The same full page appeared twice in three years, the first time as news, the second time as an advertisement

“Not a single person from the two villages has committed suicide.”

Three and a half years ago, at a time when the controversy over the use of genetically modified seeds was raging across India, a newspaper story painted a heartening picture of the technology’s success. “There are no suicides here and people are prospering on agriculture. The switchover from the conventional cotton to Bollgard or Bt Cotton here has led to a social and economic transformation in the villages [of Bhambraja and Antargaon] in the past three-four years.” (Times of India, October 31, 2008).

So heartening was this account that nine months ago, the same story was run again in the same newspaper, word for word. (Times of India, August 28, 2011). Never mind that the villagers themselves had a different story to tell.

“There have been 14 suicides in our village,” a crowd of agitated farmers in Bhambraja told shocked members of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture in March this year. “Most of them after Bt came here.” The Hindu was able to verify nine that had occurred between 2003 and 2009. Activist groups count five more since then. All after 2002, the year the TOI story says farmers here switched to Bt. Prospering on agriculture? The villagers told the visibly shaken MPs: “Sir, lots of land is lying fallow. Many have lost faith in farming.” Some have shifted to soybean where “at least the losses are less.”

Over a hundred people, including landed farmers, have migrated from this ‘model farming village’ showcasing Mahyco-Monsanto Biotech’s Bt Cotton. “Many more will leave because agriculture is dying,” Suresh Ramdas Bhondre had predicted during our first visit to Bhambraja last September.

The 2008 full-page panegyric in the TOI on Monsanto’s Bt Cotton rose from the dead soon after the government failed to introduce the Biotech Regulatory Authority of India (BRAI) Bill in Parliament in August 2011. The failure to table the Bill — crucial to the future profits of the agri-biotech industry — sparked frenzied lobbying to have it brought in soon. The full-page, titled Reaping Gold through Bt Cotton on August 28 was followed by a flurry of advertisements from Mahyco-Monsanto Biotech (India) Ltd., in the TOI (and some other papers), starting the very next day. These appeared on August 29, 30, 31, September 1 and 3. The Bill finally wasn’t introduced either in the monsoon or winter session — though listed for business in both — with Parliament bogged down in other issues. Somebody did reap gold, though, with newsprint if not with Bt Cotton.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture appeared unimpressed by the ad barrage, which also seemed timed for the committee’s deliberations on allowing genetically modified food crops. Disturbed by reports of mounting farm suicides and acute distress in Vidarbha, committee members, who belong to different parties, decided to visit the region.

Bhambraja, touted as a model for Mahyco-Monsanto’s miracle Bt, was an obvious destination for the committee headed by veteran parliamentarian Basudeb Acharia. Another was Maregaon-Soneburdi. But the MPs struck no gold in either village. Only distress arising from the miracle’s collapse and a raft of other, government failures.

The issues (and the claims made by the TOI in its stories) have come alive yet again with the debate sparked off by the completion of 10 years of Bt cotton in India in 2012. The “Reaping Gold through Bt Cotton” that appeared on August 28 last year, presented itself as “A consumer connect initiative.” In other words, a paid-for advertisement. The bylines, however, were those of professional reporters and photographers of the Times of India. More oddly, the story-turned-ad had already appeared, word-for-word, in the Times of India, Nagpur on October 31, 2008. The repetition was noticed and ridiculed by critics. The August 28, 2011 version itself acknowledged this unedited ‘reprint’ lightly. What appeared in 2008, though, was not marked as an advertisement. What both versions do acknowledge is: “The trip to Yavatmal was arranged by Mahyco-Monsanto Biotech.”

The company refers to the 2008 feature as “a full-page news report” filed by the TOI. “The 2008 coverage was a result of the media visit and was based on the editorial discretion of the journalists involved. We only arranged transport to-and-from the fields,” a Mahyco Monsanto Biotech India spokesperson told The Hindu last week. “The 2011 report was an unedited reprint of the 2008 coverage as a marketing feature.” The 2008 “full-page news report” appeared in the Nagpur edition. The 2011 “marketing feature” appeared in multiple editions (which you can click to online under ‘special reports’) but not in Nagpur, where it would surely have caused astonishment.

So the same full-page appeared twice in three years, the first time as news, the second time as an advertisement. The first time done by the staff reporter and photographer of a newspaper. The second time exhumed by the advertising department. The first time as a story trip ‘arranged by Mahyco-Monsanto.’ The second time as an advertisement arranged by Mahyco-Monsanto. The first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.

The company spokesperson claimed high standards of transparency in that “…we insisted that the publication add the source and dateline as follows: ‘This is a reprint of a story from the Times of India, Nagpur edition, October 31, 2008.’ But the spokesperson’s e-mail reply to The Hindu’s questions is silent on the timing of the advertisements. “In 2011, we conducted a communications initiative for a limited duration aimed at raising awareness on the role of cotton seeds and plant biotechnologies in agriculture.” Though The Hindu raised the query, there is no mention of why the ads were run during the Parliament session when the BRAI Bill was to have come up, but didn’t.

But there’s more. Some of the glowing photographs accompanying the TOI coverage of the Bt miracle were not taken in Bhambraja or Antargaon, villagers allege. “This picture is not from Bhambraja, though the people in it are” says farmer Babanrao Gawande from that village.

Phantom miracle

The Times of India story had a champion educated farmer in Nandu Raut who is also an LIC agent. His earnings shot up with the Bt miracle. “I made about Rs.2 lakhs the previous year,” Nandu Raut told me last September. “About Rs.1.6 lakh came from the LIC policies I sold.” In short, he earned from selling LIC policies four times what he earned from farming. He has seven and a half acres and a four-member family.

But the TOI story has him earning “Rs.20,000 more per acre (emphasis added) due to savings in pesticide.” Since he grew cotton on four acres, that was a “saving” of Rs. 80,000 “on pesticide.” Quite a feat. As many in Bhambraja say angrily: “Show us one farmer here earning Rs.20,000 per acre at all, let alone that much more per acre.” A data sheet from a village-wide survey signed by Mr. Raut (in The Hindu’s possession) also tells a very different story on his earnings.

The ridicule that Bhambraja and Maregaon farmers pour on the Bt ‘miracle’ gains credence from the Union Agriculture Minister’s figures. “Vidarbha produces about 1.2 quintals [cotton lint] per hectare on average,” Sharad Pawar told Parliament on December 19, 2011. That is a shockingly low figure. Twice that figure would still be low. The farmer sells his crop as raw cotton. One-hundred kg of raw cotton gives 35 kg of lint and 65 kg of cotton seed (of which up to two kg is lost in ginning). And Mr. Pawar’s figure translates to just 3.5 quintals of raw cotton per hectare. Or merely 1.4 quintals per acre. Mr. Pawar also assumed farmers were getting a high price of Rs.4,200 per quintal. He conceded that this was close to “the cost of cultivation… and that is why I think such a serious situation is developing there.” If Mr. Pawar’s figure was right, it means Nandu Raut’s gross income could not have exceeded Rs.5,900 per acre. Deduct his input costs — of which 1.5 packets of seed alone accounts for around Rs.1,400 — and he’s left with almost nothing. Yet, the TOI has him earning “Rs.20,000 more per acre.”

