The Geopolitics of Human Gene Editing

October 20, 2018 (Gunnar Ulson - NEO) - A cursory warning was left by renowned physics professor Stephen Hawking regarding a future where a race of superhumans, manipulating their DNA, would taking control of their own evolution. The warning came just before his death in March of this year.

The Washington Post in its article, "Stephen Hawking feared race of ‘superhumans’ able to manipulate their own DNA," would explain (my emphasis):

Before he died in March, the Cambridge University professor predicted that people this century would gain the capacity to edit human traits such as intelligence and aggression. And he worried that the capacity for genetic engineering would be concentrated in the hands of the wealthy.

To be clear, Professor Hawking wasn't warning about the technology in and of itself, but its monopolization by a handful of wealthy interests.

The Threat of Technological Monopolies 

When we look at any chapter in human history, disparity in technology has always led to tragic episodes of exploitation, violence, atrocities and even genocide. The invention and use of firearms by Western Europeans against tribes everywhere from Asia and Africa to North and South America provide us one look at how huge advantages in technology have been abused against those who lack access to it.

The invention of the atomic bomb gave the United States a period of time where it held a virtual monopoly over nuclear weapons. It eagerly used not one, but two atomic bombs on the already defeated Japanese at the end of World War II. Before America's nuclear monopoly was finally broken up by first Soviet and then Chinese nuclear weapon tests, the US had considered using further nuclear weapons during the Korean War and at at least two junctures during the Vietnam War.

Today, corporate monopolies over the very sort of biotechnology that will give rise to the race of superhumans Professor Hawking warned about, are already a source of constant, steeply controversial use and abuse.

Whether it is deceptive business practices by large agricultural corporations like Cargill, Monsanto and Bayer peddling unsafe genetically modified organisms (GMOs) or pharmaceutical corporations seizing, then price gouging charity and publicly-funded breakthroughs like gene therapy, we can already see attempts being made to concentrate biotechnology in the hands of the wealthy, and it already being eagerly abused against those without access or control over it.

It Has Already Started 

The Washington Post article would elaborate further, quoting from Professor Hawking:

Humanity, he wrote, was entering “a new phase of what might be called self-designed evolution, in which we will be able to change and improve our DNA. We have now mapped DNA, which means we have read ‘the book of life,’ so we can start writing in corrections.”

Initially, he predicted, these modifications would be reserved for the repair of certain defects, such as muscular dystrophy, that are controlled by single genes and therefore make for relatively simple corrections.

“Nevertheless, I am sure that during this century people will discover how to modify both intelligence and instincts such as aggression,” Hawking wrote.

There would be an attempt to pass laws restricting the genetic engineering of human traits, he anticipated. “But some people won’t be able to resist the temptation to improve human characteristics, such as size of memory, resistance to disease and length of life,” he anticipated.

Hawking would also point out that, obviously, unimproved humans would be unable to compete and that significant political problems would result amid this growing disparity.

It is already possible to modify human DNA, and not necessarily before birth, but in living, breathing individuals. The process of gene therapy is the targeted editing of DNA through the use of viruses reprogrammed to, instead of hijacking a human cell and making copies of itself as it does in nature, inserting edited DNA designed to serve a specific purpose.

For example, researchers at Penn State University and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia were able to edit the T-cells of leukemia patients who had otherwise terminal cancer, according to the New York Times.


The edits made the patients' immune system capable of seeing and destroying cancer cells throughout their bodies. Patients who were not responding to chemotherapy and would have otherwise certainly died in days, have been put in so-far permanent remission.

But if edits can transform ordinary immune systems to be cancer-conquering, future breakthroughs could accomplish everything from further improvements of our immune systems, to regenerative medicine (regrowing healthy cardiac cells in aging hearts as this study attempted to do in the UK).

Where would the limit be and was Professor Hawking's fears unrealistic or unfounded?

The breakthrough at Penn State, funded entirely by charity and public funds, was later hijacked by pharmaceutical giant Novartis who would go on to raise the price for the FDA-approved therapy several times higher than even costs during the highly customized and experimental research and development phase. Similar fates await other breakthroughs, paid for by the public and then scooped into the "hands of the wealthy," just as Professor Hawking warned.

It is clear that future breakthroughs improving human strength, intellect and longevity will likewise also be scooped up by these well-positioned biotechnology monopolies if nothing is done. While Professor Hawking's warning sounded like a far-fetched warning about threats in the distant future, we are already seeing that dark future take shape right now.

The Geopolitics of Human Gene Editing 

Human resources are what defines any nation and forms the cornerstone of its wealth and security. Healthy, well-educated and intelligent populations make strong nations. Thus, a nation with segments of its population possessing superhuman abilities, augmented by gene editing, would possess an obvious advantage over other nations or even over other segments within their own nation lacking these traits.

We, right now, have people walking among us who have had their genes edited to fight diseases like leukemia. A biotechnology startup, BioViva, has already tested gene therapies on its founder and CEO Elizabeth Parrish as a means of defeating human aging, the South China Morning Post reported.

It's not a matter of if, or even when, because it has already begun. The real question is, when will such editing and gene therapies start having an impact on economics and security, and what are nations doing to build the fundamental necessities to both leverage this technology and defend against those abusing it?

Nations like China have invested heavily in biotechnology and gene therapy, providing a counterbalance to what was at one point a clearly North American and European monopoly. Individuals and small organizations around the globe are currently building up a community of opensource research and development, to further ensure this technology ends up in as many hands as possible.

While some may fear runaway "proliferation," we should stop and think about why the US stopped dropping atomic bombs on other nations. It was not from self-restraint but from the threat of retaliation from nations who eventually acquired nuclear weapons as well. What emerged was a dangerous but effective balance of power that has prevailed for decades since.

A similar balance of power is required for biotechnology, a technology so powerful and with implications so profound that it may redefine our very humanity.

Nations would benefit from investing in education to build up a workforce capable of researching, developing and effectively utilizing this emerging technology. Nations would benefit from investing in start ups and cultivating independent institutions capable of producing breakthroughs to give nations parity with current leaders in biotechnology.

Professor Hawking was a brilliant man in life, and provided us with a somber but essential warning as he departed us. We will ignore the looming threat of biotechnology and human gene editing being monopolized at our own peril.

Gunnar Ulson, a New York-based geopolitical analyst and writer especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.  

Confronting the Threat of Ethnic Bioweapons

November 30, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - The United States Air Force's 59th Medical Wing's molecular biology branch recently was revealed to have been collecting specifically Russian RNA and synovial (connective) tissue samples, prompting fears in Russia of a possible US directed ethnic-specific bioweapons program. 

TeleSUR's article, "'Ethnic Bomb' Feared as US Air Force Confirms Collection of Russian DNA," would report:

Russia has raised its concerns over attempts by the U.S. military to collect DNA samples from Russian nationals, noting the potential use of such biological samples for the purpose of creating new genetic warfare weaponry.

