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MONOCULTURES, MONOPOLIES, MYTHS AND THE MASCULINISATION OF AGRICULTURE
Statement by Dr. Vandana Shiva
Director, Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology at The Policy
Round Table on "Women's Knowledge, Biotechnology and International Trade --
Fostering a New Dialogue into the Millennium" during The International
Conference
on "Women in Agriculture"
Washington
June 28 - 2 July 1998
MONOCULTURES, MONOPOLIES, MYTHS AND THE MASCULINISATION OF AGRICULTURE
by Dr. Vandana Shiva
I am writing this statement from beautiful Doon Valley in the Himalaya where the
monsoons have arrived, and our Navdanya (Nine Seeds -- Our National Movement on
Conservation of Biodiversity) team is busy with transplanting of over 300 rice
varieties which we are conserving along with the rich diversity of other
agricultural crops. Our farm does not use any chemicals or external inputs. It
is a self-regenerative system which preserves biodiversity while meeting human
needs and needs of farm animals. Our 2 bullocks are the alternative to chemical
fertilisers which pollute soil and water as well as to tractors and fossil fuels
which pollute the atmosphere and destabilise the climate.1
One of the rice varieties we conserve and grow is basmati, the aromatic rice for
which Dehra Dun is famous.
The basmati rice which farmers in my valley have been growing for centuries is
today being claimed as "an instant invention of a novel rice line" by a U.S.
Corporation called RiceTec (no. 5,663,454).2 The "neem" which our mothers and
grandmothers have used for centuries as a pesticide and fungicide has been
patented for these uses by W.R. Grace, another U.S. Corporation.3 We have
challenged Grace's patent with the Greens in European Parliament in the European
Patent Office.
This phenomena of biopiracy through which western corporations are stealing
centuries of collective knowledge and innovation carried out by Third World
women is now reaching epidemic proportions. Such "biopiracy" is now being
justified as a new "partnership" between agribusiness and Third World women.
For us, theft cannot be the basis of partnership. Partnership implies equality
and mutual respect. This would imply that there is no room for biopiracy and
that those who have engaged in such piracy apologise to those they have stolen
from and whose intellectual and natural creativity they want to undermine
through IPR monopolies. Partnership with Third World women necessitates changes
in the WTO/TRIPs agreement which protects the pirates and punishes the original
innovators as in the case of the U.S./India TRIPs dispute.4 It also requires
changes in the U.S. Patent Act which allows rampant piracy of our biodiversity
related knowledge. These changes are essential to ensure that our collective
knowledge and innovation is protected and women are recognised and respected as
knowers and biodiversity experts.5
Women farmers have been the seed keepers and seed breeders over millennia. The
basmati is just one among 100,000 varieties of rice evolved by Indian farmers.
Diversity and perenniality is our culture of the seed. In Central India, which
is the Vavilov Centre of rice diversity, at the beginning of the agricultural
season, farmers gather at the village deity, offer their rice varieties and then
share the seeds. This annual festival of "Akti" rejuvenates the duty of saving
and sharing seed among farming communities. It establishes partnership among
farmers and with the earth.
IPRs on seeds are however criminalising this duty to the earth and to each other
by making seed saving and seed exchange illegal. The attempt to prevent farmers
from saving seed is not just being made through new IPR laws, it is also being
made through the new genetic engineering technologies. Delta and Pine Land (now
owned by Monsanto) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) have
established new partnership through a jointly held patent ( No.5723785) to seed
which has been genetically engineered to ensure that it does not germinate on
harvest thus forcing farmers to buy seed at each planting season. Termination
of germination is a means for capital accumulation and market expansion.
However, abundance in nature and for farmers shrinks as markets grow for
Monsanto. When we sow seed, we pray, "May this seed be exhaustless". Monsanto
and the USDA on the other hand are stating, "Let this seed be terminated so that
our profits and monopoly is exhaustless".
There can be no partnership between the terminator logic which destroys nature's
renewability and regeneration and the commitment to continuity of life held by
women farmers of the Third World. The two world views do not merely clash
- they
are mutually exclusive. There can be no partnership between a logic of death on
which Monsanto bases its expanding empire and the logic of life on which women
farmers in the Third World base their partnership with the earth to provide
food
security to their families and communities.
There are other dimensions of the mutually exclusive interests and perspectives
of women farmers of the Third World and biotechnology corporations such as
Monsanto.
The most widespread application of genetic engineering in agriculture is
herbicide resistance i.e. the breeding of crops to be resistant to herbicides.
Monsanto's Round up Ready Soya and Cotton are examples of this application.
When introduced to Third World farming systems, this will lead to increased use
of agri-chemicals thus increasing environmental problems. It will also destroy
the biodiversity that is the sustenance and livelihood base of rural women.
What are weeds for Monsanto are food, fodder and medicine for Third World Women.