Asked if they stood by these extraordinary claims, the Mahyco-Monsanto spokesperson said, “We stand by the quotes of our MMB India colleague, as published in the news report.” Ironically, that single-paragraph quote, in the full-page-news story-turned-ad, makes no mention of the Rs.20,000-plus per acre earnings or any other figure. It merely speaks of Bt creating “increased income of cotton growers…” and of growth in Bt acreage. It does not mention per acre yields. And says nothing about zero suicides in the two villages. So the company carefully avoids direct endorsement of the TOI’s claims, but uses them in a marketing feature where they are the main points.

The MMB spokesperson’s position on these claims is that “the journalists spoke directly with farmers on their personal experiences during the visits, resulting in various news reports, including the farmer quotes.”

The born-again story-turned-ad also has Nandu Raut reaping yields of “about 20 quintals per acre with Bollgard II,” nearly 14 times the Agriculture Minister’s average of 1.4 quintals per acre. Mr. Pawar felt that Vidarbha’s rainfed irrigation led to low yields, as cotton needs “two to three waterings.” He was silent on why Maharashtra, ruled by an NCP-Congress alliance, promotes Bt Cotton in almost entirely rainfed regions. The Maharashtra State Seed Corporation (Mahabeej) distributes the very seeds the State’s Agriculture Commissioner found to be unsuited for rainfed regions seven years ago. Going by the TOI, Nandu is rolling in cash. Going by the Minister, he barely stays afloat.

Mahyco-Monsanto Biotech’s ad barrage the same week in 2011 drew other fire. Following a complaint, one of the ads (also appearing in another Delhi newspaper) claiming huge monetary benefits to Indian farmers landed before the Advertising Standards Council of India. ASCI “concluded that the claims made in the advertisement and cited in the complaint, were not substantiated.” The MMB spokesperson said the company “took cognizance of the points made by ASCI and revised the advertisement promptly…. ASCI has, on record, acknowledged MMB India’s modification of the advertisement…”

We met Nandu again as the Standing Committee MPs left his village in March. “If you ask me today,” he said, “I would say don’t use Bt here, in unirrigated places like this. Things are now bad.” He had not raised a word during the meeting with the MPs, saying he had arrived too late to do so.

“We have thrown away the moneylender. No one needs him anymore,” The Times of India news report-turned-ad quotes farmer Mangoo Chavan as saying. That’s in Antargaon, the other village the newspaper found to be basking in Bt-induced prosperity. A study of the 365 farm households in Bhambraja and the nearly 150 in Antargaon by the Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti (VJAS) shows otherwise. “Almost all farmers with bank accounts are in critical default and 60 per cent of farmers are also in debt to private moneylenders,” says VJAS chief Kishor Tiwari.

The Maharashtra government tried hard to divert the MPs away from the ‘model village’ of Bhambraja (and Maregaon) to places where the government felt in control. However, Committee Chairperson Basudeb Acharia and his colleagues stood firm. Encouraged by the MPs visit, people in both places spoke their minds and hearts. Maharashtra’s record of over 50,000 farm suicides between 1995 and 2010 is the worst in the country as the data of the National Crime Records Bureau show. And Vidarbha has long led the State in such deaths. Yet, the farmers also spoke of vast, policy-linked issues driving agrarian distress here.

None of the farmers reduced the issue of the suicides or the crisis to being only the outcome of Bt Cotton. But they punctured many myths about its miracles, costs and ‘savings.’ Some of their comments came as news to the MPs. And not as paid news or a marketing feature, either.

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/article3401466.ece

                          

Dr. Vandana Shiva

Director, Navdanya

In an interview to the journal Science, the Indian Prime Minister Dr. Man Mohan Singh, chose to focus on two hazardous technologies – genetically engineered seeds and crops in agriculture and nuclear power – as vital to the progress of science in India, and the “salvation for finding new development pathways for developing our economy”.

He also identified NGO’s as blocking this “development”, and involved the foreign hand.

The Prime Minister’s interview saddened me. It saddened me because the Prime Minister seems out of touch with science, as well as the people of India whose will he is supposed to represent in a democracy. To label the democratic voices of the citizens of India as “foreign” and as “unthinking” is an insult to democracy, to the people of India, and to the part of the scientific community which is dedicated to science in the public interest and to understanding the safety aspects of hazardous technologies like nuclear and genetic engineering. The Prime Minister’s statement is also a trivialization of the regulatory framework for biosafety and nuclear safety.

It is because these technologies have safety implications in the context of the environment and public health, we have national and international laws on Biosafety in the context of GMO’s, and nuclear safety in the context of nuclear power. The Prime Minister should be legally bound by these frameworks. The debate on safety is vital to our science, our democracy and our ecological security, food security and health security.

The Prime Minister is misleading the nation by making it appear that the only voices raising caution in the context of these hazardous technologies are “foreign funded NGO’s”. The most significant voice on Biosafety is Dr. Pushpa Bhargava who is the father of molecular biology in India and is the Supreme Court Appointee on the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee which is the Statutory Body which regulates GMO’s for Biosafety under the 1989 rules of the Environment Protection Act. Dr. Bhargava was also on the National Knowledge Commission.

The most important voice for nuclear safety is Dr. A Gopalakrishnan, the former Atomic Energy Regulatory Board Chairman.

The Prime Minister should be listening to these eminent experts for the development  of a responsible and democratic science, not creating a bogey of the “foreign hand” and starting a witch hunt of public interest groups and social movements who are the very life blood of a democracy.

This attack on movements engaged in issues related to safety of genetic engineering and nuclear power needs to be viewed in the larger context of the mega bucks foreign corporations are looking at by pushing GMOs and nuclear power plants in India.  The Prime Minister has succumbed to these pressures, and sacrificed India’s food sovereignty and energy sovereignty. He signed the US-India Nuclear Agreenment, and the deal got the approval of Parliament only through he “cash-for-votes” scandal. The Prime Minister also signed the US – India Agriculture Agreement, which seeks to put India’s food and agriculture systems in the hands of global corporate giants like Monsanto, Cargill and Walmart.

The push for FDI in retail was stopped by Parliament. The recent election results show that the people have also rejected the UPA policies focusing on the interests of global corporations while trampling on the livelihoods and democratic rights of the people of India.

We have already seen the high costs of the destruction of our Seed Sovereignty in cotton after the entry of Monsanto. 95% of our cotton seed is now owned and collected by Monsanto through licensing agreements with 60 Indian seed companies. Seed costs jumped 8000%, pesticide use increased, crop failure increased, farmers debt increased, and with debt, the epidemic of farmer’s suicides emerged.

The Prime Minister talks of a “double whammy” of  disease – but he describes it as an “opportunity”. He fails to address the “double whammy” in the food and agriculture crisis,  250,000 farmers suicides, and half of India’s children suffering from severe malnutrition. GMos are not a solution to this double whammy. They are aggravating and deepening the crisis of debt linked to capital intensive non-sustainable agriculture based on seed monopoly, which destroys food systems that produce healthy and nutritious food. The solution to farmers suicides and children’s malnutrition is the science of agro ecology and the development of ecologically intensive, low cost production which increases the production of food and nutrition as we have shown in the Navdanya report “Health Per Acre”.

