Monsanto unleashes massive GMO push into Africa

Tuesday, September 24, 2013 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Tags: Monsanto, GMO crops, Africa

(NaturalNews) When Wikileaks first dropped the bomb on the U.S. Department of State's active involvement in pushing genetically modified organisms (GMOs) on Africa back in 2010, subsequent reports affirming that the corporate cabal of predatory biotechnology was also busy conniving with corrupt government agencies to make inroads into the otherwise untapped agricultural markets of Africa quickly surfaced. But now this sinister scheme has apparently been shifted into overdrive, as the biotech industry and its many front groups grow increasingly desperate in their attempts to conquer Africa and claim it for their own.

As compiled and reported by GMWatch.org, new information gathered from multiple sources reveals that biotech companies have now infiltrated the U.S. Embassy in Harare, Zimbabwe, which is right now actively advocating what it ridiculously claims is the proven safety and efficacy of GM crops. This is, of course, in addition to the many other biotech-backed lobbying groups, non-profit foundations and developmental organizations that continue to tour the nations of Africa and aggressively blitz them with endless pro-GMO propaganda.

Though such activity has been taking place in Africa for years, it is only continuing to intensify, say experts, as the patience of biotech companies like Monsanto and DuPont grows thin. Europe has all but banned GMOs, with the exception of imported animal feed, and the U.S. is growing more and more resistant to GMOs with each passing day. So the biotech industry is shifting its focus to Africa, much of which is stricken with poverty and drought -- in other words, Africa is ripe for exploitation by multinational seed corporations.

"While Africa has long been intransigent in its stance against introducing genetically modified crops, cracks are forming in the opposition, and the world's leading biotechs -- DuPont, Monsanto, and Syngenta among them -- are poised to take advantage of the weakening stance and flood the market with seed, fertilizer, and pesticides," writes Rich Duprey for The Motley Fool about the situation. "With Europe effectively closed off to GM crops, the seed and chemical giants are looking to Africa to be their next growth market."

Corporate lobbyists shamelessly use poverty, hunger as cover story to pillage African agriculture

According to GMWatch.org, former State Department communications expert-turned-Monsanto public relations lobbyist Jay Byrne, for instance, has been actively meeting with lobbying front groups in Africa to advocate for more acceptance of GMOs. Other so-called "biotech ambassadors" are engaged in similar lobbying efforts, including pro-GMO activist Mark Lynas, who, as we previously reported, spends much of his time touring Africa and giving speeches about how GMOs can save Africa.

All this corporate pandering in promotion of GMOs has nothing to do with ending hunger and poverty in Africa, of course. This is just the front story that the biotech industry and its lackeys in the federal government are using to advance their agenda of enslaving African farmers into a system that will require them to purchase seeds from Monsanto every year rather than save and reuse them. It is about power, control and greed -- an incessant bloodlust for agricultural dominance in every corner of the globe.

"If Africa does succumb to the siren song of GM crops, control of the food chain will be taken from the hands of the family farmer and placed into those of the agri-giants," adds Duprey. "For farmers who wished to go back to the old ways, their fields would have to lie fallow for years before the chemicals poured onto them were gone, a practical impossibility when the harvests are used for subsistence ... A new era of agricultural colonialism will be born where the local farmer ends up becoming enslaved to the global profit demands of corporate agriculture."

Sources for this article include:

http://gmwatch.org

http://www.fool.com

http://www.naturalnews.com

http://science.naturalnews.com