[Scpg] our local corro speaks

[scpg-admin at arashi.com]

T R A N S I T I O N S

by Steven Sprinkel
associate editor
ACRES,USA
A Voice for Eco-Agriculture
www.acresusa.com


July 2001


 
Naomi Klein's essay -When Choice Becomes Just A  Memory-  in the Guardian 
(UK) on Thursday June 21, 2001, suggests strongly that "Soon all our foods 
will be polluted by genetic modification. The ( corporations ) real strategy 
is to introduce so much genetic pollution that meeting the consumer demand 
for GM-free food is seen as not possible. The idea, quite simply, is to 
pollute faster than countries can legislate - then change the laws to fit the 
contamination."

As successive public and private sector pro-GMO representatives, including 
the US president, pour into Europe they ask European officials to accept 5% 
contamination as equivalent to GE-free, and therefore not subject to labeling 
nor standards that prohibit the importation of certain varieties.

Forget that the idea is an affront to logic. Maybe they just asked for 5% and 
will take instead 3%. Its all a matter of time according to Ms. Klein. 
Meanwhile, Japanese food safety officials have imposed a zero-tolerance for 
non-approved GMO traits found in imported foods, and their lab testing is 
beginning to discover the widespread presence of illegal genetics in foods 
manufactured by domestic Japanese companies. We are also being asked to 
consider the threshold for GMO contamination in Organic. My impression is 
that too many folks are willing to compromise and far too few are willing to 
hold the line on Zero. 

Two organic farmers I know are very concerned about the high-stakes GMO game 
they have been dragged into without so much as an invitation. Both Otto 
Mueller and Reno Travis have been quoted here in the past. You may remember 
that Mueller farms on 340 acres, 210 of which is organic crop land, in 
southern Iowa, and that Travis, who recently married Muellers sister, Mabel, 
farms in Hays County, Texas on 40 acres, growing mostly vegetables and fruit 
as well as egglayers and broilers, 400 of the former and a yearly rotation of 
4 flocks of 1000 broilers for a total of around 4400 birds. Because of Travis 
new Iowa family connections he has become more familiar with many issues 
pertaining to genetic engineering  and more alarmed about the future of seed 
purity in particular as well as environmental contamination and, as he puts 
it,       " the usual kind of blue-blazer, button down-shirt crooks trying to 
make things easier for themselves by making it harder on somebody else."

So I asked Reno what he thought were Ottos chances of raising a GMO crop of 
corn this season. 

" Well, I guess its getting tricky. Last year he grew soybeans again on the 
same ground where he grew soybeans in 1999 and this year his certifier 
expects some other crop to be grown there other than soybeans. You know, the 
rotation deal. Otto told them it wasnt for the money that he had stayed with 
beans, because with corn its all five dollars a bushel. With the soybeans, if 
you compare them as crops in the field, the beans look better. Until you 
combine them, end up with 12% splits and discover that one whole area had 
beetle damage. So that makes corn a better economic crop, because that is 
six-hundred dollars to the acre no matter what.

" However, with all the GMO corn being grown all around him, and now with the 
possibility that the seed itself has been contaminated-to what extent 
everyone is still guessing at- these circumstances make planting corn a lot 
riskier than it should ever be. And this year may be the one where somehow 
the hammer gets dropped on all of us and all our production is out of 
compliance because of GMOs. Even the chickens, because their feed will have 
been really conventional rather than organic."

" Do you really think that will happen? I asked. "What would be the scenario? 
A certifier starts testing corn bins? A manufacturer starts demanding 
absolute purity? I dont think one certifier would elect to do that on their 
own. Everybody would go get certified by some other outfit. And why ( or 
which) manufacturer would have the courage to go stand on the railroad tracks 
like that?"

" Yeah, youre right. It would take consumers too long to react to the 
absolute prohibition, and by that time old Organochip-dot-com would be 
dot-dead."

" Hey that reminds me. I was wondering if you think that this year the folks 
who had "No-GMOs" on their bags and cans will take those labels off because 
they wont really be true any more."

" They probably should-unless they plan on testing every truckload of corn 
and soybeans."
" And squash and Canola
" And cotton."
" Yeah," Travis agreed. " Its a lot bigger problem than we ever dreamed it 
might become just two or three years ago. Sort of crazy for us all to get 
bent about the USDA suggesting that GMOs should be allowed in organic foods, 
and now we are on the verge of de-facto GMOs in everything."
" Except okra"
" Yeah even Okra. Ill bet some ninny somewhere is making baby blue Okra to 
match the football jerseys for the University of Southern Scandalvania.  But 
hold on a minute. It was one thing to ask if sewage sludge should be used on 
a field prior to planting carrots, but I wonder if there was anyone at USDA 
who figured that the entire food system would be compromised by runaway 
genetics, or if they knew way ahead of time that the way to kill all the 
demands for labeling was instead to hasten the day of complete contamination."

" Soon that will make as much sense as warning people that the ocean is wet."

I laughed. " So what can be done. Now they think they can classify rogue 
Round-up ready corn as exotic weeds? Like APHIS is going to get involved is 
all this. Talk about cowards. USDA/APHIS should have been willing to 
categorize all of this as undesireable and exotic and impound it all the 
minute it went awry."

" Well," Reno Travis replied, "we cant go around ripping it all out by the 
roots because there is 137 million acres of GMO crops, not counting Canada. 
But Otto told me he thought that all the organic farmers should sell their 
crops on the conventional market this year in protest. Just walk away from 
Horizon, Eden, Whole Foods, Cascadian, Gerber, Mountain People, Blooming 
Prairie, Tree of Life, whoever.

 Just flat out spill the beans, stand on the railroad tracks like you said, 
and stop pretending that this aint so bad and is going to go away because it 
is that bad, it aint going to go away and it may just take the equivalent of 
all of us ripping up all our crops and selling them to ADM and Cargill to 
make people catch a fire on this because it might not be too late. But I will 
not lay bets on one more planting season after this. The only people who 
might have, and I emphasize might have, any courage in this is farmers. "

" Will Otto do that?"

" No, or well,  I dont know. Wouldnt surprise me if he did, the way he was 
talking the other night. He is not one to make idle threats, and when he gets 
wound up over something he usually follows through. Take going organic. He 
resisted it for quite awhile until he had figured out that it would really 
work, and now there isnt a stronger proponent in all of Jefferson County. But 
I dont know why Otto should fly solo and go and sacrifice everything. A 
protest like that would have to be pretty universal to be of any use. Maybe 
we could get everyone to do it for a month. Just dry up the organic 
procurement stream for thirty days and see if that caught everyones 
attention."

And, all talk of courage and rail-road tracks aside, it now appears that only 
some mass movement, sparked not by violence but by simple acts of conscience, 
will arrest the indifference of American consumers, especially a multitude of 
organic consumers, and promote in them a desire to halt this experiment 
before the experiment ruins our chances of containing it. 

Anti-Biotech and anti-transgenic activists in the UK frequently sign off 
their correspondence with this inspirational quote. Maybe Otto is thinking 
along the same lines: "Precisely because I do not have the beautiful words I 
need, I call upon my acts to speak to you" - Daisy Zamora