Navdanya’s report “The GMO Emperor has No Clothes” provides  empirical     evidence on the performance of GMOs in farmers fields, not in Monsanto sponsored propoganda. GMOs have failed to increase “yields”, reduce the use of pesticides, or reduce the prevelance of pests and weeds. They have, infact, increased chemical use, and led to the emergence of super pests and super weeds.

To impose a failed technology with extremely high social and ecological costs undemocratically on India in the name of “science” is anti science and anti democracy. It is anti-science because real science is based on the new disciplines of agro-ecology and epi-genetics, not the obsolete idea of genetic determinism and genetic reductionism. The latest science in energy is renewable energy, not nuclear.

Yet the Prime Minister under the influence of global corporations, will stop at nothing to destroy the nation’s seed sovereignty, food sovereignty, energy sovereignty, and health and nutrition security. The attack on NGOs  should be seen along with the attack on India’s Biosafety regulatory framework. There is an attempt to dismantle the Biosafety rules under the Environment protection attack and  replace them with the Biotechnology Regulatory Authority of India (BRAI) which would rob the states of the powers they have under the Constitution and in the current Biosafety laws. After all, 13 states stopped the Bt Brinjal. To blame the moratorium on Bt Brinjal on the foreign hand is to turn a blind eye to the role of the states under federal structure of our constitution.

The proposed BRAI will also rob citizens of their right to justice and biosafety by blocking them from approaching civil courts. The corporations will be deregulated, citizens will be policed.

The Prime Minister’s attack on movements in his interview in Science is part of this larger attack on democracy and people’s rights in order to undemocratically promote the role of global corporations in the vital sectors of food and energy.

The debate on Genetic Engineering and Nuclear Power is a test case of the intense conflict between corporate rule and democracy, between corporate science pushing hazards, and public science calling for safety. It is a contest between science and democracy on one side, and propaganda and dictatorship on the other.

                          

In an interview to the journal Science (Feb. 24 edition), Prime Minister Manmohan Singh chose to focus on two hazardous technologies — genetically engineered seeds and crops in agriculture and nuclear power — as vital to the progress of science in India and the “salvation for finding meaningful new pathways of developing our economy”. He also talked about foreign-funded NGOs that were blocking this development.
What Dr Singh said in the interview saddened me because he seems out of touch with science as well as the people of India whose will he is supposed to represent in a democracy. To label the democratic voices of the citizens of India as “foreign” and unthinking is an insult to democracy, to the people of India and to the scientific community. The scientific community is dedicated to developing science in public interest and to understanding the safety aspects of hazardous technologies like nuclear and genetic engineering.
Dr Singh’s statements also trivialised the regulatory framework for biosafety and nuclear safety. Biotechnology and nuclear science have safety implications in the context of the environment and public health. We have national and international laws on biosafety in the context of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), and nuclear safety in the context of nuclear power and Dr Singh should be legally bound by these frameworks. The debate on safety is vital to our science, our democracy and our ecological food and health security.
Dr Singh is misleading the nation by making it appear as if the voices raising caution are only of “foreign-funded NGOs”. The most significant voice on biosafety is of Dr Pushpa Bhargava, the father of molecular biology in India and Supreme Court Appointee on the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee, which is the statutory body that regulates GMOs for biosafety under the 1989 Environment Protection Act. The most important voice for nuclear safety is of Dr A. Gopalakrishnan, the former chairman of Atomic Energy Regulatory Board. Dr Singh should listen to these eminent experts for developing a responsible and democratic science rather than creating the bogey of “foreign interference” and starting a witch hunt of public interest groups which are the very life and blood of a democracy.
This attack on movements engaged in safety issues of genetic engineering and nuclear power needs to be viewed in the larger context of the megabucks foreign corporations pushing GMOs and nuclear power plants are looking at in India. Dr Singh has succumbed to these pressures and has sacrificed India’s food and energy sovereignty. He signed the Indo-US civil nuclear agreement and the deal got the approval of Parliament only through the “cash for votes” scandal. Dr Singh also signed the Indo-US Agriculture Initiative which seeks to put India’s food and agriculture systems in the hands of global corporate giants like Monsanto, Cargill and Walmart, though the push for foreign direct investment (FDI) in retail was stopped by Parliament.
The recent Uttar Pradesh and other Assembly election results show that the people have rejected those policies of the UPA that focus on the interests of global corporations while trampling on the livelihood and democratic rights of the people of India.
We still haven’t recovered from the huge price we had to pay when our seed sovereignty in cotton was destroyed after the entry of Monsanto: Seed costs jumped 8,000 per cent, use of pesticides increased, as did crop failure, and that in turn increased farmers’ debt. And with debt came the epidemic of farmers’ suicides. Today, 95 per cent of our cotton seed is owned and collected by Monsanto through licensing agreements with 60 Indian seed companies.
Dr Singh talks of the “double whammy” of disease but he describes it as an “opportunity”. He fails to address the “double whammy” in the food and agriculture crisis — 250,000 farmer committed suicide and half of India’s children are malnourished. The GMOs are not a solution to this double whammy. They are aggravating and deepening the crisis of debt linked to capital intensive, non-sustainable agriculture based on seed monopoly, which destroys food systems that produce nutritious food. The solution to farmers’ suicide and children’s malnutrition is the science of agro-ecology and the development of ecologically intensive, low-cost agriculture that increases the production of nutritious food as we have shown in the Navdanya report titled, “Health Per Acre”.
Navdanya’s report “The GMO emperor has no clothes” provides empirical evidence about the performance of GMOs in farmers’ fields. The GMOs have failed to increase yields or reduce the use of pesticides. The prevalence of pests and weeds hasn’t decreased either. GMOs have, in fact, increased chemical use and led to the emergence of super pests and super weeds.
To impose a failed technology with extremely high social and ecological costs undemocratically on India in the name of “science” is anti-science and anti-democracy. It is anti-science because real science is based on the new disciplines of agro-ecology and epigenetics, not the obsolete idea of genetic determinism and genetic reductionism. The latest science in energy is renewable energy and not nuclear.
Yet, the Prime Minister, under the influence of global corporations, will stop at nothing to destroy the nation’s seed, food and energy sovereignty, as well as health and nutrition security. His attack on NGOs should be seen along with the attack on Biosafety Regulatory Framework in India. There is an attempt to dismantle the biosafety rules and replace them with the Biotechnology Regulatory Authority of India (Brai), which would rob states of the powers they have under the Constitution and in the current biosafety laws. After all, 13 states stopped the Bt brinjal. To blame the moratorium on Bt brinjal on NGOs “funded from the US and Scandinavian countries” is to turn a blind eye to the concerns of the states. The proposed Brai will also rob citizens of their right to justice and biosafety by blocking them from approaching civil courts. The corporations will be deregulated and citizens will be policed.
Dr Singh’s attack on NGOs is part of this larger attack on democracy and people’s rights, to undemocratically promote global corporations in the vital sectors of food and energy.
The debate on genetic engineering and nuclear power is a test case of the intense conflict between corporate rule and democracy, between corporate science pushing hazards and public science calling for safety. It is a contest between science and democracy on one hand and propaganda and dictatorship on the other.