The U.S. Air Force has sought to calm the Kremlin's concerns, noting that the samples would only be used for so-called “research” purposes rather than for bioterrorism.

Addressing Russian reports, U.S. Air Education and Training Command spokesperson Captain Beau Downey said that his center randomly selected the Russian people as a source of genetic material in its ongoing research of the musculoskeletal system.

The report would also state that:

However, the usage of Russian tissue samples in the USAF study fed the long-brewing suspicion that the Pentagon is continuing in its hopes to develop an alleged “biological weapon” targeting specifically Russians.

Russian President Vladimir Putin would be quoted as stating:

Do you know that biological material is being collected all over the country, from different ethnic groups and people living in different geographical regions of the Russian Federation? The question is – why is it being done? It’s being done purposefully and professionally. 

And while the US military attempted to brush off the notion that any sort of ethnic-specific bioweapon was being researched, the notion of such a weapon is not far fetched at all.

US policy papers have included them in America's overall long-term geopolitical and military planning for nearly two decades, and the US Air Force itself has produced papers regarding the various combinations such weapons could manifest themselves as.

There is also the disturbing history of Western-aligned nations having pursued ethnic-specific bioweapons in the past, including the Apartheid regime in South Africa which sought to use its national vaccination program as cover to covertly sterilize its black population.

US Policy Papers Have Discussed Ethnic-Specific Bioweapons  

In the Neo-Conservative Project for a New American Century's (PNAC) 2000 report titled, "Rebuilding America's Defenses" (.pdf) it states (emphasis added):

The proliferation of ballistic and cruise missiles and long-range unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) will make it much easier to project military power around the globe. Munitions themselves will become increasingly accurate, while new methods of attack – electronic, “non-lethal,” biological – will be more widely available. (p.71 of .pdf) 

It also stated:

Although it may take several decade for the process of transformation to unfold, in time, the art of warfare on air, land, and sea will be vastly different than it is today, and “combat” likely will take place in new dimensions: in space, “cyber-space,” and perhaps the world of microbes. (p.72 of .pdf)

And finally: 

And advanced forms of biological warfare that can “target” specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool. (p.72 of .pdf)

More recently - in 2010 - the US Air Force in a counterproliferation paper titled, "Biotechnology: Genetically Engineered Pathogens" (PDF),  would list multiple ways such weapons could be deployed (emphasis added):

The JASON group, composed of academic scientists, served as technical advisers to the U. S. government. Their study generated six broad classes of genetically engineered pathogens that could pose serious threats to society. These include but are not limited to binary biological weapons, designer genes, gene therapy as a weapon, stealth viruses, host-swapping diseases, and designer diseases. 

The paper discusses the possibility of a "disease that could wipe out the whole population or a certain ethnic group." While the paper claims its purpose is to study such weapons as a means of developing defenses against them, America's history as a global military aggressor and the sole nation on Earth to have ever wielded nuclear weapons against another nation-state suggests a high likelihood that if such weapons can be produced, the US has already stockpiled them - if not already deployed them.

South Africa's Project Coast Then and Biotech Now 

The notion of the West using such weapons already has an alarming precedent. Regarding South Africa's Apartheid regime - the United Nations' report titled Project Coast: Apartheid’s Chemical and Biological Warfare Programme would explain (emphasis added):

There was some interaction between Roodeplaat Research Laboratories (RRL) and Delta G [biological and chemical weapon laboratories respectively], with Delta G taking on some of RRL’s biochemistry projects and RRL doing animal testing of some Delta G products. One example of this interaction involved anti-fertility work. According to documents from RRL [Roodeplaat Research Laboratories], the facility had a number of registered projects aimed at developing an anti-fertility vaccine. This was a personal project of the first managing director of RRL, Dr Daniel Goosen. Goosen, who had done research into embryo transplants, told the TRC that he and Basson had discussed the possibility of developing an anti-fertility vaccine which could be selectively administered—without the knowledge of the recipient. The intention, he said, was to administer it to black South African women without their knowledge.

At the time, the technology appears not to have been sufficiently mature enough to realize the Apartheid regime's ambitions. However, the technology not only exists today, there are examples of it being used to spectacular effect - so far for good - but could just as easily be used for bad.

The above mentioned US Air Force paper would go into detail regarding each weapon it listed, including one called gene therapy:

Gene therapy might just be the silver bullet for the treatment of human genetic diseases. This process involves replacing a bad gene with a good gene to normalize the condition of the recipient. Transfer of the “healthy” gene requires a vector to reach its target. Vectors commonly used are “viruses that have been genetically altered to carry normal human DNA” such as “retroviruses, adenoviruses, adeno-associated viruses, and herpes simplex viruses.”

Gene therapy has already been used during clinical trials to permanently cure everything from blood cancers to rare genetic disorders. The New York Times, in an article titled, "Gene Therapy Creates Replacement Skin to Save a Dying Boy," would report on one of the latest breakthroughs using the technology, stating:

Doctors in Europe used gene therapy to grow sheets of healthy skin that saved the life of a boy with a genetic disease that had destroyed most of his skin, the team reported on Wednesday in the journal Nature. This was not the first use of the treatment, which adds gene therapy to a technique developed to grow skin grafts for burn victims. But it was by far the most body surface ever covered in a patient with a genetic disorder: nine square feet.

One could imagine a malicious weapon used in reverse to knock out the genes that maintain healthy skin, causing a victim's skin to blister and fall off.


In utilizing gene therapy as a weapon, the US Air Force report would note:

Gene therapy is expected to gain in popularity. It will continue to be improved upon and could unquestionably be chosen as a bioweapon. The rapid growth in biotechnology could trigger more opportunities to find new ways to fight diseases or create new ones. Nations who are equipped to handle biotechnology are likely to consider gene therapy a viable bioweapon. Groups or individuals without the resources or funding will find it difficult to produce this bioweapon.

Regarding "stealth viruses," a variation of the weaponized gene therapy technique, the report states:

The basic concept of this potential bioweapon is to “produce a tightly regulated, cryptic viral infection that can enter and spread in human cells using vectors” (similar to the gene therapy) and then stay dormant for a period of time until triggered by an internal or external signal. The signal then could stimulate the virus to cause severe damage to the system. Stealth viruses could also be tailored to secretly infect a targeted population for an extended period using the threat of activation to blackmail the target.

With gene therapies already approved for sale in the European Union and the United States, and with more on the way, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that covert, weaponized gene therapies are also either already developed and waiting, or already deployed as "stealth viruses."

Developing and Deploying

The US maintains a global network of military medical laboratories and research centers.

