Farmer suicides hit 10-year high - Agence France-Presse (21/7/2006)

1.Farmer suicides hit 10-year high as aid package from Indian PM falls short
2.Indian Prime Minister Faces the Dead Farmer Problem (excerpt)
3.India should be totally free from GMO food or feed

EXCERPT: Srijit Mishra, said "something has to be done with the moneylenders. The ground level situation seems to be getting worse."

Activists blame the high cost of genetically modified seeds for adding to farmers' indebtedness. (item 1)
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1.Farmer suicides hit 10-year high as aid package from Indian PM falls short
The suicide rate of farmers in India's poverty-stricken main cotton belt has hit a 10-year high, apparently prompted by disappointment at an aid package from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Paul Peachey
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE , Saturday, July 22, 2006
http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?pp_cat=17&art_id=23378&sid=8946138&con_type=1

The suicide rate of farmers in India's poverty-stricken main cotton belt has hit a 10-year high, apparently prompted by disappointment at an aid package from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Sixty farmers - including two fathers and their sons - have killed themselves this month, crippled with debt and hit by falling prices for cotton, says a group working with farmers.

Singh announced on July 1 a relief package of 37.5 billion rupees (HK$6.23 billion) after a visit to the Vidarbha region of western Maharashtra.

More than 600 Vidarbha farmers killed themselves in the 12 months to the end of June, hitting a peak of more than 70 in March, said Kishor Tiwari, of the Vidarbha People's Protest Forum. But it got worse after Singh's visit.

The death rate is the highest in the 10 years the group has kept records.

"People are very disappointed because they had high hopes," Tiwari said, as Singh missed key issues.

Singh ordered a waiver of interest payments to state-owned banks. But activists say he failed to address the issue of private moneylenders used by 90 percent of farmers. Some moneylenders - including politicians and businessmen - charge up to 120 percent annual interest from farmers.

Federal government officials earlier this year said more than 8,900 farmers had committed suicide since 2001 in four states hardest hit by agricultural distress, including 980 in Maharashtra.

The number has been dismissed by activists. A state government-backed report, for instance, says more than 4,100 farmers ended their lives in Maharashtra in 2004.

Its author, Srijit Mishra, said "something has to be done with the moneylenders. The ground level situation seems to be getting worse."

Activists blame the high cost of genetically modified seeds for adding to farmers' indebtedness. And the Supreme Court last month backed investigators who said US biotech giant Monsanto charged too much for cotton seed and had to cut prices.

Mahyco Monsanto's cotton was planted by more than one million Indian farmers in 2005, resulting in higher yields and less pesticide, the company claimed. But farmers said GM seed last year was nearly four times the price of traditional seed.
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2.Indian Prime Minister Faces the Dead Farmer Problem

EXCERPT from 'Indian Prime Minister Faces the Dead Farmer Problem' By P. SAINATH in which the Indian journalist dissects the Indian central government's response to the appalling situation in the Vidharba region:

"There is also not a whisper of incentives for food crops in the 'package'. The rebirth of jowar [sorghum bicolor] would have helped farmer, soil, and food security. Suicides are far higher among cash crop farmers than among food crop growers here. It would also have seen the revival of livestock - jowar is where the fodder comes from. Instead, there is Rs.180 crore for "seed replacement." This sounds like gifting big bucks to people pushing Bt and other exotic seed that would further ruin farmers here. The same sum could have been used for an incentive of Rs.1000 per acre for growing jowar. Instead, we got notions like gifting a thousand high yielding cows to farmers in each of six districts here. For those with no access to fodder and struggling to feed their families, these cows will eat them out of hearth and home." http://www.counterpunch.org/Sainath07212006.html

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3.GM seeds
Letters, Frontline, Vol 23/Issue 14, Jul. 15-28 2006
INDIA'S NATIONAL MAGAZINE
http://www.frontlineonnet.com/stories/20060728004812900.htm

IT is highly disturbing that the GEAC is in a hurry to clear large-scale field trials of Bt. Brinjal ("Seeds and protests", June 30). Independent studies show adverse health effects arising from GM crops in all parts of the world. The field trials of Bt. Cotton in India have already led to the total contamination of the cotton chain.

Neither the government nor the companies have so far come forward to own responsibility for the failure, let alone redress the victims' grievances.

India should be totally free from GMO food or feed. As Europe has successfully banned GM food, India also should be firm in its stand.

R. Soundararajan
Nagapattinam, T.N.


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