This column first appeared in The Asian Age on March 28th 2012

                          

4th & 5th April
Conference Room No.1
India International Centre
Max Mueller Road
New Delhi – 110 003

4th April 2012
Day – 1 : Celebrating 25 years of Navdanya

Session I : Threats of Bio-diversity and Traditional Knowledge: 25 years of
Bio imperialism through IPRs

Session II : Conserving Biodiversity, Defending Traditional Knowledge: 25 years
Of resisting Bio-piracy

Session III : Institutions and Instruments to Protect Biodiversity and
Traditional Knowledge

5th April 2012
Day – 2

Session IV : Patents on Seed and Seed Monopolies and the threat to
Agriculture and Food Security

Session V : Patents in Medicinal Plants and Traditional Knowledge:
Threat to Public Health

Session VI : Threats and Challenges of Next 25 years

                          

The dominant economic model, based on limitless growth, is leading to an overshoot in the use of the earth’s resources and pushing us to the brink of an ecological catastrophe. The model prompts violent grab of the remaining resources of the earth by the rich from the poor. The resource grab is an adjustment by the rich and powerful to a shrinking resource base — land, water, biodiversity — without adjusting the old resource-intensive growth paradigm to the new reality. This has led to ecological scarcity for the poor, deepening poverty and deprivation. In the long run it means the extinction of our species, as climate catastrophies and extinction of other species are bound to make the planet uninhabitable.
The “green economy” agenda being pushed in the run-up to Rio+20, or the Earth Summit, to be held in June, could well become the blueprint for the biggest resource grab in history, with corporations appropriating the planet’s green wealth and biodiversity. These corporations will take our green wealth to make “green oil” for biofuels, energy, plastics, chemicals — everything that the petrochemical era based on fossil fuels gave us. Movements worldwide have started to say no to the “green economy” of the “one per cent”, because an ecological adjustment is possible and it is taking place. This adjustment involves seeing ourselves as part of the fragile ecological web, not outside and above it, and immune from the consequences of our actions.
Ecological adjustment also implies that we see ourselves as members of the earth’s community, sharing its resources equitably with all species and within the human community. Ecological adjustment requires an end to resource grab and privatisation of our land, biodiversity, seeds, water and atmosphere. It requires the recovery of the commons and the creation of “earth democracy”.
The dominant economic model based on resource monopolies and oligarchy is in conflict not just with ecological limits of the planet but also with the basic principles of democracy. The adjustment being dictated by the oligarchy will further strangle democracy and people’s freedom of choice. Sunil Bharti Mittal, one of India’s industry captains, recently said that “politics is hurting the economy and the country”. His observation reflects the mindset of the oligarchy, that democracy can be done away with.
Calls for a democratic, ecological adjustment are being heard worldwide in non-violent protests, from the Arab Spring to the American autumn of “Occupy Wall Street” and the Russian winter challenging the hijack of electoral democracy. These are the signposts for democratic adjustment in response to the austerity programmes imposed by the IMF, World Bank and other financial institutions that created the financial crisis.
The Third World had its structural adjustment and forced austerity through the ’80s and the ’90s, leading to the IMF riots. India’s structural adjustment of 1991 has given us the agrarian crisis with the result that a quarter million farmers have committed suicide so far and food crisis is pushing every fourth Indian to hunger and every second Indian child to malnutrition. The trade liberalisation reforms dismantled our food security system, which was based on universal public distribution system. It opened up the seed sector to multi-national companies, and now an attempt is being made through the Food Security Bill to make our public feeding programmes a market for food MNCs.
The forced austerity continues through the imposition of so-called reforms, such as FDI in retail, which would rob millions of people of their livelihood and disrupt the production system.
Europe started its forced austerity in 2010. And everywhere — UK, Italy, Greece, Spain, Ireland, Iceland and Portugal — there are anti-austerity protests. The banks and financial institutions responsible for the economic crisis want society to adjust by going without jobs and livelihoods, pensions and social security, public services and the commons, whereas people want financial systems to adjust to the limits set by nature, social justice and democracy.
The precarious living conditions of the “99 per cent” has created a new class which Guy Standing, professor of economic security, University of Bath, calls “The Precariat”. If the Industrial Revolution gave us the working class, the proletariat, globalisation, which gave us the “free market”, created “the new dangerous class” of “The Precariat” —low-wage workers, both migrants and locals, living on the edge of our modern, global economy.
It is often said that with increasing growth, India and China are replicating the resource-intensive, wasteful lifestyles of the Western countries. The reality is that while a small group, three to four per cent of India, is joining the mad race for consuming the earth by acquiring more and more automobiles and air-conditioners, the large majority of India is being pushed into “de-consumption” — losing their basic entitlements like food, water and shelter because of resource grab, land grab and market grab.
From the throes of the 99 percentres’ movements a new paradigm is emerging, one that was practised and championed by Mahatma Gandhi. As opposed to the forced austerity of the World Bank and IMF, this is the paradigm of voluntary simplicity — of reducing one’s ecological footprint and ensuring the well-being of all.
While forced austerity that helps the rich become super rich, and the powerful become totalitarian, voluntary simplicity enables us all to adjust ecologically, to reduce over-consumption of the planet’s resources and create a path for economic adjustment based on justice and equity.

The article can be found on the Asian Age at http://www.asianage.com/columnists/green-greed-242

                          

The Prime Minister  Man Mohan Singh has invoked the Foreign Hand that Indira Gandhi used to refer to  explain the people’s resistance to hazardous technologies like Nuclear Power and Genetic Engineering. His comments have been published in the journal Science.

The PM’s comments are misplaced on a number of counts. Firstly , if there is a Foreign Hand  shaping India’s policy, it is working through the PM himself. Dr Man Mohan Singh signed the US India Agriculture agreement with President Bush, which attemps to hand over India’s Seed Supply to Monsanto, Grain trade to Grain giants like Cargill , and Retail trade to giants like Walmart. He also signed the Us India Nuclear deal handing over our energy sovereignty to global powers. The Government nearly collapsed, and the vote in parliament went through only through the ‘cash for votes’ scandal. The foreign hand of global corporations is  grabbing India’s food and energy sectors.

Secondly, by saying that Indian movements are not indigenous, the PM is insulting democracy and the people of India, and  distorting facts.The people of  Jaitapur fighting the Areva nuclear power plant are self organised  and are fighting a French company. It is the Govet joinig the Foreign hand in land grab and imposing the nuclear plant that no one wants. The same is the case for Kudumkulam.

I started Navdanya 25 years ago to create an alternative to GMO s and patented Seeds. When half a million farmers came out with us to say No to Patents on Seed, they were speaking from India’s Soil .When we organized collectively to stop BT Brinjal, and the Environment Minister did his duty under the EPA act and announced a moratorium , the PM removed him from the Ministry, showing once again that the  foreign hand of Monsanto works through the PM.

