from Claire Robinson, WEEKLY WATCH editor
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Dear all:

The Indian media is doing a good job of exposing the carnage caused amongst poor farmers by Bt cotton crops. But Monsanto is desperately trying to keep India's farmers on the GM treadmill by rolling out 20 new Bt hybrids. And GM lobbyists are even demanding that the Indian government subsidise Monsanto's expensive GM seeds to help enable greater "technology penetration"! (ASIA)

Meanwhile in Europe, EU Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel seems hell-bent on enabling GM contamination of organic crops, something hotly contested by organic farming bodies. (EUROPE)

Claire [email protected]
www.gmwatch.org / www.lobbywatch.org

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CONTENT
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ASIA
EUROPE
AFRICA
THE AMERICAS
TERMINATOR
MIDDLE EAST
FOOD SAFETY
PATENTS

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ASIA
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+ ANDHRA PRADESH FARMERS HIT BY FAILED BT COTTON...
A report for Indian TV station NDTV says farmers in Andhra Pradesh are grappling with crippling debt and desperation and choosing to end their lives after their cotton crop failed.

EXCERPT:
Most farmers say that Bt cotton, introduced to put an end to their problems, has now become one of the biggest causes of farmer suicides.

Twenty-year-old Vijayalakshmi is a widow and she blames Bt cotton for it. Less than two months ago, her husband Raju drank pesticide because the Bt cotton he grew on four acres left him with a debt of over Rs 1 lakh. With no buyers even for the land he owned, the humiliation of not being able to even ensure his wife and two little children don't go hungry was too much for the 25-year-old.

"We grew Raasi [Bt] hybrid seeds with great hope but it has ruined us. Never before, had we invested Rs 75,000 in one crop. Now he is dead and I have debts and two children. What should I do?" said Vijaylakshmi.

... "Bt cotton is hardly useful. They had said that it would yield 10-12 or even 15 quintals but I got only 3 quintals," said Devaiah, a cotton farmer.

... In the last four years that Bt cotton has been grown, every time farmers encountered a failure, they were told, that particular variety had failed for some reason but the technology itself was faultless.

So a new variety was popularised the next year. As one activist put it, Bt cotton has become the story of "operation successful, patient dead". http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6159

+ ... BT "SOLUTION" IS PART OF THE PROBLEM
A second report from NDTV gives more examples of tragedies caused by Bt cotton:

EXCERPT:
In the 1980s, when cotton farmer suicides were reported in Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh, synthetic pyrethroids were brought in as the solution. In 1997, when Warangal cotton farmers committed suicide, genetically modified Bt cotton was touted as a solution. Four years after Bt cotton was introduced in Andhra Pradesh, the solution seems to have become part of the problem.

Chandraiah, a farmer in Gopanapally village in Warangal district committed suicide after his [Bt] crop failed. His wife Swarnakka does not even know if he drank pesticide, because she had no money to take him to hospital. Even his last rites were performed with money villagers contributed.

"We have huge loans. My son-in-law abandoned our only daughter because we could not pay dowry. The debt must be Rs 40,000 already. The crop loss broke my husband. I don't even know what he did to himself," said Swarnakka, farmer's widow. http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6169

+ JURY URGES CANCELLATION OF BT COTTON APPROVALS
A jury of experts convened in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, noted the problems with Bt cotton and the economic losses suffered by farmers and urged the immediate cancellation of all Bt cotton approvals and for studies to be carried out on the problems with the crop. A scientist working for Nuziveedu Seeds said that there should not be any halt in the development of transgenic technology as it will help in evolving the perfect solution for the problem.[!!!] http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6165
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6164

+ DON'T MEET MONSANTO!
The South Against Genetic Engineering, a South Indian alliance of over 50 networks, farmers groups, civil society organisations, consumer activists, scientists, academics and media people, has urged the president and the prime minister of India to stand by India's farmers and not meet the CEO of Monsanto.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6152

+ PM SAYS HE WILL TAKE UP FARMERS' CAUSE WITH MONSANTO MAN
Andhra Pradesh agriculture minister N Raghuveera Reddy said that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had assured the state government that he would take up the cause of farmers with Monsanto chairman, Hugh Grant.

''On knowing that the Monsanto chairman was going to meet the prime minister, I and chief minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy had met Dr Singh and represented to him that cotton growers of the state were being exploited by the US seed major,'' he said.

The Andhra Pradesh state government has decided to drag Mahyco-Monsanto to the Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices Commission (MRTPC) to challenge the company's high prices for Bt cotton seed.
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