Bt cotton is coming up for review in India right NOW!

As Devinder Sharma points out in his URGENT statement below: the choice confronting the Indian government is ending rural poverty, hunger and farm suicides or continuing to hype GM crops.

But at this critical juncture the relevant regulatory body - the GEAC - is refusing to even listen to civil society!

CONTACT DETAILS FOR THE HEAD OF GEAC:

GEAC Chairman: Suresh Chandra
Tel: +91-11-24361308
Fax: +91-11-24363967
Email: [email protected]

Ask Suresh Chandra about the research showing the massive and unnecessary costs of GM cotton compared to effective non-pesticidal alternatives:
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4921

Ask Suresh Chandra to look at the Punukula village initiative which has been so overwhelmingly successful that it is being taken to hundreds to other villages in the state of Andhra Pradesh by the AP Agriculture Minister. This is the same state in which farmers have gone on the rampage in fury at the disappointing results they've had from Bt cotton.

No Bt Cotton, No Pests! How cotton farmers are being fleeced
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4935
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From: Devinder Sharma

India's Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) ready to endorse corporate Bt Cotton agenda:

Refuses to invite the civil society organisations/individuals to present their part of the story.

After the controversy shrouding the hasty approval of Bt cotton three years ago by an 'incompetent' GEAC (it hardly has one and a half members, with the chair [a bureaucrat] being tossed around frequently) the GEAC is ready for another round of 'scientific fraud'.

After having approved Bt cotton, based on inconclusive and faulty scientific trials, the apex committee is now busy trying to formalise the approval for all times to come. It has called for a meeting of the experts on Mar 4. The conditional approval for three years comes up for reconsideration on Mar 4.

The GEAC has not yet responded to requests by the Forum for Biotechnology & Food Security, Gene Campaign, Greenpeace, Research Foundation, Bharat Krishak Samaj and the Centre for Sustainable Agriculture/Hyderabad among others to be given an opportunity to explain the reality check on Bt cotton.

So much for transparency in governance!

Nevertheless, as agricultural scientists remain busy in trying out the Bt gene technology, an obscure village in Andhra Pradesh - Punukula - has charted a new path in sustainable cotton cultivation. The village has clearly demonstrated what agricultural scientists were not willing to acknolwedge all these years -- no pesticides, no pests. And to take it still further, no Bt cotton, no pests!!

Interestingly, while the AP Agricultural University did not see any merit in taking the Punukula village initiative to other villages in the Pradesh, the AP Agriculture Minister actually visited the village to see for himself the transformation. He then decided to replicate the Punukula non-pesticidal management in cotton in 400 villages. This programme has already been launched.

This is a very disturbing trend for the future of science. Why are agricultural scientists not interested in anything that is not linked to commercial interests of the agribusiness companies? How come the Agriculture Minister found the NPM model viable and effective, and the agricultural scientists could not? Does it mean that even politicians are becoming more sensible than agriculture scientists?

Four years ago, when Devinder Sharma made a presentation before the GEAC asking for the banning of pesticides on cotton rather than the introducing of Bt cotton, the then chair of the Monitoring and Evaluation Committee (part of GEAC) said that he was not aware of any non-pesticidal alternative in cotton!! And we always thought only policy makers live in ivory towers!!!

The choice before the Indian government is very clear. It can end rural poverty, hunger and farm suicides or it can continue to hype GM crops.

GEAC Chairman: Suresh Chandra
Tel: +91-11-24361308
Fax: +91-11-24363967
Email: [email protected]

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