In Indian agriculture women use 150 different species of plants for vegetables,
fodder and health care. In West Bengal 124 "weed" species collected from rice
fields have economic importance for farmers.6 In the Expana region of
Veracruz, Mexico, peasants utilise about 435 wild plant and animal species of
which 229 are eaten.7
The spread of Round Up Ready crops would destroy this diversity and the value it
provides to farmers. It would also undermine the soil conservation functions of
cover crops and crop mixtures, thus leading to accelerated soil erosion.
Contrary to Monsanto myths, Round Up Ready crops are a recipe for soil erosion,
not a method for soil conservation.8
Instead of falsely labelling the patriarchal projects of intellectual property
rights on seed and genetic engineering in agriculture which are destroying
biodiversity and the small farmers of the Third World as "partnership" with
Third World women, it would be more fruitful to redirect agricultural policy
towards women centred systems which promote biodiversity based small farm
agriculture.
A common myth used by Monsanto and the Biotechnology industry is that without
genetic engineering, the world cannot be fed. However, while biotechnology is
projected as increasing food production four times, small ecological farms have
productivity hundreds of time higher than large industrial farms based on
conventional farms.9
Women farmers in the Third World are predominantly small farmers.10
They provide the basis of food security, and they provide food security
in partnership with other species. The partnership between women and
biodiversity has kept the world fed through history, at present, and
will feed the world in the future. It is this partnership that needs to
be preserved and promoted to ensure food security.
Agriculture based on diversity, decentralisation and improving small
farm productivity through ecological methods is a women-centred, nature
friendly agriculture. In this women-centred agriculture, knowledge is
shared, other species and plants are kin, not "property", and
sustainability is based on renewal of the earth's fertility and renewal
and regeneration of biodiversity and species richness on farms to
provide internal inputs. In our paradigms, there is no place for
monocultures of genetically engineered crops and IPR monopolies on
seeds.
Monocultures and monopolies symbolise a masculinisation of agriculture.
The war mentality underlying military-industrial agriculture is evident
from the names given to herbicides which destroy the economic basis of
the survival of the poorest women in the rural areas of the Third World.
Monsanto's herbicides are called "Round up", "Machete", "Lasso"
American Home Products which has merged with Monsanto calls its
herbicides `Pentagon', `Prowl', `Scepter', `Squadron', `Cadre',
`Lightening', `Assert', `Avenge'. This is the language of war, not
sustainability. Sustainability is based on peace with the earth.
The violence intrinsic to methods and metaphors used by the global
agribusiness and biotechnology corporations is a violence against
nature's biodiversity and women's expertise and productivity. The
violence intrinsic to destruction of diversity through monocultures and
the destruction of the freedom to save and exchange seeds through IPR
monopolies is inconsistent with women's diverse non-violent ways of
knowing nature and providing food security. This diversity of
knowledge systems and production systems is the way forward for ensuring
that Third World women continue to play a central role as knowers,
producers and providers of food.11
Genetic Engineering and IPRs will rob Third World women and their
creativity, innovation and decision making power in agriculture. In
place of women deciding what is grown in fields and served in kitchens,
agriculture based on globalisation, genetic engineering and corporate
monopolies on seeds will establish a food system and world view in which
men controlling global corporations control what is grown in our fields
and what we eat. Corporate men investing financial capital in theft and
biopiracy will present themselves as creators and owners of life.
We do not want a partnership in this violent usurpation of the
creativity of creation and Third World women by global biotechnology
corporations who call themselves the "Life Sciences Industry" even while
they push millions of species and millions of small farmers to
extinction.
References
1. a) Cultivating Diversity: Biodiversity Conservation and the
Politics
of the Seed", Research Foundation for Science, Technology and
Natural Resource Policy (RFSTNRP), New Delhi, 1993
b) Sustaining Diversity: Renewing Diversity and Balance Through
Conservation", RFSTNRP, New Delhi, 1994
c) The Seed Keepers", RFSTNRP, New Delhi, 1995
2. Vandana Shiva, " Biodiversity and IPRs: Lessons from Basmati Biopiracy"
and "The Basmati Patent: What it Implies? How Should India Respond?
Briefing Papers prepared for the Conference of Parties to the Convention
on Biological Diversity held in Bratislava, May 1998
3. Vandana Shiva, K.Vijayalakshmi, K.S. Radha, "Neem: A User's Manual"
RFSTNRP, New Delhi and CIKS, Madras, 1995
4. Vandana Shiva, "W.T.O,. Rules Against Democracy and Justice in the U.S.
- India TRIPs Dispute", Briefing paper prepared for the Conference of
Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, Bratislava May 1998)
