The Pineapple Problem

"http://tinyurl.com/2vjyzq2"

Costa Rica is a beautiful country with a perfect climate for growing some of the world's most popular plants (both ornamental and nutritious). But does this translate into real economic benefit for the people of Costa Rica? For at least 100 years, foreign agri-business has been attempting to despoil Costa Rica's riches and often succeeding. It began with United Fruit and banana plantations and continued with pineapple and other crops and with first USA and then international conglomerates such as Chiquita Banana, Dole, and others. I was told that "they" came in with huge tractors separated by a kilometer and with a razor sharp blade or wire between them and simply bulldozed huge swaths of rain forest to make pineapple plantations. "They" paid off politicians and government workers to get whatever permits they wanted and then hired the locals whom they paid very little, required long back-breaking work from them, and treated them as sub-human. Then Costa Rica got tougher with them and the labor laws became tougher and more fairly enforced so that "they"had to start paying a minimum wage and pay into the government health and pensions funds. I now that as long ago as 2008, Dole Pineapple was getting around many of these restrictions by hiring workers by the day, trucking them in in the backs of cattle trucks, and then letting them go. So they were only temporary, casual, and part-time workers according to the legal records. They would then send the cattle trucks out again and collect the workers lined up waiting for a job. The work, of course, is seasonal. That makes it easy for Dole and other such companies to get around various labor laws.

I have been told by workers in the banana plantations and in the rice fields that pesticides are sprayed from crop dusters while the workers are in the fields working. The incidence of sterility, birth defects, and cancers among these workers and their families is very high.

The ecological damage done by the clearing of huge areas of forest to plant a single crop is enormous. The on-going damage is still not completely known.

The economic questions is this: Do the losses to the environment and the public health get cancelled out by economic benefits to the people of Costa Rica?

This blog from PoveryMatters Blog, attemps to answer the question. Anyone interested in the Costa Rica left behind by tourists, should be aware of how outside interests and mega agribusiness in particular are affecting the country.

Some links regarding Monsanto that YOU should check out.

http://tinyurl.com/4y3mg63
http://tinyurl.com/6xz4naq
http://tinyurl.com/3fhyckj
http://tinyurl.com/3oa2z73
http://tinyurl.com/5tcggy8
http://tinyurl.com/42sfl7a
http://tinyurl.com/3w3s5jt
http://tinyurl.com/5sn7ssx

Monsanto and Secrecy

EU court attacks GM crop secrecy
Anti-GM protest in Luxembourg, 20 Oct 08
Anti-GM campaigners have widespread support in the EU

Europe's top court has ruled that EU governments have no right to conceal the location of field trials of genetically modified (GM) crops.

The European Court of Justice was responding to a case brought by Pierre Azelvandre in Alsace, eastern France.

He wanted to know where GM field trials had taken place in his local area.

The only EU-approved GM crop is a strain of corn developed by the US firm Monsanto. But GM trials for research are legal, under strict controls.

The court in Luxembourg ruled on Tuesday that "information relating to the location of the release can in no case be kept confidential".

It said "considerations relating to the protection of public order and other secrets protected by law... cannot constitute reasons capable of restricting access to the information listed by the [EU] directive, including in particular those relating to the location of release".

On Monday, the European Commission failed in a bid to force the governments of France and Greece to allow Monsanto's GM corn to be grown in their countries.

Opponents of GM crops say more scientific data is needed, arguing that their long-term genetic impact on humans and wildlife could be harmful.

The biotech industry says the crops are as safe as traditional varieties, and that they would provide plentiful, cheaper food.

Et Tu, Obama?

from the December 26, 2008 edition - http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/1226/p09s02-coop.html
A food agenda for Obama
Now's the time to reinvent America's farm and food policies.
By Christopher D. Cook

San Francisco

Within hours of former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack's nomination last week as Agriculture secretary, websites were humming with well-documented critiques of his affinity for genetically engineered crops, agribusiness giant Monsanto, heavily polluting factory farms, and other Big Farm interests.

Some critics expressed outrage, others surprise, especially since they had mounted a vigorous, 55,000-plus strong online petition to persuade President-elect Barack Obama to nominate someone more progressive who would promote sustainable food and farming.

The need for sweeping change could not be clearer when it comes to our food: At taxpayer expense, current policy subsidizes large corporate farms and destructive industrial agriculture, which rob the countryside of economic diversity and precious environmental resources, such as water and topsoil.

These same subsidies, and anemic regulatory enforcement, encourage an increasingly monopolized food system, and a "cheap food" policy that lards us with fatty, processed foods – the cost of which is ultimately dear, more than $100 billion annually for obesity and diet-related diseases. Today's food system also generates a sizable portion of America's greenhouse gases, and rests on fast-dwindling and volatile oil supplies.

Now is the time for something different – change we can eat.

As Mr. Obama weighs a massive stimulus package, he should include new funding streams that promote sustainable food – to build up alternatives such as farmer's markets, local "foodshed" programs that promote consumption of local produce, and farm-to-institution projects that encourage schools, hospitals, and other large buyers to purchase local organic foods when possible.

The change we need in food is as urgent as any we face – changes that affect national health, energy security, global warming, and more. Here, then, is a not-so-modest nine-point platform for food reform, some of which could be included in Obama's stimulus package. Other elements may require a lengthier policy push:

1. New public investments targeting sustainable agriculture, defined as organic, small- to mid-sized, diversified farming.

2. New investments in local/regional food networks and foodsheds – to help build up the connections between farmers and consumers, to open up and expand new markets for organic farmers and those considering the transition; for more farmer's markets and food stores that feature local produce.

3. A moratorium on agribusiness mergers, and strenuous antitrust provisions and enforcement to protect what little is left of diversity in the food economy.

4. A moratorium on all new genetically modified (GMO) products, and an expansion of existing ones, and appointment of a blue-ribbon panel/commission to assess the impact of GMO foods on our environment and our health.

5. A moratorium on – and gradual phasing out of – concentrated animal feeding operations, aka factory farms, which are among the nation's top polluters of water and air, and breeders of widespread and virulent bacterial strains.

6. Dramatically expanded regulatory enforcement and staffing in the US Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration to protect food safety and meat industry labor and environmental practices.

7. Slowing the hazardously fast meatpacking (and poultry) assembly line, to protect workers and consumers.

8. Incentives for small-scale urban, suburban, and rural farming ventures oriented toward diversified local food systems.

9. Bold public investment in a raft of public awareness campaigns that build support, and expand markets and demand, for sustainable alternatives such as urban agriculture and gardening, and reducing fast-food consumption.

10. Fill in the blank, and send me your thoughts at www.christopherdcook.com.

Food is a vital cornerstone of both individual life and civil society, and our current system is making us fatter, churning out greenhouse gases, and abusing workers and animals.

With a new administration elected on a "change" agenda, it's a timely moment to press for the most basic change of all: change in the food that ends up on our plates and in our bodies.

• Christopher D. Cook is a journalist and the author of "Diet for a Dead Planet: Big Business and the Coming Food Crisis."