In addition to the 59th Medical Wing involved in collecting Russian genetic material, the US covers the entire Southeast Asian region from Bangkok, Thailand with its Armed Forces Research Institute of Medical Sciences (AFIRMS).

While it publicly claims it exists to, "to conduct state of the art medical research and disease surveillance to develop and evaluate medical products, vaccines, and diagnostics to protect DOD personnel from infectious disease threats," its personnel, equipment, and research could easily be used for dual purposes in creating any of the above stated, so-far "theoretical" ethnic-specific bioweapons.

The US Embassy in Thailand website states that AFIRMS is the largest of a global network of military medical laboratories, claiming:

AFRIMS is the largest of a global network of US Defense Department Overseas Medical Research Laboratories—with sister laboratories in Peru, Kenya, Egypt, and the Republics of Georgia and Singapore. USAMD-AFRIMS has nearly 460 staff members (predominantly Thai and US) and an annual research budget of approximately $30-35 million.

With labs in South America, Europe, Africa, and Asia - and through the use of subcontractors - the US military has access to a variety of genetic materials and facilities to conduct research and develop all of the weapons its own policy papers have described.

Through US State Department-funded programs, the US could easily create "vaccine" campaigns and "clinics" to deliver the above described bioweapons in a variety of ways.


Fighting in the Dark and Shedding Some Light 


The US Air Force's paper would also point out:

Biological warfare attacks may resemble a natural disease outbreak phenomenon and it would be very difficult to trace back to the source, thereby discounting the perpetrator’s actions.

And indeed, nations without the ability to independently sequence, detect, and react to ethnic-specific genetic bioweapons could already have been targeted, or could be targeted at any moment without any means of even knowing, let alone reacting.

On the other hand, nations with not only a well-developed biotech industry, but also with military labs focused on both detecting and launching biological warfare with such weapons - it would be like fighting a war against a blindfolded enemy.

To remove the blindfold, governments and military institutions around the world, as well as communities and local institutions, would need to develop and have access to a quick and efficient means to sequence DNA, spot abnormalities, and develop possible corrective gene therapies to repair or "patch" malicious weaponized DNA introduced into a population.

Biological warfare surveillance would need to be done not only across a nation's population, but also across its food and water supply as well as its livestock, wildlife, and insect populations. Genetically modified crops have been designed to target and turn off genes in insects and could just as easily be used to target human genes.

In Science Daily's article, "Crops that kill pests by shutting off their genes," it states:

Plants are among many eukaryotes that can 'turn off' one or more of their genes by using a process called RNA interference to block protein translation. Researchers are now weaponizing this by engineering crops to produce specific RNA fragments that, upon ingestion by insects, initiate RNA interference to shut down a target gene essential for life or reproduction, killing or sterilizing the insects.

Studies are still ongoing to determine what harm genetically modified organisms (GMOs) - in their current state - are doing to human health. Spotting and reacting to subtle, weaponized GMOs will be even harder.

The use of genetically engineered mosquitoes to deliver "vaccines" presents another possible vector for weaponized biotech. The increasingly "global" nature of many vaccination programs is also a looming danger - particularly since these programs are directed by primarily Western powers - many of whom protected, cooperated with, and even aided and abetted the South African Apartheid regime, including with its various weapons programs.

Biotech is not merely a matter of economics. It is a matter of national security. Allowing foreign corporations representing compromised or nebulous foreign interests to produce vaccines for human or veterinary uses or to alter the genomes of a nation's agricultural crops for whatever perceived benefits cannot outweigh the possible and actualized threats.

In a world where warfare extends into cyber and genetic space, nations that lack independent human healthcare systems capable of producing their own vaccines or managing their own biodiversity find themselves as defenseless as nations without armies, navies, or air forces. However impressive a nation's conventional military capabilities are, lacking proper planning and defenses regarding this new and expanding biotech threat mitigates all possible advantages and maximizes this fatal weakness.

If genetics is a form of living information, then concepts familiar to IT security experts may prove useful in explaining how to safeguard against malicious "code" introduced into our living systems. The ability to "scan" our DNA and spot malicious code, to remove or patch it, and to develop safeguards against it, including "backing up" individual genomes biologically and digitally will not entirely prevent biological weapons from creating damage, but will mitigate their impact - transforming a possible extermination of an entire ethnicity or race to a containable, relatively minor outbreak.

Unlike nuclear weapons, research and development of these biotech tools is accessible to virtually any national government and even to many private institutions. Integrating biotech into a nation's national security planning and implementation is no longer optional or speculative. If the tools to manipulate and target genes for good already exist, then the tools to abuse them also exist.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine“New Eastern Outlook”.   

Standing Up To Multinational Big-Ag: Nepal, Monsanto, & USAID

May 24, 2016 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Throughout history, controlling India was the key to controlling Nepal. British control over the landlocked nation was an extension of its control over India itself. Today, imperialism is far from a distant memory. It did not go "extinct," rather, it merely "evolved." Today, imperialism looks like national and international "aid programs" which are used as fronts and vectors for corporate special interests.

USAID, the World Food Programme, and others, for instance, serve as fronts and vectors for corporations like Monsanto. In turn, Monsanto seeks a monopoly over world food production and the immense wealth and influence associated with such control. Just like the British East Indies Company did for centuries (1600's-1800's) the West is using a combination of corporations and foundations to project geopolitical power. And few other sectors engender such sought-after geopolitical power like control over a nation's agriculture.

The story of corporate-financier interests attempting to conquer Nepal through this method is not new. In 2011, when "Maoist" rebels finally took control of the country and Western-style "democracy" foisted upon the Nepali people, Western corporations were already positioned to overrun the levers of power by controlling the nation's infrastructure.

In the immediate aftermath of years of fighting, USAID along with Monsanto and a corrupt, weak, and vulnerable Nepal government began a "pilot program" indoctrinating some 20,000 farmers in the use of patented, poisoned, economy-wrecking GMO crops, and in particular Monsanto's infamous hybrid maize breeds. The program had also received backing from members of neighboring India's government who had already helped introduce Monsanto's GMO crops throughout their country -beginning the wholesale destruction of India's food security and domestic farming industry.


The Nepali Times in 2011 reported in their article, "Going to seed," that:

A US-government supported pilot project to introduce into Nepal hybrid maize seeds produced by the multinational, Monsanto, has set off alarm bells over its potential harm. 

USAID's Nepal Economic, Agriculture, and Trade Activity (NEAT) has got the Department of Agriculture and Monsanto to set up test plots to promote the new seeds in Chitwan, Nawalparasi and Kavre districts. This pilot plan will train 20,000 farmers in hybrid maize production methods and help in marketing the seeds.