The PM has invoked development challenges. One big development challenge we face is the agrarian crisis which has pushed  250000 farmers suicide linked to debt, and debt created by high cost non-renewable seed  unreliable seed like Monsanto’s Bt Cotton. There is a foreign hand in India’s farm suicides, and the PM has a responsibility to bring back Seed sovereignty by supporting peopl’s movements , not attacking them.

The second big  development challenge is hunger and malnutrition. Every 4^th India is now hungry. Every second Indian child is today wasted and stunted. And the junk food culture promoted by the foreign hand has  made India the capital of diabetes. We have the solutions for growing more food and healthier food. The PM should be promoting the indigenous solutions we offer. Instead, he wants to turn hunger into a market for giants like Sodexo  by introducing cash vouchers for the  food, thus dismantling the Public Distribution system. The proposals in the proposed Food Security Act  are drafted by the foreign hand. It is peoples movements which are defending India’s Seed Sovereignty and Food Sovereignty .

                          

By Dr Vandana Shiva, NAVDANYA

vandana@vandanashiva.com

The biggest corporate hijack on the planet is the hijack of the food system.And the costs of the corporate takeover of food has huge irreversible consequences for the Earth and people everywhere.

From the seed to the table, corporations are seeking total control over biodiversity, land,water. They are seeking control over how food is grown, processed and distributed. And in seeking this total control, they are destroying the earth’s ecological processes,our  farmers, our health and our freedoms.

Monsanto with 5 gene giants are trying to control and own the seed through genetic engineering and patents. Monsanto wrote the World trade Organisation treaty on Intellectual property which forces countries to patent seeds. As a Monsanto reprentative said, they were the patient, diagnostician and physician all in one. They defined a problem, and for them the problem was that farmers save seed, They offered a solution, and the solution was that seed saving and seed sharing should be defined as intellectual property theft and criminalized.I believe that saving seeds and protecting biodiversity is our ecological and ethical duty. That is why I started Navdanya 25 years ago. Navdanya is a movement to occupy the seed. We have created 66 community seed banks, saved 3000 rice varieties , stopped laws that would prevent us from seed saving, faught against Biopiracy. Monsanto has created a Seed Emergency on a global scale.  And by destroying the seed , they have established Seed monopoly. India  has lost its cotton diversity since Monsanto took over the cotton seed supply . (5 % cotton seed sold on India today is Monsanto’s Bt cotton. The price of seed jumped 800%, farmers got trapped in debt, and 250000 indebted farmers have commited suicide in India since Monsanto’s entry in the seed market. Saving Seeds and defending our seed freedom has become a survival issue. Control over the seed is control over food and control over life. Corporations like Monsanto have created a seed emergency This is the reason  I am starting a Global citizen’s campaign on Seed Sovereignty. I hope you will all join. The case 84 organisations including Navdanya have filed against Monsanto in New York through Pubpat is an important step in reclaiming  seed sovereignty.

Contrary  to the claim of corporations, the chemical based Green revolution and genetic engineering do not produce more food. Navdanya’s report on GMOs shows that The GMO Emperor has no Clothes. Our report Health per Acre shows that  Biodiverse Organic farming protects nature while increasing nutrition  per Acre. We have the solutions to hunger.

Cargill the world’s biggest Grain giant wrote the Agriculture agrrement of WTO. It has destroyed local production and local markets everywhere, uprooted small farmers, devastated the Amazon, and speculated on food commodities pushing millions to hunger. A global corporate controlled food system robs farmers of their incomes by pushing down farm prices, and robs the poor of their right to food by pushing up food prices. If a billion people are hungry today, it is because of the greed driven, capital intensive, nonsustainable corporate controlled globalised industrialized agriculture. While creating hunger, agribusiness collects our tax money as subsidies in the name of removing hunger.

And this system has pushed another 2 billion to food related diseases like obesity and diabetes. Replacing healthy  local food culture with junk and processed food is achieved through Food safety laws, which I call pseudo hygiene laws. At the global level these include the Sanitary and Phyto sanitary agreement of WTO. At the national level they include new corporate written Food Safety laws in Europe and India, and the Food safety modernization Act in the US.

The final link in the corporate hijack of food are retail giants like Walmart.We have been resisting the entry of Walmart in India because big retail means big ag, and together the corporate giants destroy  small shops and small farms which provide livelihoods to millions.

We must occupy our food because corporations are destroying our seed and soil, our water and land, our climate and biodiversity. 40% Greenhouse gases that are destabilizing the climate come from corporate industrial agriculture. 70% water is wasted for industrial agriculture . 75% biodiversity has been lost due to industrial monocultures.

We have alternatives which protect the earth, protect our farmers, and protect our health and nutrition. To occupy the food system means simultaneously resisting corporate control and building sustainable and just alternatives, from the seed to the table. One seed at a time, one farm at a time, one meal at a time we must break out of corporate food dictatorship and create a vibrant and robust food democracy.

                          

by Dr Vandana Shiva, NAVDANYA

vandana@vandanashiva.com

The biggest corporate hijack on the planet is the hijack of the food system.And the costs of the corporate takeover of food has huge irreversible consequences for the Earth and people everywhere.

From the seed to the table, corporations are seeking total control over biodiversity, land,water. They are seeking control over how food is grown, processed and distributed. And in seeking this total control, they are destroying the earth’s ecological processes,our  farmers, our health and our freedoms.

Monsanto with 5 gene giants are trying to control and own the seed through genetic engineering and patents. Monsanto wrote the World trade Organisation treaty on Intellectual property which forces countries to patent seeds. As a Monsanto reprentative said, they were the patient, diagnostician and physician all in one. They defined a problem, and for them the problem was that farmers save seed, They offered a solution, and the solution was that seed saving and seed sharing should be defined as intellectual property theft and criminalized.I believe that saving seeds and protecting biodiversity is our ecological and ethical duty. That is why I started Navdanya 25 years ago. Navdanya is a movement to occupy the seed. We have created 66 community seed banks, saved 3000 rice varieties , stopped laws that would prevent us from seed saving, faught against Biopiracy. Monsanto has created a Seed Emergency on a global scale.  And by destroying the seed , they have established Seed monopoly. India  has lost its cotton diversity since Monsanto took over the cotton seed supply . (5 % cotton seed sold on India today is Monsanto’s Bt cotton. The price of seed jumped 800%, farmers got trapped in debt, and 250000 indebted farmers have commited suicide in India since Monsanto’s entry in the seed market. Saving Seeds and defending our seed freedom has become a survival issue. Control over the seed is control over food and control over life. Corporations like Monsanto have created a seed emergency This is the reason  I am starting a Global citizen’s campaign on Seed Sovereignty. I hope you will all join. The case 84 organisations including Navdanya have filed against Monsanto in New York through Pubpat is an important step in reclaiming  seed sovereignty.

Contrary  to the claim of corporations, the chemical based Green revolution and genetic engineering do not produce more food. Navdanya’s report on GMOs shows that The GMO Emperor has no Clothes. Our report Health per Acre shows that  Biodiverse Organic farming protects nature while increasing nutrition  per Acre. We have the solutions to hunger.

