-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1
The Suicide Belt
,----[ Quote ]
| He is one of nearly 200,000 Indian
| farmers, many of them cotton growers, to
| commit suicide since 1997. In fact,
| suicide among farmers in India has become
| so prevalent that officials in New Delhi
| keep a tally. Hanging and consumption of
| poison are the common methods of death,
| and most farmer suicides have occurred in
| Indiaâs cotton belt, which extends from
| Hyderabad north to Nagpur, at the
| geographical center of India, and east to
| the state of Gujarat.
|
| [...]
|
| Cotton seed has historically been among
| farmersâ lowest expenses. During the
| harvest, cotton growers would cultivate
| crop seeds and save them for the following
| season. As a general practice, they also
| would swap seeds with neighboring farmers,
| ensuring through natural selection that
| subsequent generations of cotton seed
| would be best suited for the region.
| Although local cotton did not provide the
| same potential yields as cotton seed from
| the Americas, it had adapted to Indiaâs
| unique climate â an intense monsoon season
| followed by months of drought.
|
| Monsanto helped to abolish this practice.
| At the turn of the century, the company
| introduced a genetically modified cotton
| plant that produces bacteria known as
| Bacillus thuringiensis, or Bt, a commonly
| used pesticide against bollworm. When Bt
| cotton seed first came to market
| nationwide in 2002 under the trademark
| Bollgard, a box recommended for one acre
| of farmland was 1,400 rupees, about $35, a
| substantial amount for a farmer who in a
| good year will earn a few hundred dollars
| to support his family. Although
| government-regulated prices have been
| halved to 750 rupees per box â a predatory
| pricing lawsuit filed by the state of
| Andhra Pradesh forced Monsanto and the
| federal government to lower the prices â
| the input costs of Bt cotton are still
| more than the average farmer can afford to
| spend out of pocket.
`----
http://columbiacitypaper.com/?p=1141
Developing Countries Blast WHO Report On IP, Demand âCredibleâ Approach
,----[ Quote ]
| A critical report on financing research
| and development of medicines for the
| worldâs poorest was created without
| transparency, failed to live up to its
| mandate, and did not address the potential
| threat that intellectual property rights
| can pose to access to drugs, developing
| countries said today at the World Health
| Assembly. But a proposal by a group of
| Latin American countries for a new
| intergovernmental working group was not
| accepted by developed countries and others
| and quick informal consultations began to
| work out differences before the end of the
| assembly this week.
|
| [...]
|
| Even the United States â generally
| supportive of the groupâs work â said it
| was âregrettableâ that information on
| process and manner of work was not
| included in the report itself when
| published, and that member states did not
| hear about it until last weekâs informal
| meeting (IPW, WHO, 14 May 2010).
`----
http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2010/05/18/developing-countries-blast-who-report-on-ip-demand-credible-approach/
Recent:
Monsanto targets public radio to spread false biotech messages
,----[ Quote ]
| For years my alarm has been set to pubic
| radio so I can lie in bed for five minutes
| and have a grasp on the day's news before I
| even get up. I, like many other Americans,
| rely on NPR and other public-radio shows for
| news that is what I deem to be as unbiased
| and fair as possible. But this morning my
| ears burned as I listened to an on the
| American Public Media show Marketplace
| sponsored by Monsanto, the world's largest
| corporate agribusiness chemical firm, touting
| how its genetically modified (GM) seeds are
| going to save the world from environmental
| catastrophe and human hunger. It left me
| wondering, particularly in tough economic
| times, how do media ethics hold up? (The GMO
| seed giant has been bombarding liberal-minded
| publications with similar propaganda, see
| image to the right, for months.)
`----
http://www.grist.org/article/national-public-propaganda
Monsantoâs Seed Patents May Trump Antitrust Claims (Update2)
,----[ Quote ]
| âJustice is clearly trying every way it can
| to see whether Monsanto is exceeding its
| rights under the patent,â said James Weiss, a
| Washington-based attorney at K&L Gates LLP
| who helped defend Microsoft Corp. against a
| federal antitrust probe. âAt the end of the
| day, they may not be able to do much with it
| because of the scope of those patents. In
| almost all the cases, the courts come out on
| the side of intellectual property.â
|
| Yet Monsantoâs seeds are so ubiquitous that
| they have become like AT&Tâs telephone lines
| before the companyâs 1984 breakup or
| Microsoft Corp.âs Windows operating system in
| the 1990s, said James P. Denvir, an attorney
| who represents rival seedmaker DuPont Co. and
| led the governmentâs AT&T case.
|
| [...]
|
| Monsantoâs attorney, Dan Webb, defended
| Microsoft in 2002 against government
| antitrust claims. A former U.S. Attorney in
| Chicago, he also prosecuted Admiral John
| Poindexter in the Iran- Contra affair.
`----
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-03-12/monsanto-s-seed-patents-may-trump-antitrust-claims-lawyers-say.html
Related:
Dark cloud over good works of Gates Found
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,6827615.story?coll=la-home-headlines
Gates Foundation Revokes Pledge to Review Portfolio
,----[ Quote ]
| ...the Gates Foundation took down their public statement on this
| and replaced it with a significantly altered version which seems to
| say that investing responsibly would just be too complex for them
| and that they need to focus on their core mission: 'There are
| dozens of factors that could be considered, almost all of which
| are outside the foundation's areas of expertise. The issues
| involved are quite complex...
`----
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/12/1756212&from=rss
Gates Foundationâs Influence Criticized
,----[ Quote ]
| The chief of malaria for the World Health Organization has complained that
| the growing dominance of malaria research by the Bill and Melinda Gates
| Foundation risks stifling a diversity of views among scientists and wiping
| out the world health agencyâs policy-making function.
`----
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/16/science/16malaria.html?_r=2&hp&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation- Truth Revealed
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ttq0IdULfjg
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation- Truth Revealed Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVlnqnMHQ1c
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.10 (GNU/Linux)
iEYEARECAAYFAkv2ROEACgkQU4xAY3RXLo6VaQCfYt2ilg9wnkaje7CLPTkIZ4cr
n74AoJ+SjsDJqMnCd2SLVe1xmTIueqOw
=M1Qi
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
|
|