Another Nepali Times piece that same year titled, "Why Monsanto? Instead of improving harvests, a USAID program to push hybrid maize will make Nepali farmers more destitute," explicitly stated:

The USAID-Monsanto partnership is blatant exploitation of a corrupt and unstable government in Nepal. There is no 'point of no return' when it comes to this issue. Monsanto's presence in Nepal will be irreversible and will result in the introduction of genetically-modified crops, further alienating farmers from their land and food production, with disastrous consequences.

Resistance to this power-grab disguised as "aid" began immediately, but it was only in 2014 that the Nepal government through a court order, finally prohibited GMO seeds from entering the country, thus disrupting Monsanto's plans.

 Al Jazeera in an article titled, "In Nepal, victory for anti-GMO activists?," would report that:

After a 2-year battle, Nepal's supreme court issued an order Wednesday temporarily prohibiting the import of genetically modified seeds. This would prevent multinational agricultural corporations like Monsanto from selling and distributing their products in the country. Many in Nepal celebrated the news.

However, the battle between genuine activists and NGOs versus corporate-funded operations posing as NGOs continues. The following year, in an effort to improve its image in Nepal, Monsanto would offer a paltry 150,000 USD in "aid" to help  "towards relief and rehabilitation efforts in Nepal" after a devastating earthquake struck, its press release would claim. Considering the massive profits Monsanto reaps from neighboring India alone, and the amount of money it spends on lobbying, 150,000 USD is not only insignificant, it is insulting - a true testament of Monsanto's priorities and principles.

According to Monsanto's own website, its India office covers Nepal, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka as well. Without constant vigilance and activism by advocates for food security and food sovereignty in Nepal, the threat Monsanto and other corporations like it, will continuously loom. Just like during the age of British imperialism, the key to controlling Central and South Asia, is controlling India. A strong foothold there - like Monsanto possesses - ensures constant pressure on India's neighbors.

With USAID and the World Food Programme openly working with and essentially for a corporation motivated purely by profits, Nepal, and many other nations around the world, both developed and developing, must be vigilant regarding such "charities" and "aid" organizations. They are clearly humanitarian in name only, and instead, serve as vectors for very inhumane agendas.

Hope. 

The backlash against Monsanto didn't begin and end only in Nepal. The backlash exists in India itself where this "biotechnology" has been introduced, its promises broken, and the reality of Monsanto's business model allowed to fully sink in among farmers and consumers. Monsanto has even gone as far as threatening to pull out of India due to the effects of this ongoing backlash. The Himalayan Times reported in a March 2016 article titled, "Monsanto threatens to exit India," that:

Monsanto Co, the world’s biggest seed company, threatened to pull out of India today if the government imposed a big cut in royalties that local firms pay for its genetically modified (GM) cotton seeds.

The royalties are the key to controlling India's food supply, and food supplies everywhere else Monsanto does business. If and when its GMOs take over food production, the world itself will become beholden to it, these royalties sustaining Western hegemony over global food supplies. Monsanto and corporations like it, as well as the centers of power from which they operate - primarily Wall Street, Washington, London, and Brussels - will further advance what they call their "international order," by controlling the international food supply. Control over one's food supply lends a significant amount of influence over what should otherwise be a sovereign government answering to its people, not foreign corporations who can, at any time, create bounty or famine, skew markets or bolster them.

Image: Little else could be more despicable than spreading corporatism under the guise of "aid," and especially claiming that is "form the American people," rather than at the expense of both them and the people USAID is "aiding." 

That the backlash against Monsanto has put enough pressure on the Indian government to make decisions acting against Monsanto's interests is, however, a sign of hope. Not only must pressure continue to be placed both on Monsanto directly and those in local government approached and bought-off by Monsanto, but alternative agricultural models, markets, and infrastructure must be created by both farmers and consumers, for farmers and consumers - cutting out both middle men and foreign corporate interests seeking power and profits at the expense of the people.

Nepal's temporary reprieve from Monsanto's advances despite the vulnerability it faced after its protracted civil war, should give hope to others in nations under more favorable conditions. Knowledge both of the geopolitical threat Monsanto represents as well as the more immediate economic and agricultural threat it poses is perhaps the most valuable tool in establishing resistance. To finally defeat Monsanto, however, nations throughout the world will have to develop viable alternatives to feed themselves that are both healthier, and more profitable than the promises offered by Monsanto and other multinationals engaged in agribusiness.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”. 

Editor's Note: Further evidence of Monsanto's ties to both USAID and the US State Department can be seen in the US Embassy in Nepal's own September 2011 press release titled, "USAID Teams with the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives and the Monsanto Company to Enhance Maize Production in Nepal." Also featured on USAID's official website is "A Data Picture of USAID Public - Private Partnerships: 2001 - 2014 (.pdf)," which lists Monsanto among other notorious corporations as "Most Frequently Participating in USAID Public-Private Partnerships."  

Ukraine a Vector for GMO Poison's Spread Through EU

April 17, 2015 (Ulson Gunnar - NEO) - When the Washington Post chooses to pen an insulting, condescending editorial targeting entire nations speaking up against Western impropriety, one can just as well assume the precise opposite of whatever narrative the Post is trying to push forward is true.

Regarding American biotech companies and their attempts to infest the planet with genetically modified organisms (GMOs), and in particular their attempts to corrupt the whole of Europe with their unwanted poison through a backdoor (Ukraine), has prompted Russia to speak up for their Eastern European neighbor. Up until the armed coup in 2013-2014, also known as the "Euromaidan," Ukraine had adamantly rejected GMOs.

With an obedient client regime now installed in Kiev, a series of political, economic and military decisions have been made that have more or less extinguished Ukraine as a sovereign nation state. Along with its extinguished sovereignty comes a complete lack of desire for self-preservation, and so, sowing one's fields with genetically tainted, unsafe, literal poison goes from being adamantly avoided, to being openly embraced.

This brings us back to the Washington Post and a recent editorial it has published. Titled, "Russia says Western investment in Ukraine’s farms is a plot to take over the world," it first attempts to make Russia's accusations that Monsanto is now moving in on Ukraine with plans to institute GMOs nationwide sound unfounded. That is until the Post itself admits that is precisely what Monsanto is doing. The pieces claims:

Ukraine has long tried to sell itself to Europe as the once-and-future breadbasket of the continent, promising that Western investment is the key to making its under-exploited black earth bloom. 

But official Russia would like you to know that all this agricultural development talk is really just a secret plot to help companies like Monsanto take over the world.

Then the Post openly admits:

Genetically-modified cultivation was long banned in Ukraine – as was the sale of farmland.

Then admits:

But the association agreement signed between the European Union and Ukraine last year may have created new space for the potential introduction of genetically-modified crops in Ukraine. 

Finally, the Post mentions Monsanto:

Monsanto – perhaps the most recognizable corporate name in genetically modified products – did express interest in investing in Ukraine last year. (It’s worth noting that the company operates in Russia as well, though not with GMOs, just as it has operated in Ukraine.)