Cargill the world’s biggest Grain giant wrote the Agriculture agrrement of WTO. It has destroyed local production and local markets everywhere, uprooted small farmers, devastated the Amazon, and speculated on food commodities pushing millions to hunger. A global corporate controlled food system robs farmers of their incomes by pushing down farm prices, and robs the poor of their right to food by pushing up food prices. If a billion people are hungry today, it is because of the greed driven, capital intensive, nonsustainable corporate controlled globalised industrialized agriculture. While creating hunger, agribusiness collects our tax money as subsidies in the name of removing hunger.

And this system has pushed another 2 billion to food related diseases like obesity and diabetes. Replacing healthy  local food culture with junk and processed food is achieved through Food safety laws, which I call pseudo hygiene laws. At the glbal level these include the Sanitary and Phyto sanitary agreement of WTO. At the national level they include new corporate written Food Safety laws in Europe and India, and the Food safety modernization Act in the US.

The final link in the corporate hijack of food are retail giants like Walmart.We have been resisting the entry of Walmart in India because big retail means big ag, and together the corporate giants destroy  small shops and small farms which provide livelihoods to millions.

We must occupy our food because corporations are destroying our seed and soil, our water and land, our climate and biodiversity. 40% Greenhouse gases that are destabilizing the climate come from corporate industrial agriculture. 70% water is wasted for industrial agriculture . 75% biodiversity has been lost due to industrial monocultures.

We have alternatives which protect the earth, protect our farmers, and protect our health and nutrition. To occupy the food system means simultaneously resisting corporate control and building sustainable and just alternatives, from the seed to the table. One seed at a time, one farm at a time, one meal at a time we must break out of corporate food dictatorship and create a vibrant and robust food democracy.

                          

http://www.takeastep.net/TheJester/step-it-up.html

Step It Up!: Navdanya’s Rights of Mother Earth Petition

April 27, 2010
This Declaration was adopted by the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, in Bolivia. The Bolivian government has submitted it to the United Nations for consideration.

Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth

Preamble
We, the peoples and nations of Earth: considering that we are all part of Mother Earth, an indivisible, living community of interrelated and interdependent beings with a common destiny; gratefully acknowledging that Mother Earth is the source of life, nourishment and learning and provides everything we need to live well; recognizing that the capitalist system and all forms of depredation, exploitation, abuse and contamination have caused great destruction, degradation and disruption of Mother Earth, putting life as we know it today at risk through phenomena such as climate change; convinced that in an interdependent living community it is not possible to recognize the rights of only human beings without causing an imbalance within Mother Earth; affirming that to guarantee human rights it is necessary to recognize and defend the rights of Mother Earth and all beings in her and that there are existing cultures, practices and laws that do so; conscious of the urgency of taking decisive, collective action to transform structures and systems that cause climate change and other threats to Mother Earth; proclaim this Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth, and call on the General Assembly of the United Nations to adopt it, as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations of the world, and to the end that every individual and institution takes responsibility for promoting through teaching, education, and consciousness raising, respect for the rights recognized in this Declaration and ensure through prompt and progressive measures and mechanisms, national and international, their universal and effective recognition and observance among all peoples and States in the world.

Article1. Mother Earth

1. Mother Earth is a living being.
2. Mother Earth is a unique, indivisible, self-regulating community of interrelated beings that sustains, contains and reproduces all beings.
3. Each being is defined by its relationships as an integral part of Mother Earth.
4. The inherent rights of Mother Earth are inalienable in that they arise from the same source as existence.
5. Mother Earth and all beings are entitled to all the inherent rights recognized in this Declaration without distinction of any kind, such as may be made between organic and inorganic beings, species, origin, use to human beings, or any other status.
6. Just as human beings have human rights, all other beings also have rights which are specific to their species or kind and appropriate for their role and function within the communities within which they exist.
7. The rights of each being are limited by the rights of other beings and any conflict between their rights must be resolved in a way that maintains the integrity, balance and health of Mother Earth.

Article 2. Inherent Rights of Mother Earth

1. Mother Earth and all beings of which she is composed have the following inherent rights:
   a) the right to life and to exist;
   b) the right to be respected;
   c) the right to regenerate its bio-capacity and to continue its vital cycles and processes free from human disruptions;
   d) the right to maintain its identity and integrity as a distinct, self-regulating and interrelated being;
   e) the right to water as a source of life;
   f) the right to clean air;
   g) the right to integral health;
   h) the right to be free from contamination, pollution and toxic or radioactive waste;
   i) the right to not have its genetic structure modified or disrupted in a manner that threatens its integrity or vital and healthy functioning;
   j) the right to full and prompt restoration from the violation of the rights recognized in this Declaration caused by human activities;
2. Each being has the right to a place and to play its role in Mother Earth for her harmonious functioning.
3. Every being has the right to wellbeing and to live free from torture or cruel treatment by human beings.

Article 3. Obligations of human beings to Mother Earth

1. Every human being is responsible for respecting and living in harmony with Mother Earth.
2. Human beings, all States, and all public and private institutions must:
   a) act in accordance with the rights and obligations recognized in this Declaration;
   b) recognize and promote the full implementation and enforcement of the rights and obligations recognized in this Declaration;
   c) promote and participate in learning, analysis, interpretation and communication about how to live in harmony with Mother Earth in accordance with this Declaration;
   d) ensure that the pursuit of human wellbeing contributes to the wellbeing of Mother Earth, now and in the future;
   e) establish and apply effective norms and laws for the defence, protection and conservation of the rights of Mother Earth;
   f) respect, protect, conserve and where necessary, restore the integrity of the vital ecological cycles, processes and balances of Mother Earth;
   g) guarantee that the damages caused by human violations of the inherent rights recognized in this Declaration are rectified and that those responsible are held accountable for restoring the integrity and health of Mother Earth;
   h) empower human beings and institutions to defend the rights of Mother Earth and of all beings;
   i) establish precautionary and restrictive measures to prevent human activities from causing species extinction, the destruction of ecosystems or the disruption of ecological cycles;
   j) guarantee peace and eliminate nuclear, chemical and biological weapons;
   k) promote and support practices of respect for Mother Earth and all beings, in accordance with their own cultures, traditions and customs;
   l) promote economic systems that are in harmony with Mother Earth and in accordance with the rights recognized in this Declaration.

Article 4. Definitions

1. The term “being” includes ecosystems, natural communities, species and all other natural entities which exist as part of Mother Earth.
2. Nothing in this Declaration restricts the recognition of other inherent rights of all beings or specified beings.

To
Dr. Manmohan Singh
Hon’ble Prime Minister of India
New Delhi
South Block, Raisina Hill,
New Delhi – 110 101.

Subject : Stand up for the Rights of Mother Earth

Dear Sir,

India today may be revelling in its nearly double digit growth but it is forgetting its ancient legacy of reverence for Mother Earth and the need to protect nature for future generations. On the occasion of the 150th birth anniversary of India’s National Poet, Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore, let us also be reminded of his innate wisdom and warning that “the greed of gain has no time or limit to its capaciousness. Its one object is to produce and consume. It has pity neither for beautiful nature nor for living human beings. It is ruthlessly ready without a moment’s hesitation to crush beauty and life out of them, molding them into money.”

