"Food is a tool. It is a weapon in the US negotiating kit"- Earl Butz, former US Secretary of Agriculture

"with proper use these surpluses can be made [far more potent] than the hydrogen bomb" - Congressman Brooks Hays

"For Washington, the choice was simple: Either accept US food aid unconditionally, or allow your population to starve." – from Feeding the famine?
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More excerpts from 'Feeding the famine? American food aid and the GMO debate in Southern Africa', by Noah Zerbe of the Center for Philosophy of Law, Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium.

These excerpts come from the report's conclusion.

LINK TO PDF FOR THE FULL REPORT: http://www.geocities.com/nzerbe/pubs/famine.pdf
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Conclusion: US Food Aid Policies Revisited

Despite resort to humanitarian rhetoric in its attack of European Union policy, the food aid distributed by the United States during the 2002 food crisis in Southern Africa demonstrates the continuing focus on the expansion of American policy objectives which marked earlier aid programs. The steadfast refusal to mill GM maize before distribution as food aid in particular highlights the ways in which American food aid was intended to serve specific American policy objectives. Indeed, three areas in which the decision to send food aid to Southern African advanced American goals can readily be identified: surplus disposal, market development, and foreign policy considerations. Let us briefly consider each.

Surplus Disposal: Following the introduction of genetically modified maize in the United States in 1996, maize exports to Europe collapsed. From a peak of 3,513 million metric tons in 1995, total maize exports to the EU collapsed to just 26 million metric tons by 2002 (USDA, 2003). The increased competition for European markets from non-GM producers left the United States with large quantities of surplus maize which it was unable to sell on international markets. Export to Africa under the banner of food aid conveniently disposed of the growing maize surplus (Vidal, 2002).

Market Development: USAID has a long history of promoting agricultural biotechnology in Africa. Indeed, the agency has made it its mission to "assist developing countries in building the framework for decision- making that will facilitate access to these opportunities the science [of biotechnology] holds and will ensure the safe and effective application of this technology" (USAID, 2003: np). However, Africa has been at the forefront of challenging the expansion of agricultural biotechnology, and especially of the proprietary system of patent rights that surrounds it - opposition most clearly articulated in the African Model Law on plant genetic resources (Zerbe, 2003). But, for USAID, the food crisis represented an opportunity to expand the promotion of biotechnology on the continent. Faced with the choice of importing GM food aid or allowing their populations to starve, USAID was banking on the governments of Southern Africa to choose GM food.

Foreign Policy Objectives: As noted above, US biotech corporations had been locked out of Europe since the EU imposed its moratorium on the approval of new GM crops. With no sign of the moratorium being lifted, the United States chose to pursue a more aggressive strategy. In exporting unmilled GM maize to Africa, the US was hoping (indeed banking) on cross-pollination with domestic varieties. If Europe had no alternative, non-GM sources of food, it would be unable to resist biotechnology. Furthermore, the more countries cultivating GM crops, the more likely US pressure on the European Union (either backdoor diplomacy or public pressure through the World Trade Organization) would be successful. Either way, European markets would again be opened to US maize exports.

But the United States failed to anticipate the strength of African opposition to GM food aid. By demanding that US food aid be milled before distribution, African governments were not simply giving into misguided European fears over agricultural biotechnology. Rather, they were attempting to secure the long-term economic viability of their agricultural sectors. Unable to compete directly against American and European farmers who are heavily subsidized and protected by their governments, African farmers were responding to European demands for non-GM agriculture through specialized production. The importation of GM seed would have undermined their capacity to engage in such specialized production, cutting off an important source of foreign exchange, particularly for Zambia and Zimbabwe. By failing to recognize the importance of non-GM production for the future health and vitality of the economies of Southern Africa, and by demanding that countries accept US food aid unconditionally in an effort to promote its own foreign policy and commercial objectives, the US policy exacerbated the food crisis. What should have been a routine food relief operation became a highly charged debate over the future of agricultural biotechnology not just in Africa but around the world.

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