Since Monsanto already operates in Ukraine, what else would it be investing in additionally that it hasn't had the opportunity to before besides GMOs? Ukraine would serve as the perfect victim to host Monsanto and other biotech corporations' GMO-infected products in the heart of Europe.

With the EU itself relaxing some of its regulations regarding GMOs, likely without the consent of a population increasingly conscious of the risks and actively seeking organic alternatives, biotech conglomerates hope to make GMO products spread from what will be the completely unregulated fields of Ukraine, into Europe and to become as ubiquitous and unavoidable as they are in America.

Elsewhere around the world, big-agriculture has attempted to use other backdoors to bring their products into regions they are wholly rejected, including Asia where "Golden Rice" has been proposed as the answer to fighting "vitamin A deficiency," even  when simply planting some carrots would accomplish this goal more easily, cheaper and without the threat of tainting Asia's rice crops with a strain consumers would reject out of hand.

In other instances, conquering Western interests, like in Afghanistan, have used "aid" as a backdoor to bring big-agriculture and GMOs into the region.

So by the Post's own admission and by simply looking at what Monsanto and its counterparts have done all over the world already, they themselves couldn't agree more with the Russian Federation regarding Monsanto's obvious intentions in Ukraine and for the rest of Europe.

The Post, like many papers across America and Europe, has long-served the interests of the monied elite, with biotech and big-agriculture counted prominently among them. The Post and others will spin and obfuscate Monsanto's intentions until it is too late to overturn the genetic corruption their crops will inflict on the once well-protected, sovereign fields of Ukraine.

Like many other things in Ukraine, the so-called "Euromaiden" that was allegedly spurred for freedom and self-determination has clearly stripped Ukraine of both its freedom and its ability to determine what is best for itself. From a military set upon its own people, to an economy looted by foreign interests, to a government directed literally by foreigners who chair it, to now fields to be sown with genetically altered poison, the ruination of Ukraine is nearly complete and a lasting testament to what the West truly means when it says "democratization."

No One Will Buy GMO-Tainted Crops 

Included in Russia's comments regarding the impending despoilment of Ukraine's agricultural industry by Monsanto and others, the Post would report:

Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev told a meeting of his counterparts in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization on Tuesday that the West plans to grown “genetically modified crops” in Ukraine. And it’s a fool’s errand too, he suggested, because, “to put it mildly, Europe will not approve of such products.”

The Post, in its role as associate lobbyist for big-agriculture, attempts to downplay this fact. However, reported elsewhere, even within the Western media itself, are reports that the agricultural powerhouse that is the United States is now importing organic corn because consumers refuse to eat tainted GMO products grown within the States.

Bloomberg in its report "U.S. Forced to Import Corn as Shoppers Demand Organic Food" would claim:

A growing demand for organics, and the near-total reliance by U.S. farmers on genetically modified corn and soybeans, is driving a surge in imports from other nations where crops largely are free of bioengineering. 

Imports such as corn from Romania and soybeans from India are booming, according to an analysis of U.S. trade data released Wednesday by the Organic Trade Association and Pennsylvania State University.

The humiliation of a nation historically self-reliant agriculturally having to import something as basic as corn because everything grown domestically is poisoned is a lesson any Ukrainian seeking to preserve what is left of not only their dignity, but their sense of self-preservation should take note of. Even as the "miracle" of GMO evaporates amid an increasingly astute market in the United States, US corporations are buying off Ukraine's infinitely servile regime to place Ukraine's neck into the same noose.

However, in a way the Post is right. Russia is crazy to think Monsanto is taking over the world. The corporation, despite untold of billions pumped into lobbying, propaganda, bribes and other forms of mass persuasion, is failing miserably to convince people to ingest their poison, even in the nation their headquarters is located in. However, Russia shedding light on what Monsanto is trying to do in Ukraine, against the obvious best interests of Ukraine itself, is yet another illustration of how the "Euromaiden" putsch had nothing to do with freedom, and everything to do with Washington and Wall Street hijacking yet another nation and its resources out from under its own people under the guise of "democracy."

Ulson Gunnar, a New York-based geopolitical analyst and writer especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”. 

GMO Golden Rice: The Scourge of Asia

August 9, 2014 (Ulson Gunnar - NEO) - Asia’s dependency on rice cultivation for both subsidence and income is intuitively understood. The Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO) estimates the agricultural population of lowland rice cultivation in Asia to be over 470 million - larger than the entire population of the United States. Improvements in rice cultivation would stand to lift hundreds of millions from debt and poverty. Conversely, the disruption of rice cultivation would threaten to mire hundreds of millions in deeper debt, inescapable destitution, and all of the negative socioeconomic implications that follow.

Asia’s rice farmers produce between 1-2 harvests a year depending on the climb and climate of any given region. They do so to sell their rice, generally to mills who in turn sell the final product to exporters or for domestic consumption. Out of each harvest, rice farmers keep a portion for their own consumption, but the vast majority of what they grow is for income.

The UK-based Rice Association claims there are up to 40,000 species of rice, with a wide variety of characteristics suitable for different markets and uses. Rice farmers grow those which local, national and regional markets are best suited to move. In nations where subsidies are offered for rice crops, cheap, easy to grow varieties are chosen. More desirable or exotic species are grown by independent farmers who have developed their own cooperative with millers, marketers and exporters. The rice Asians eat depends on both economic and market realities. The impoverished eat what is cheapest and most easily available, but not necessarily that which is healthiest.

Enter GMO: Problem, Reaction, Solution 

Poor diet leads to vitamin deficiencies, a persistent problem among the impoverished. A lack of basic healthcare and education allows the otherwise easily rectified problem to continue unresolved. The World Health Organization (WHO) states on their website, “an estimated 250,000 to 500,000 vitamin A-deficient children become blind every year, half of them dying within 12 months of losing their sight.” This statistic is global, not regionally specific to Asia, but Southeast Asia in particular suffers from such deficiencies.

WHO prescribes cheap vitamin supplements and the promotion of local gardens to produce a variety of fruits and vegetables that can easily solve not only vitamin A deficiency, but other deficiencies as well. WHO states, “for vulnerable rural families, for instance in Africa and South-East Asia, growing fruits and vegetables in home gardens complements dietary diversification and fortification and contributes to better lifelong health.”

Surely then, one would expect both regional governments and international organizations to focus on these recommendations. However, there is a vocal and growing cry to solve this problem with another, more radical solution, the implementation of genetically modified (GM) rice containing beta-carotene to target specifically vitamin A deficiency in Asia.  Promoted by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), directly funded by agricultural giants Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer and others, along with the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) which is also partnered with big-business agriculture, genetically modified “Golden Rice” containing beta-carotene is promoted as the solution to saving “millions of children.”

