[Reader-list] Fw: Gates foundation again, this time facing fire wrt its green revoln program in africa

[lalitha kamath]

As a follow up to the last post on the wide-ranging influence of the Gates Foundation, this article focuses on Gates and Rockefeller foundations efforts to forge a green revolution in Africa.  Critics fault the program as a trojan horse to promote the fertilizer-pesticide-GM seed lobbies. Whats also of interest is that doubts about the program's efficacy are based in large part on problems in implementation in india...


Business Daily Africa

http://www.bdafrica.com:80/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5936&Itemid=5811


Written by Wanjiru Waithaka



February 18, 2008: Agriculture experts have criticised a programme

seeking to restore soil fertility in Kenya and other African countries,

saying that similar programmes implemented in India and elsewhere

aggravated farmer's problems instead of providing solutions.



At stake is the future of the continent's agricultural practices —what

is grown, how it is grown, who gets to grow it, who processes it, who

sells it and where and how much the African consumer will pay.



The programme is an initiative of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in

Africa (Agra), which recently announced that it was committing $180

million to the five-year project in 13 African countries. Agra's soil

health programme is targeted at small scale farmers and aims to increase

farm yields and incomes by giving farmers seeds and inputs such as

fertilizers through licensed agro-dealers.



The Sh12.6 billion grant has been funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates

Foundation (Sh11.55 billion) and the Rockefeller Foundation (Sh1.05

billion).



Kenya's pilot project started last year and farmers have been receiving

a Sh6,000 voucher from the Government enabling them to acquire various

farm inputs like seeds, fertilisers, stock borer dust and post-harvest

pesticides. Agro-dealers in major towns are being trained on how to

handle farmers and supported financially to have enough stocks to ensure

farmers have adequate supply. 8,000 farmers in 10 districts across the

country, mainly in Western Kenya are currently signed up.



In Chuka and Runyenjes, the programme is being made sustainable by

compelling farmers to give to the village programme coordinator about

five bags of the harvest, which is collectively sold and used to buy

inputs for the next planting season.



In western Kenya, farmers who meet every day or the last day of the week

to discuss farming issues also deposit about Sh10 per day each. The

money is deposited with an agro-dealer and used to purchase inputs when

the planting season arrives.



Critics, however say that Agra's programmes are a Trojan horse for

genetically modified seeds which in Africa have only been fully embraced

by South Africa. Although popular in many regions of the world GMO use

in Africa has been hindered by safety concerns and regulatory issues

even though the continent is in dire need of boosting its food production.



Agra has also been accused of fronting for seed and fertilizer companies

in the West such as Syngenta and Monsanto that are hungry to take a

slice of the African seed market.



"Although Agra does not on the face of it promote the use of GM

technologies, 70 organisations from 12 African countries see Agra as

shifting African agriculture to a system dependent on expensive, harmful

chemicals, monocultures of hybrid seeds, and ultimately GMOs," says the

African Centre for Biosafety in a paper authored by Mariam Mayet.



"These groups argue that the Green Revolution under the guise of solving

hunger in Africa is nothing more than a push for a parasitic

corporate-controlled chemical system of agriculture that will feed on

Africa's rich biodiversity," she says.



These concerns were also echoed by participants from 25 countries

representing farmers, agricultural and pastoralist organisations at a

forum held in Mali from November 25 to December 2 last year to discuss

the pitfalls of Green Revolution in Africa.



"Once the mask of philanthropy is removed, we find profit-hungry

corporations vying to control the seed market in African countries,

create a path for genetically modified seeds and foods and to pry open a

market for chemical fertilizers—which in turn will have an adverse

effect on African indigenous seed populations and destroy bio-diversity,

not to mention the devastation of the environment and the salination

of the soil," said Mukoma wa Ngugi, co-editor of Pambazuka News in a

recent commentary in Business Daily.



Agra's programme has been likened to Monsato's "Seeds of Hope Campaign"

in South Africa. The company which has a strong foothold in South

Africa's seed industry introduced 'Combi-Packs' containing hybrid maize

seed, some fertilizer, and some herbicide.



The company also promotes 'no or low till farming' meant to meant to be

a minimally invasive conservation farming technique, in that farmers do

not plough or till the land.



Instead, they cut small furrows for the seeds. This farming practice

entails negligible soil disturbance, maintenance of a permanent

vegetative soil cover, direct sowing, and sound crop rotation and is

particularly beneficial for smallholder farmers, because there is no

need to use a tractor, a major cost saving.



However, using this technique requires the increased use of herbicides,

since weeds are not removed by tilling the land, and Monsanto is

therefore a fervent supporter of this technique says Ms Mayet.



"Several studies have shown that Monsanto's Roundup herbicide is a

threat to human health; not only a hormone-disruptor, but is also

associated with birth defects in humans," she says. In most areas these

packs are sold through private agents. They are substantially more

expensive than conventional seed and usually subsidized meaning that

withdrawal of state support will leave poor farmers out in the cold, in

a replica of the first Green Revolution in India in the 1960s.



Dr. Namanga Ngongi, Agra's president, says comparing Agra's programmes

with those of Monsanto in South Africa is a mistaken view of Agra.

"Agra's seed programme is firmly rooted in conventional breeding and the

use of Africa's rich agro-biodiversity. We will use indigenous crop

varieties that are adapted to the various agro-ecological zones of the

continent," he says.



"Green revolution" was first coined in 1968 to describe the success in

increasing yields in wheat, maize and rice in India and Southeast Asia.



The essential features of that model comprised of a technology package

involving the use of external inputs such as inorganic fertilizers,

herbicides, pesticides, laboratory developed hybrid seeds, mechanisation

and extensive irrigation projects.



The Rockerfeller Foundation which is also financing Agra played a

crucial role in promoting this technology package that also formed the

basis of agriculture development aid and assistance at that time.



"These varieties only produced the desired 'high yielding' results if

there was irrigation, mechanisation, and plenty of chemical fertilisers

(the real key) and pesticides," says Grain, an international

non-governmental organisation which promotes the sustainable management

and use of agricultural biodiversity based on people's control over

genetic resources and local knowledge.



Under the programme, India increased its wheat production ten-fold and

its rice production three-fold. But the country paid a heavy price. "The

use of large amounts of water, fertilisers and chemical pesticides

impoverished soils, leaving them less fertile and highly polluted," says

Grain in a paper titled 'A new Green Revolution for Africa?'



Local biodiversity was drastically reduced, bringing farmers under the

dependence of pesticide manufacturers and outside seed suppliers.



"The profound cultural and economic changes wrought by the Green

Revolution produced a massive rural exodus, and, with it, a profound

loss of traditional knowledge and skills. For most farmers, any early

profits were soon converted into debts, with many farmers, unable to

repay their debts, taking their own lives," says the NGO.



Dr. Ngongi disagrees with this assessment of Asia's green revolution.



"Asia's green revolution saved many millions of lives and contributed

immensely to the dynamic economic performance of Asian countries. Yes,

it also had some negative impact on small-scale farmers and on the

environment. However, the positives greatly outweighed the negatives,"

he says adding that an African green revolution has the advantage of

learning from the errors that were committed when Asia was launching its

green revolution.



Dr Ngongi says that misuse of fertilizers, improper and uncontrolled use

of water, the construction of huge dams, and the concentration on

breeding a few miracle varieties of a few crops are now well understood

and will not be repeated.



"Agra's approach is to work with national institutions, in both public

and private sector in close partnership with farmers, especially

small-scale farmers, most of whom are women, to resolve problems that

have a negative impact on farmers' productivity and incomes," he says.








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