On World Environment Day in 1972, the United Nations Conference on Human Environment began in Stockholm. Smt. Indira Gandhi, our then Prime Minister, was the only Head of Government who travelled to Stockholm to participate in it. She addressed the gathering by quoting our ancient scripture the Atharva Veda and said “O pure Earth, May that we utilize your soil well, without causing you injury or harm or disturbing any vital element in you.”  This is our civilization’s legacy – for which we have stood up and spoken on behalf of the Rights of Mother Earth and her people, and against apartheid of any kind. You are the custodian of this legacy as our Prime Minister.

We have given the world the concept of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakum – the Earth family which represents the democracy of all life. Our indigenous traditions of reverence for the earth are still upheld by our tribal cultures and rural communities. The Indian constitution has also reflected this spirit by adopting the PESA act. Across India, tribals are adopting resolutions under PESA, declaring: “We pledge that the resources of our village do not belong to an individual, they belong to the community…. From today we will refer to the Earth that sustains us as Mother Earth. Our Mother Earth is not a tradable commodity.”

In the wake of Rio +20, twenty years after the first Earth Summit held at Rio in 1992, we urge you to uphold our moral, political and spiritual heritage and support the Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth during the Earth Summit and be guided by its spirit in your action and policies as well.

We hope that our voices reach you and give you courage to represent our unique ecological civilization which has always stood for non-violence, peace and trusteeship of the Earth. We hope India will join the ranks of the people and nations who have the vision to endorse, support and champion the cause of the Rights of Mother Earth.

For the Earth

                          

How should we respond?

Dr. Mira Shiva  M.D.                                                                                                                     Dr. Vandana Shiva

Director                                                                                                                                                                   Director

Initiative for Health & Equity in Society                                                                                           NAVDANYA

A-60 Hauz Khas                                                                                                                                                     A-60 Hauz Khas

New Delhi 110016                                                                                                                              New Delhi 110016

Email: mirashiva@gmail.com Email: vandana@vandanashiva.com

M: 9810582028                                                                                                                                 M: 9810025169

The National Nutrition Policy  was formulated in 1993 recognizing the  high level of childhood malnutrition maternal anaemia, and also recognizing  nutrition as one of the  most important determinant of health.  It  covered the various dimensions  of  food & nutrition,  from production, procurement, storage, distribution, consumption, recognizing the different needs  depending on   stages  in life  eg growing years, pregnancy , lactation, & also  quantum of   physical  exertion it  gave roadmap of what needed  to be done  to  deal with this  major Public Health  problem . It was extremely unfortunate  for the children of our nation  that the National Nutrition Policy was never implemented in all these years .

The deepening hunger and malnutrition crisis in India has been known for long. The governments own National  Family Health Survey-3 should already have shocked the nation. In 2005-2006 it had shown that 20 percent of Indian children were wasted (severely malnourished) and 48 percent were stunted (chronically malnourished. 43 percent were underweight. Inspite of its high economic growth India is closing the future for half her children.

The fact  that 36.6% of our women have Body mass Index(BMI) of 18.5 which indicates  chronic  hunger   has been known for long & it is a continuing  tragedy  . It is also known  that 20% of maternal mortality is due to anemia   & that  childhood malnutrition is the underlying cause of death in an estimated 35% of all death among children under 5years

Utsa Patnaik, one of India’s most important economists wrote a  extremely analytic , insightful book, “The Republic of Hunger”. It is interesting that the first time the Prime Minister has expressed shock about the food emergency in the country was when the same facts were brought out by the HUNGaMA report.

The report found that in the 100 focus districts, 42 percent children were underweight, down from 43% inn 2005-2006  59 percent were stunted, up from 48% in the 2005-2006 National Family Health Survey.

Yet the HUNGaMA report talks of a 20.3 percent reduction in underweight children.

It is not just in selectiveness of data that the HUNGaMA report presents a distorted picture. Its most serious lacunae is that it misses the most important determinant, of hunger and malnutrition, access to healthy and nutritious food. The report    fails to recognize  the   umbilical cord like  connect  between agriculture and food and nutrition security. This disconnect is evident in the image used in the HUNGaMA report cover page. It is a slice of white bread on the cover. White bread which is not a staple in India and in nutritionally deficient , being made from refined flour. The cover could  have had rotis of different grains.

While mothers education might have a role, the assumption that women have no indigenous knowledge of nutrition is a devaluation of women’s knowledge. If there has been an erosion of this knowledge, its causes need to understood.

It women remain Hungary & are not able to feed their children it is definitely  not because of ignorance, it is because many  are unable to grow food because of land grab and displacement. They are unable to purchase  adequate  healthy  food for their family, because of the rising food prices & their own low purchasing power. The PDS has   supplied only cereals  rice or wheat,  basically carbohydrates – no dals, no edible oil.

Issues of livelihoods and entitlements issues of food justice have been substituted by blaming the victims – According to the HUNGaMA report it is mother’s ignorance that is responsible for their children suffering from malnutrition. Food production is being replaced by “hungama” –  noise. But sound bites  unfortunately don’t translate into food bites. Food security begins with  our farmers and fields growing food.  A media campaign supporting real, meaningful, wholistic solutions will definitely help. It cannot be a substitute to real solutions.

Now that the Prime Minister is awake to the crisis, what will the policy response be? There are two responses that can be offered to address the hunger and malnutrition crisis – one is a real sustainable  comprehensive  health  solution, the other is unfortunately   a reductionist ,  false solution.

The real solution to the hunger and malnutrition crisis is:

1. To grow more nutritious & diverse  food
2. To strengthen equitable and just systems of distribution and entitlement
3. To increase nutritional literacy, in public which includes policy  makers &
4. Ensure Agriculture polices that promote nutrition food production & protect  the food producers , large number of whom  are women

To grow more food we need to intensify our food systems ecologically. The chemical intensification of the Green Revolution has not produced more nutrition. In fact our  nutrition basket  actually went down because pulses, oil seeds, greens were displaced by expanding monocultures of wheat and rice. Food loaded with pesticides has health destructive impact, more so on the  already malnourished.

Rice and wheat alone do not make for a nutritious and balanced diet. That is why the first step in removing malnutrition is to “Grow Nutrition”.

Navdanya’s report “Health Per Acre: Organic Solutions to Hunger and Malnutrition” shows that biodiverse organic farming is the most efficient way to increase production of nutrition at low cost, in ways that make nutritious food available everywhere.

Biodiversity grows nutrition, monoculture grow nutritional deficiencies organic increases the micronutrients and trace elements in food. Organic crops have  30% more calcium, 80% more chromium, 498% more iodine, 30% more magnesium, 10% more zinc than chemically grown crops. (Ref: Health Per Acre, pg. 68).

We have also started “Gardens of Hope” which can become “Gardens of Health and Nutrition”.  We create kitchen gardens, community gardens, school gardens (edible school yards – Saagwadi’s).  Anganwadis and  schools  should be linked to a garden growing fresh and nutritious vegetables and fruits. “Growing nutrition” is the real solution to malnutrition.

