,000 mangoes or the 15,000 banana varieties disappear from science and from the earth. Monsanto becomes "inventor" of seed, the "owner" of life through intellectual property and patents. It does not matter of 200,000 Indian farmers commit suicide because they have been pushed into debt by costly, unreliable, non-renewable seed and the related destruction of their seed sovereignty and seed freedom. All that matters is that the profits of seed corporations keep increasing.

And the land is no longer the provider of food and livelihoods. It is transformed into "real estate" - increasing controlled by those who accumulate "unreal" wealth through "non-work".

The controversy over the Special Economic Zones brought into conflict the two worldviews - the worldview based on the scared earth and the worldview based on casino and financial speculation.

Finance Minister Mr. P. Chidambaram was forced to state, "there is a sacred tie between the tiller and the land. Andy attempt to snap the relationship is bound to face opposition.

Farmers who have tilled the land for generations, and want to continue taking care of the earth, refuse to be uprooted. The new rich, the big corporations, think that they have the right to dispossess.

Every tribal and every farmer of their land and resources, bury the soil under the concrete jungle of new luxury townships, and literally kill the earth. From the perspective of Mati-Ma, this is matricide. And no society can flourish if it destroys the very source of its sustenance.

The sensex will rise and fall. The earth has sustained life for billions of years and can continue to do so. While wealthy Indians are high on the recent climb of the stock market they need to remember the collapse of the financial markets in South East Asia in 1997.

We as a society and as a civilization based on the sacred earth are on the threshold of destroying our very ecological foundation by worshipping money and markets. These are becoming the new sacred. And false sacred emerge when society looses its anchor.

We need to reanchor ourselves in the earth. We need to stop uprooting those who are anchored in the land, our peasants and tribals.

We need to return to the Earth, our mother.