Golden Rice: Scourge of Asia

In reality Golden Rice will do nothing of the sort. The promotion of Golden Rice is not unlike any given commercial endeavor. IRRI’s website links to articles like, “A senseless fight,” which asks, “how could anyone in good conscience seek to thwart technology that has even a remote chance of tackling the problem of vitamin A blindness?” The appeal to emotions and sickly children diverts from the real threat Golden Rice poses to the very people it claims to be helping. People who grow rice, grow it to sell to markets. These markets are well-developed, based on indigenous agricultural technology and tradition, and linked to export markets with stringent requirements (many of which restrict or outright ban GMO). The introduction of GM rice for any reason, would threaten or potentially destroy the livelihood of hundreds of millions of people.

Proponents of Golden Rice suggest rice farmers replace their profitable crops with genetically modified rice that will treat only one of many vitamin and mineral deficiencies they may or may not potentially suffer from, deficiencies that could be easily solved through other methods. Clearly illogical in terms of “helping” the malnourished, Golden Rice must serve another purpose.

The author of IRRI’s featured article, “A senseless fight,” suggests that “Golden Rice is being developed by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), which is a not-for-profit institute, and the seeds will be distributed to farmers who can resow them as they wish. In these cases, the argument [against Golden Rice] switches to “Golden Rice is a Trojan horse”. In other words, by sneaking below the barriers of suspicion, it will open the floodgates to GMO technology and from then on to a slippery slope and the takeover of the world’s seed supply.”

The author, in their attempt to defend Golden Rice, reveals the true agenda behind the otherwise useless crop. Governments, international organizations and the private sector (i.e. Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer) will flood Asia with Golden Rice, where it will intermingle and contaminate rice species that have been in use for centuries and form the foundation of Asia’s historical and modern agricultural industry. The livelihoods of some 470 million people who depend on rice farming in Asia (not to mention those that import and consume Asian rice beyond Asia’s borders) would be jeopardized by the proliferation of Golden Rice disseminated under the dubious guise of humanitarian concerns.

The marketing machine behind Golden Rice doesn’t ever seem to address this critical fact. That Golden Rice seeds will be kept and sown each year by prospective cultivators only increases the dangers of cross-contamination with other, economically and culturally valuable species. It is in all regards a flagrant attempt to infiltrate, corrupt and overtake rice production at its very geographical and socioeconomic heart. It is akin to a plague openly being designed, tested and prepared to be unleashed on a population. The spread of Golden Rice too is a plague that will compound exponentially the challenges already facing millions of farmers across Asia.

When all it takes to solve vitamin A deficiency is what WHO claims is “supplementation” that costs “a couple of cents a dose,” and the growing of gardens that solve not only vitamin A deficiencies Golden Rice claims to target, but a whole host of other deficiencies Golden Rice most certainly does not address, the fact that Golden Rice is not what it is promoted to be is obvious. It is, as IRRI coined it, a “Trojan horse,” that will not only fail to stop malnutrition, but will expand the very destitution, poverty, and helplessness that causes malnutrition in the first place.

Ulson Gunnar, a New York-based geopolitical analyst and writer especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Golden Rice: GMO "Super Gruel" for the Masses

You don't need big-ag's Golden Rice, you just need a garden. 

July 16, 2014 (LocalOrg) - Corporate biotechnology monopolies like Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer, and others have met increasing resistance to their attempts to patent and control global agriculture. They have spent untold fortunes attempting to sway the public but to no avail. Local, organic agriculture is growing in popularity and proliferating across all social-strata. The introduction of technology to automate and augment organic farming is making it as competitive and accessible or more so than the capital-intensive models of monopoly employed by big-ag. 

In response, big-ag has attempted several distasteful public relation stunts, including "super bananas for Africa" and "Golden Rice" to allegedly feed Asia's poor.

They claim these initiatives are purely altruistic. Business Insider in its article, "A Miracle Rice Could Save Millions Of Lives," claims: 

Golden Rice, once it is widely released, will be much more cost-effective, as agricultural economist Alexander Stein has shown. Despite common misconceptions, no one stands to get rich when poor farmers start growing Golden Rice. Instead, it will represent a fundamentally different approach, an embodiment of the old "teach a man to fish" adage.

Business Insider's source? Big-ag giant Syngenta and the "Golden Rice Humanitarian Board." The board, of course, is stacked with big-ag-funded "NGOs," USAID representatives, and representatives of big-ag itself. The board represents the revolving door between corporate monopolies and big-government - and their combined efforts to use every means necessary to advance their collective self-interests.  

Contrary to their claims of altruism, the initial profit of selling the rice to farmers will be immense. Posing as an act of charity will secure taxpayer subsidized funding from governments around the world to "feed the children." 

Once the genetically engineered rice is being grown, big-ag herbicide, pesticide, and chemical fertilizer regiments will reap billions more, all likely to be subsidized as well - diverting state resources away from traditional, localized, and more effective nutritional and agricultural development programs.  

There is also another profit to be made, one not of money directly, but in terms of public perception. Using the Trojan Horse of  "charity" to proliferate genetically modified crops that are otherwise wholly rejected around the world, will constitute big-ag's "foot in the door" in gaining wider acceptance for their monopolizing and destructive business model. 

The very name, "Golden Rice Humanitarian Board" reflects the frequent ploy of inserting "humanitarian" anywhere exploitation and human rights are being violated the most. The "humanitarian war" for instance, is a term used to sell unpopular extraterritorial military aggression. For big-ag, "humanitarian crops" are used to push unpopular and dangerous biotech products on the planet's most vulnerable people.  

Don't You Want to Save the Children?
The paid-for narrative of big-ag's lobbying efforts to push Golden Rice revolves around portraying anti-GMO activists opposing the scheme as wanting to "starve children." The simplistic propaganda ploy is as dishonest as it is insulting. The very concept of relieving suffering throughout the developing world with a monoculture of genetically altered "super gruel" at face value is both undignified and untenable.

In Thailand for instance, one of the world's leading producers of rice, those who grow rice - and would potentially grow Golden Rice - do so for the sole purpose of selling it. They do indeed consume part of their annual harvest - but the species they grow are determined by market demand.  Not only is there no demand for genetically modified rice species, nor will there ever be, Golden Rice contaminating the thousands of varieties of native, organic rice species Asia's rice farmers do depend on for their livelihood would be an immeasurable catastrophe. 

Tainting native species, however, will be a boom for big-ag - opening a door that cannot be closed again and inviting the rest of its business model into markets it was previously restricted from. Consumers unable to avoid genetically modified rice would have no choice but to accept it, along with other genetically modified products. This is the truth behind the tangibly desperate drive to push Golden Rice through. 

