RAFI Communique
February/March 2000
Terminator 2 Years Later:
Suicide Seeds on the Fast Track
"We've continued right on with work on the Technology Protection
System [Terminator]. We never really slowed down. We're on target,
moving ahead to commercialize it. We never really backed off."
- Harry Collins, Delta & Pine
Land Seed Co., January, 2000
ISSUE: Despite mounting opposition from national governments
and United Nations' agencies, work on Terminator and Traitor
(genetic trait control)
moves full speed ahead. After Monsanto and AstraZeneca publicly
vowed not to commercialize suicide seeds in 1999, governments
and civil society organizations were lulled into thinking that
the crisis had passed. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Last year AstraZeneca conducted its first field trial on genetic
trait control technology in the UK. According to industry sources,
it is not the first company to conduct field tests. Can commercialization
be far behind?
PLAYERS: Delta & Pine Land, the world's largest cotton seed company,
proudly asserts that it is "moving ahead to commercialize" Terminator.
Monsanto and AstraZeneca have each merged with other companies
since they pledged not to
commercialize suicide seeds. The Gene Giants collectively hold
over 30 Terminator-type patents. Corporate commitments to disavow
Terminator are short-lived and virtually meaningless in light
of the eye-popping pace of corporate takeovers and makeovers.
The United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Director
General Jacques Diouf has joined many South governments in opposing
Terminator. Despite massive public protest, the US Department
of Agriculture (USDA) continues to defend and support anti-farmer,
Terminator research.
IMPACT: Without government action to firmly reject Terminator
and Traitor, these technologies will soon be available commercially,
with potentially disastrous consequences for farmers, food security
and biodiversity.
Chemically dependent seeds the goal of Traitor technology -
will hold farmers and food security hostage to a handful of multinational
enterprises. National agricultural production could become wholly
dependent upon foreign exports of critical chemical inducers.
Entire countries could be forced to surrender national seed sovereignty
and be held in biological bondage if governments decided to use
the technology to enforce trade sanctions or resolve trade
disputes. Could genetic trait control technology become a biological
weapon used for agro-terrorism?
POLICY: The future of Terminator/Traitor Technology rests with
national governments and multinational corporations. The pressure
points for political action are, first and foremost, with national
governments around the world.
Second, pressure should be applied at key international fora
such as the Convention on Biological Diversity, FAO, the World
Trade Organization's Trade-Related Intellectual Property (WTO/TRIPs),
at the upcoming Global Forum
on Agricultural Research in Dresden, and at negotiations in Geneva
to strengthen the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention. RAFI's
work in Year Three of the Terminator will be in these international
areas.
(Full article at www.rafi.org)
Ronald Nigh
Dana, A.C.
Mexico, D.F. & San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas
Tel. y FAX 525-666-73-66 (DF)
529-678-72-15 (Chiapas)
danamex@mail.internet.com.mx
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