5. Vandana Shiva, Afsar H.Jafri, Gitanjali Bedi, Radha Holla-Bhar, "The
Enclosure and Recovery of the Commons", Research Foundation for
Science, Technology and Ecology (RFSTE), New Delhi, 1997
6. Hope Shand, "Harvesting Diversity", RAFI, 1997.
7. UNDP, Agroecology: Creating the Synergism for a Sustainable
Agriculture, 1995
8. Speech delivered by Hendrik Verfaillie, President, Monsanto at the
Forum
on Nature and Human Society, National Academy of Sciences, Washington
D.C.-- October 30, 1997
9. Vandana Shiva, "Betting on Biodiversity: Why Genetic Engineering Will
Not Feed the Hungry", RFSTE, New Delhi, 1998
10. a) Vandana Shiva, "Betting on Biodiversity: Why Genetic
Engineering
Will Not Feed the Hungry", RFSTE, New Delhi, 1998
b) Vandana Shiva, "Globalisation of Agriculture, Food Security and
Sustainability, RFSTE, New Delhi, 1998
11. Vandana Shiva, "Most Farmers in India are Women", FAO, 1991
12. a) Vandana Shiva, "The Violence of Green Revolution: Third
World Agriculture, Ecology and Politics", TWN, Malaysia,
991 and the Other India Book Store, Goa, 1993
b) Vandana Shiva, "Monocultures of the Mind: Biodiversity,
Biotechnology and the Third World", TWN, Malaysia, 1993
************************************************************************
Prof. Mohammad Yunus 4 Jul 98
President
Grameen Bank
Bangladesh
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Dear Prof. Yunus,
When a few decades ago, you gave a few hundred Takas from your pocket to rural
women in Bangladesh who were in the grip of a famine, you started a movement
called "the grameen bank" which used microcredit to enable women to use their
skills, their knowledge, their resources to build local markets for their
products, rejuvenate their livelihoods and hence improve their food
entitlements.
When you announced your Joint Venture with Monsanto on June 25 in New York at
the Microcredit Summit, you reversed that movement and took a step to betray the
interests of the women you have served so far. The microcredit scheme linked to
the Grameen Monsanto centre will create markets for Monsanto's products not the
products based on the creativity of Bangladesh peasants. They will not build on
the skills and knowledge and resources which women of Bangladesh have, they will
wipe out their knowledge and resources and destroy their livelihoods and food
security.
Monsanto's skills in agriculture are in the field of genetically engineered
crops. These crops are designed to use more agrichemicals like Round-up which
is a broad spectrum herbicide that kills anything green. Your microcredit
venture with Monsanto will directly finance the destruction of the green
vegetables that women collect from the fields. Round-up also has negative
impacts on fish which provide 80 per cent of the animal protein in Bangladesh.
Initiatives on Sustainable Agriculture which are promoting agriculture without
agrichemicals show an increase of 11 per cent in yields and 52 per cent in farm
incomes when agrichemical use is stopped as a result of which fish can thrive in
the fields and in the small ponds which scatter the rural land scope of
Bangladesh.
Contrary to your announcement, Monsanto's technologies are not environment
friendly, or sustainable. They pose a threat to ecosystems and agriculture.
Monsanto's technologies will push Bangladeshi peasants into debt as they have to
spend more money on herbicides, seeds, royalties and technology fees. This
rising indebtedness of farmers is intrinsic to industrial agriculture and is the
reason why only 2 per cent farmers survive in the U.S. and thousands of farmers
have committed suicide in India.
Grameen Monsanto Centre will become a partner in the destruction of biodiversity
and farmers livelihoods supported by free access to biodiversity. You will have
contributed to the establishment of monopolies on seeds through patents with
Monsanto collecting rents every year from farmers for saving seed or through
technologies like the "Terminator" which are designed to prevent the germination
of future generations of seed so that farmers are forced to buy seed every
year.
Your microcredit support to the spread of Terminator seeds or patented seeds
will not liberate the poor, it will enslave them irreversibly. Monsanto
controls the Terminator technology through its recent purchase of Delta and Pine
Land. Monsanto has also bought up Cargill seeds, MAHYCO, Holden, DeKalb,
Agracetus, Calgene, Asgrow and is emerging as a global monopoly which threatens
food security world wide.
People around the world are concerned and are questioning this monopoly and
fighting it.
You have made a name for yourself in the annals of history through your
innovation and commitment to the poor in setting up the Grameen Bank to serve
rural women in Bangladesh. I am sure you will not want your efforts to be
hijacked as a marketing strategy by Monsanto. The US$ 150,000 that Monsanto is
giving to start the Grameen Monsanto Centre is a miserable 0.6 per cent of US$
1.6 billion that it is spending in an advertisement campaign against the
consumers in Europe who have rejected Monsanto's genetically engineered foods. I
am sure you do not want to go down in history as the man who took the side of a
corporation against citizens worldwide and who introduced destructive
technologies and corporate monopolies in Bangladesh and robbed rural women of
their resources, their knowledge, and their right to life.
We call on you to withdraw from this partnership with Monsanto and invite you to
join the growing world wide movement of people against Monsanto and against
genetic engineering and patents on life.
Yours sincerely,
Dr. Vandana Shiva
Director, Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology
Founder, Diverse Women for Diversity
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