Additionally, encouraging people to sustain themselves on a single crop is irresponsibly dangerous - with the practice of monoculture farming already responsible for miring thousands in debt when their single crop fails or market fluctuations make their single crop unprofitable. For farmers already existing along the edge of poverty and debt, depending on a single crop multiplies, not hedges the potential for disaster.

At every juncture big-ag claims its products are for the benefit of the impoverished, starving, and those who till the land. But today, most farmers still scratch a living at the lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum - particularly those who regularly buy into big-ag's various monopolies over seeds, fertilizer, herbicides and pesticides.

How to Really Feed the Poor 

As Greenpeace and Grain.org have noted, the solution to malnutrition can be as simple as having farmers diversity their crops and for rural populations to grow their own personal or community gardens.

Greenpeace stated in a statement on Golden Rice that:

...a range of projects, such as ecologically farmed home and community gardens, that increase access to healthy and varied diets can eradicate not only VAD, but simultaneously tackle other nutrient deficiencies. Ecological farming can in fact better contribute to healthy and diverse diets by empowering people to access and produce their own healthy and varied food, which is the real long-lasting solution populations affected by VAD need.

Grain.org reported in a paper titled, "Grains of delusion: Golden rice seen from the ground," that: 

IRRI says that the Green Revolution may have actually increased malnutrition among the poor. Consumption of vegetables in most Asian countries has remained stagnant since the Green Revolution and vegetable prices have increased in both real and relative terms. In India, annual rice and wheat production has more than tripled from pre-Green Revolution levels. On the other hand, household consumption of vegetables has dropped 12 percent over the last two decades. Pulse and legume consumption is down even more and is becoming more and more costly, and malnutrition remains high.

Monoculture farming for a globalized economy renders entire nations as producers for markets beyond their borders leaving less room and resources to cultivate what is needed for local populations. Net exporters are generally so because they work and sell for far less than nations that import goods. 

Not only do community gardens and diversifying crops give farmers and the impoverished access to a more varied and dignified diet, it opens the door to polyculture - the growing of more than one crop for both personal consumption and for additional income. Organic polyculture is promoted in Thailand by the head of state as part of a national self-sufficiency program and those that practice both self-sufficiency and sustainable economic growth, avoid both the pitfalls of debt and the dangers of monoculture farming. 

Education is also key. Raising awareness as to what causes malnutrition and how to prevent it will raise the demand for a variety of fruits and vegetables giving farmers added incentives to diversify their crops. It will also produce the political impetus to pursue other pragmatic solutions, such as community gardens and networks of local farmers' markets.  

Ultimately, if immense amounts of government funding must be spent to solve global malnutrition, why not spend it on initiatives that will give the poor access to the same variety and dignity in diet that the rest of the world enjoys? Why insist on an expensive, risky, and proven dangerous genetically modified monoculture model that will essentially feed the poor "GMO super gruel" instead? The benefits for big-ag and perpetuating their immense and unwarranted power over global agriculture is clear - so are the dangers and exploitation faced by the impoverished poor these monolithic corporations are pretending to help. 

Big Agri's GMO "Super Bananas for Brown People"

Perhaps the most racists, disgusting public relations stunt yet to sell genetically modified poison to the masses and monopolize the world's food supply.

June 21, 2014 (Tony Cartalucci - LocalOrg) - Much of the starvation and malnutrition across the so-called "developing" or "third" world, is due to the unmitigated, global campaign of human exploitation driven by globalization. The Walmarts and Tescos of the world line their shelves with goods cultivated, manufactured, and otherwise sourced from millions of people living under unhealthy, inhumane conditions up to and including literal slavery across the third world. This system of global interdependency, lorded over by Wall Street and London corporate-financier monopolies, doesn't just coincidentally allow such conditions to exist, but is built on this perpetual and ever expanding socioeconomic disparity.

Clearly the solution to solving destitution that leads to malnutrition and starvation is addressing the socioeconomic disparity that created it in the first place, but the monopolies that benefit from this disparity the most are in no way about to do so. Instead, their proposal is to feed the third world with genetically modified gruel to make up for the fact that poor populations cannot access a normal, balanced diet. This "GMO gruel" not only allows big-agricultural monopolies to expand their markets under the guise of "charity," but allows them to monopolize a greater portion of the world's food supply. By hooking the third world on "GMO gruel" that will be patented, centrally controlled, and beyond the means of local populations to reproduce independently, the very perpetrators of global disparity will only tighten their grip on humanity tighter still.

From "Golden Rice" to "Super Bananas," this GMO gruel represents the very worst of a long history of inhuman, racist imperialism. It is essentially corporate-financiers handing out "Super Bananas for Brown People."

The same propaganda networks focused on keeping consumers globally ignorant about what is in their food through anti-GMO labeling campaigns, are pushing poisoned, monopolizing GMO schemes like "Golden Rice" and "Super Bananas," disguised as "socially conscious" biotech "charity." But GMO gruel for the most destitute of society is not an answer. At best, it is a cheap publicity stunt designed to push GMO into new markets while painting opponents of big-agri multinationals as "promoting starvation." At worst it is a sovereignty usurping assault on a global, national, local, and even personal level. Either way, it should be wholly condemned and rejected.

The Real Solution 
The real and most obvious solution is not peddling GMO gruel to the impoverished to make up for the fact that they don't have access to a normal diet, but to give them access to a normal diet in the first place. This is done with first stabilizing the geopolitical chaos that creates and perpetuates socioeconomic injustice. This must be done by exposing and foiling the West's various hegemonic geopolitical campaigns in Africa, South America, Asia, and even Eastern Europe.

Next, education and localizing agriculture through training and assistance could be done in the short term, providing a long term, self-sustaining solution. Organic farms producing a variety of crops for local consumption, rather than devastating, debt-incurring monoculture pursued by farmers worldwide in a self-defeating cycle of debt and dependency on big-agri, could begin solving deficiencies in local diets - not to mention a whole host of other socioeconomic challenges.

Image: The multinational corporations pushing for "super bananas for brown people" are the very monopolies that have created and perpetuated the conditions of immense disparity that have caused malnutrition and starvation for millions in the first place. Understanding that these monopolies are the problem, and that decentralizing their power is the answer, is the first step to truly solving injustices now being exploited to further expand the power of these special interests.  

For the hundreds of millions being wasted on "Super Bananas" and "Golden Rice," such funding could be directed toward truly solving malnutrition and starvation. By solving these problems permanently and locally, big-agricultural giants like Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer, and others, would be denied an opportunity to exploit human misery they themselves have contributed to creating and perpetuating, to merely expand their monopolies and negative impact on humanity further.

In Thailand, the new military-led government that has come to power is attempting to ween the population off of subsidies and dependency on big-agricultural giants through a national organic agriculture initiative that includes creating localized fertilizer production, local processing, and even training in marketing to give farmers the power to sell their crops directly to the markets rather than depend on big-retail monopolies.