Aggressive promotion of trees and plants having nutritive   therapeutic value should be started as it provides income generation opportunities ,as well as socially relevant education , training  , & learning in science , ecology & nutrition.

While ecological farming provides all necessary nutrients, industrial fortification with micronutrients adds only one or two nutrients to nutritionally deficient and nutritionally empty food. This reductionism has been called “nutritionism” and cannot address the multidimensional aspects of malnutrition.

In terms of fair and just distribution, the central pillar must be a decentralized but universal PDS system. We have outlined the framework in our “Anna Swaraj” report.

Another pillar has to be fair and equitable terms of trade, both domestically and internationally.  Half of India’s hungry are farmers, half of the world’s hungry are farmers. This is because they are being trapped in a negative economy, with costs of production increasing and prices of their produce falling. They thus get trapped in debt and the debt trap makes repayment of debt the overriding pressure. Both at the individual level, and at a country level, the debt trap creates hunger.

At the international level the negative terms of trade between North and South have been intensified with the a systematic removal of quantitative restrictions (QR’s) in the South with a continuation of the $400 billion  farm subsidies in the North. This leads to dumping, dumping undermines domestic production and agricultural livelihoods. Destruction of food production and livelihoods translates into hunger. Correcting the unfair rules of trade  in W T O ,  stopping speculation in food   is central to addressing malnutrition as has been pointed out by the UN  Special Rapporteur on Food – Oliver de Schutter as well as the former UN Special Rapporteur on Food, Jean Ziegler, in his new book, “Hunger – A Weapon of Mass Destruction”.

Nutritional literacy is vital to addressing malnutrition. This is particularly important in the context of the explosion of aggressive promotion, production and consumption of “junk foods” and processed foods. Not only are 48% of our children stunted, in cities like Delhi 25% are obese. The figure was 7% in 1995. This is another form of malnutrition. Corporations which make their profits from pushing junk foods loaded with monosodium glutamate, transfats, salt & sugar  also mislead citizens about the  nutritive value of  commercially processed  food  in comparison to wholesome  , natural organic , foods .

Nutrition literacy includes “knowing your food” – both the value to indigenous nutritious diverse  foods like millets, different dals, oils, vegetables , fruits  and the health hazards associated with  junk and processed food as well as GM foods .

“Complementary  Foods”  for children   jointly brought out by Navdanya &  Breastfeeding Promotion Network of India (BPNI) shows that  children’s malnutrition can be effectively addressed through nutritious indigenous foods and keeping food and nutrition security in women’s hands.

We need awareness spread on all these various  dimensions of “Growing  Nutrition”. If a media campaign can focus on producing more nutritious foods, and on issues of food rights and food justice, and if policies shift to support action on the ground, we can create a real solution to malnutrition.

The false solution to malnutrition can evolve as follows. A lot of noise will be made, a lot of Hungama created. And then the nation will be told that the crisis is too big for the people of India and the governments, from local to national level to manage, only global corporations can address it& that  Indian women are ignorant, and food security cannot be left in their hands. The Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) is waiting in the wings to profit from hunger and  these false solutions. They will offer genetically engineered and industrially fortified foods as solutions to malnutrition. They will offer genetically engineered Golden Rice as a solution to Vit. A deficiency and blindness prevention. We have called this a blind approach to blindness prevention because we can grow seventy times more Vit. A by growing and using Vit. A rich foods & crops like the pumpkins, carrot, mangoes,  drumstick, coriander, curry leaves etc.

Not just vit A foods, but iron , calcium protein rich Indian nutritive foods are listed in one of National Institute of Nutrition Hyderabad’ much valued but inadequately promoted publication, “Nutritive  Value of Indian Foods”.

The reluctant approach to nutrition in medical Education & , medical practice  with focus on commercially promoted neutraceuticals, vitamins,  tonics, energy  drinks  costly  food supplements.

The Food Security Bill has already sneaked in this option of corporate entry in a footnote to schedule II in which “Take Home Rations” for vulnerable women and children are specified as energy dense food fortified with micro-nutrients. If the language was “rich in micronutrients” we could imagine the creative efforts of thousands of local organizations would be used. This would create livelihoods for women’s groups and ensure culturally appropriate diets. The phrase “fortified with micro-nutrients” refers to industrial fortification controlled by big corporations which is being pushed by groups like GAIN, the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition, led by the Gates Foundation.

Another foot note is to hot cooked meals. The foot note states “Meals shall be prepared in accordance with the prevailing food laws”. This is the Food Safety and Standards Act formulated  by the food processing industrial units  which replaced the Prevention of Food Adulterate Act. When the Food Safety and Standards Act was introduced I had written an essay called “Food Fascism”. Industry is increasingly using pseudo hygiene laws to destroy local, artisanal, decentralized food preparation . Food wars are taking place around the world around new artificial “food safety standards” which have nothing to do with healthy and safe food, and more with promoting industrial food production and the corporate Hijack of food.  In Eastern Europe, cows milked by hand is being declared unsafe by pseudo hygiene rules which are imposing factory farms. In Italy, industrial standards nearly destroyed artisanal cheese making. It took a movement to defend it. In France, farmers rose against pseudo hygiene laws which would have shut down farmers markets.

India’s new food safety law defines diversity as “unsafe” and  criminalizes farmers who bring diversity to the market. The core of the Act is bureaucratic control through a “license permit raj” in our food system. Art. 31 (i) of the Act states that no person shall manufacture, sell, stock, distribute or exhibit for sake any article of food except under a license issued by the State Commissioner of Food Safety. This means our subziwala, our street vendor, our dhabas, who bring us fresh food, and also deserve a livelihood for their families are deprived.

Roasted peanuts that a “bharbuja” sells have been put in the same category as irradiated food, and genetically engineered food. FSSAI’s consumers awareness on food safety show an advertisement having a woman  cooking on chulah. The content of advertisement are in Hindi and the newspaper is Times of India and page is the sport page carries the message that freshly cooked food is unsafe processed food is better  .  The dabba-walas of Mumbai will be burdened with the same licensing arrangements as a high fructose corn syrup factory of Cargill or Monsanto’s GM foods.

A license inspector raj controlled from Delhi is a recipe for corruption. In the area of food, with  such high levels of malnutrition, poverty, high food prices, corruption could kill.

It is said the devil lies in the detail. Both in the Food Safety and Standards Act and  in the proposed Food Safety Bill, and in the HUNGaMA report, the devil is lying in the details.

In this food emergency, we stand at a cross road. Will we promote a centralized, corporate controlled, unhealthy industrially processed  food systems that destroys our farmers, our biodiversity, our health and will deepen the food and nutrition crisis, or will we  make a paradigm shift to innovative and creative & also wise solutions  to shape decentralized diverse people controlled healthy and nutritious food systems which will ensure food and nutrition  security, food  sovereignty  & which like the Amul Co-operative  provide economic support to the women in the village , while making healthy nutritious food available to  many others.  Will we have food slavery, or will we create food democracy and food sovereignty.