GMW:_Biotech_in_global_retreat/Bay_Area_Mobilizes_to_Shut_Down_Biotech_Convention

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GMW:_Biotech_in_global_retreat/Bay_Area_Mobilizes_to_Shut_Down_Biotech_Conventio\

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" GM_Watch "

Sat, 22 May 2004 16:36:36 +0100

 

GM WATCH daily

http://www.gmwatch.org

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1.Biotech is in global retreat...

2.Bay Area Mobilizes to Shut Down Biotech Convention

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1.Biotech in global retreat

 

So far this year Monsanto, the world's biggest GM crop polluter, has backed down

on GM wheat globally, backed out of GM canola in Australia, stopped marketing

its GM cotton in Indonesia and closed its grain research facilities in Europe.

 

Monsanto and Syngenta have dropped GM sugar beet in Europe, while Bayer decided

not to commercialise GM maize in the UK even though it was the single GM crop

for which marketing permission had been given.

 

Meanwhile, the only GM crop commercially grown in the whole of the EU,

Syngenta's Bt176 maize, has been withdrawn by the Spanish Government from the

market. In addition, whole regions of Europe have declared themselves GM-free.

http://www.foeeurope.org/GMOs/gmofree/index.htm

 

Even in the US the pace of new products being brought through the regulatory

process has sharply declined and there has also been a sharp drop in efforts to

develop new GM products. For instance, field trials involving GM fruit and

vegetables had plummeted to about 20 by 2003 from about 120 in 1999.

http://www.iht.com/articles/520925.html

 

In the UK in 2004 GM crop trials of all sorts have shrunk down to just one

trial, while GM field trials have continued to be destroyed elsewhere in Europe.

http://www.biotechimc.org/or/2004/05/2795.shtml

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2.San Francisco Bay Area Mobilizes to Shut Down Biotech Convention

http://www.reclaimthecommons.net

Reclaim the Commons, 21.05.2004

 

San Francisco Bay Area Residents Pledge to Shut Down Biotech Convention in

solidarity with G8 Summit protests in Georgia

 

Call to Reclaim the Commons unites Peace, Racial Justice, & Global Justice

Movements

 

Bay Area Peace, Racial Justice, and Global Movement organizers have called for a

mass mobilization to Reclaim the Commons, as the biotech and pharmaceutical

industries prepare for their biggest convention ever in San Francisco, June 6-9,

and the Group of Eight Nations (G8) makes ready for its yearly summit off the

coast of Georgia, June 8-11.

 

With over 50 endorsers, including Direct Action to Stop the War, Ella Baker

Center for Human Rights, and Global Exchange, and thousands of protestors from

across the country expected to flood the Bay Area in early June, activists are

calling for " No War on Iraq, No War on the Commons! "

 

On June 8, the opening day of the G8 Summit, the Direct Action component of the

Reclaim the Commons Mobilization (RTC) has vowed to shut down the biotech

convention in San Francisco as a demonstration of opposition to corporate rule

locally and globally.

 

" From the beginning of the anti-war movement, Direct Action to Stop the War has

targeted the corporate interests behind the war - that's why we shut down the

San Francisco financial district the day after the invasion. Now that Americans

are getting a true and terrible glimpse of US tyranny in Iraq, while

Halliburton, Bechtel, Chevron, and others skim millions from this brutal

occupation, it’s time to connect the dots and expose how unchecked corporate

power is the real culprit -working through groups like the G8, they usurp

democracy, oppress people, and appropriate the commons both at home and abroad, "

said Meddle Bolger of Direct Action to Stop the War, whose anti-war protests

last year resulted in over 2000 arrests.

 

Brian Tokar of the Institute for Social Ecology, an RTC co-sponsor, said, " The

biotech industry is a case study of out-of-control corporate power and reckless

development—their WMDs include irreversible genetic pollution and bio-weaponry,

and they have a revolving door policy with government: USDA chief Anne Veneman

was a former Monsanto lobbyist. "

 

Organizers define the commons as everything needed to support healthy life on

earth; from air, water, and food, to public spaces, culture, and genes. They say

that RTC is not just a one-time mass protest against corporate power and

biotech, it's also about movement-building and creating just and sustainable

alternatives to the corporate model.

 

" With this mobilization, the Peace, Global Justice, and the Racial Justice

Movements are going much further toward creating one single, unstoppable

movement, " said Luna Pantera, a long-time racial-justice activist and single

parent from Oakland, California. Pantera stated, “The links are obvious: What’s

happening in Iraq is happening here everyday, in our prisons and in low-income

communities of color. The same corporate power-brokers who are defining

international military and trade policies that exploit poor countries of color,

are also responsible for domestic policies that institutionalize poverty and

racism—like huge tax breaks for the rich, staggering inequality in public

education, unbridled prison spending, racist police brutality, and open season

for big developers—policies that favor Big Business over the common good. "

 

RTC activists say they also intend to leave the Bay Area greener than they found

it—starting in low-income neighborhoods of color. They are using permaculture in

a new form of direct action that also strengthens communities. Food forests,

propagation for massive plant give-aways, and community gardens are already in

progress. Plans are in the works for eco-villages for the homeless, intersection

beautification projects, and sustainable-living showcases. " We are helping

ourselves and others get off of the corporate grind and out of the corporate

cage. We envision thriving, sustainable local economies, and neighborhood

councils participating in authentic democracy. We're creating that reality while

we're composting the Empire, " said Rose of the Green Bloc, a national

activist network that is pioneering solutions-oriented direct action.

 

Highlights of the week-long series of events include a teach-in with an

impressive roster of international presenters, a " really, really free market "

that contrasts an experimental gift economy with free-market capitalism, a

biotech world café, where participants engage in deep, democratic discussion of

the impacts of the biotech industry on San Francisco, a peace march,

biodiversity ball, and a racial justice day of actions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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