Real solutions that truly help the people, are implemented at the expense of corporate-financier monopolies. By decentralizing everything from fertilizer, pesticide, and herbicide production, to distribution and retail, the very existence of multinational monopolies are challenged. Since the governments many people believe serve their interests, in fact are directed by corporate-financier special interests, expect none of these solutions to ever be implemented by "them."

Instead, we must come together as communities to solve these issues locally for ourselves, and create sustainable models that can be replicated around the world by others who need them most. It is not a solution that can be implemented overnight, but it can be done, step by small step, year by year, toward a better tomorrow. Since "Super Bananas" and "Golden Rice" are in fact, not solutions at all, it is guaranteed that the problems of malnutrition and starvation, as well as dependency on unjust multinational monopolies, will persist or in fact, worsen. We have nothing to lose, no matter how slow our progress may seem, by taking the first tentative steps today.   

Organic Farming: The Choreography of Polyculture

Joel Salatin introduces Polyface Farm in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley. 

Joel Salatin
UCBerkley OCW
November 6, 2012

 Joel Salatin's presentation begins at 5:50 minutes.

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Cargill and Others Behind anti-Organic "Stanford Study"

Anti-organic "study" is not news, rather, coordinated propaganda campaign.
by Tony Cartalucci
 
September 5, 2012 - Harry Wallop of the London Telegraph ends his anti-organic food editorial with the following sentence:

"Tomorrow, the baby is going to get an extra dollop of pesticide-sprayed carrots."

Whether or not Wallop is as brain-addled as he leads on to being, the point of his editorial is to encourage similar attitudes amongst the Telegraph's readership, attempting to manipulate public perception in the wake of a recent Stanford University "study" regarding organic food.

Image: Conflict of interest? Strange that Stanford University is partnered with agricultural giant Cargill and just so happens to come out with a study that suggests organic food is no better than its big-agri competition. According to Stanford University, Cargill has donated at least 5 million dollars  for the creation of a Center on Food Security and the Environment (FSE). Cargill's website has a page describing its partnership with Stanford which can be found here. Cargill and many others also are listed as donors by Standford University in their 2011 Annual Report (page 38, .pdf).

....

Whether or not readers of the Telegraph will put their own health and that of their children at risk for the sake of protecting big-agri's bottom line and the faltering paradigm that big-agri products are safe for human consumption simply because Harry Wallop thinks its good to feed his baby with pesticide-sprayed carrots remains to be seen.

The London Telegraph, when not fabricating news to support England's latest imperial adventures overseas, is at the forefront of many of the largest corporate-financier funded lobbying campaigns. Recently, someone has splurged, and splurged big on anti-organic food lobbying built atop a suspect Stanford study. 

A Flawed "Study"

When entire news cycles are dominated by headlines built on a single university study, with editorials attempting to hammer in big-agri talking points, a lobbying effort is clearly afoot. 

Two news cycles have already been dedicated to trashing organic food. Organic food is free of pesticides and genetic manipulation, both of which are proven to cause learning disabilities, decreased IQ, sterility, and a myriad of other health problems including a wide variety of cancers.

This most recent anti-organic food campaign began with a Stanford study (and here) out of its Center for Health Policy (a subsidiary of Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies), examining the nutritional value of organic food versus non-organic. Food with pesticides on it had nearly the same nutritional value, the study claims, as organic food - completely skipping over the whole point of eating organic.

Indeed, the nutritional value would be similar - but the entire point of eating organic is not because of vastly superior nutritional value, but to avoid the "extras" included with products from big-agri corporations.

The Stanford study intentionally dismisses concerns regarding the presence of pesticides by simply claiming levels were within legal tolerances. No discussion was made on whether legal tolerances equated to safe tolerances, nor was there any mention made of the harmful effects of genetically modified organisms (GMO) or other controversial food additives found in non-organic food products.

So why the strawman argument?

A Corporate-funded "Study"

The Stanford Center for Health Policy states the following  on its own website:

"The Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) relies on support from its friends, as well as from national and international foundations and corporations, for the funding of the Institute's research, teaching and outreach activities."

The Center for Health Policy is a subsidiary of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI). So who are these "friends," national and international foundations and corporations funding the research of FSI and its subsidiary, the Stanford Center for Health Policy?

Image: From Stanford Center for Health Policy's own website it is admitted that " national and international foundations and corporations" fund its research and "outreach activities." This confirms the suspicions of an increasingly aware public who saw the "study" as biased, contradictory of both logic and ethics, and the result of insidious corporate-funding. 

....

According to FSI's 2011 Annual Report (page 38, .pdf) Agricultural giant Cargill, British Petroleum (BP), the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (heavily invested in both Cargill and big-agri giant Monsanto), the Ford Foundation, Google, Goldman Sachs, the Smith Richardson Foundation, and many other corporate-financier, Fortune 500 special interests.

Image: From Stanford's 2011 FSI Annual Report (page 38, .pdf), of which the Center for Health Policy is a subsidiary, is funded by Cargill, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (heavily invested in both Cargill and big-agri giant Monsanto), and a myriad of other Fortune 500 corporate-financier special interests. The report at face value is throwaway propaganda, but its funding reveals a more insidious, coordinated effort to manipulate public perception, stretching across academia, mass media, government, and big business. (click image to enlarge)

....

That none of this is mentioned, and the lack of independence and transparency involved in the study and its presentation to the public, overturns the credibility of both Stanford, and the Western media machine that so eagerly shoveled the results out to the public. Combined with the fact that the study itself is flawed, and the concerted, disingenuous nature with which it is being promoted to the public, a premeditated public relations campaign, bought and paid for by Stanford's FSI sponsors, most notably Cargill and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is self-evident.

What to Do?

Quite obviously, one should continue eating organic. Additionally, the duplicitous nature exhibited by academia, the mass media, and the vast corporate interests overtly driving them both, demands from us to redouble our efforts at implementing full-spectrum boycotts aimed at big-agri as well as other Fortune 500 corporate-financier monopolies. This includes other processed food makers such as Pepsi and Coca-Cola, Kraft, and the myriad of subsidiaries they maintain.

We should also redouble our efforts at supporting local farmers, attending and contributing to local farmers markets, and investigating the possibility of growing, if only a small percentage, our own herbs, fruits, and vegetables.

Freedom and self-determination come from economic independence, self-reliance, and self-sufficiency. The most fundamental form of economic independence is having a safe, secure, and local food supply operated for, by, and of the people. Cementing this emerging paradigm, in spite of the crass, juvenile, even criminally irresponsible editorials like that of the Telegraph's Harry Wallop, and multimillion dollar "studies" subsidized by Cargill and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is the first step on extending this paradigm shift to other areas required for maintaining and advancing modern civilization.