Technology Trends: ETC Group Workshops on New Technologies, Agriculture and Corporate Power at World Social Forum, Porto Alegre (Brazil)
26th -30th January 2005
It's the worlds biggest Jamboree of grassroots social action and new ideas. Once again ETC Group (Action Group on Erosion, Technology and Concentration) will be hosting and speaking at various events at the World Social Forum (Porto Alegre Brazil 26th-30th Jan). Our workshops aim to empower Social Movements and Civil Society to identify and resist the damage from the new waves of corporate technologies and industrial concentration breaking globally across society. We will be providing workshops addressing concerns stretching from nanotechnology, genomics and human enhancement technologies to new forms of Biopiracy (theft of cultural and genetic resources by the gene giants) as well as sharing the celebration of the ongoing defence of biodiversity and food sovereignty by indigenous and small farmers. As well as hosting four events of our own, ETC researchers will also be speaking at events arranged by others throughout the five days of the Social Forum (see details below) and you can visit us on our stall at the Social Forum to pick up ETC publications or have a chat.
Please do come join us at the following events:
"Brave New World: Converging Technologies at the Nano-scale
28th January, 8.30am-11.00. Room F101
"Down on the Farm: The Impact of Nano-scale Technologies on Food and Agriculture"
29th January, 12.00pm - 15.00. Room: F209.
"Genomics, Nanotechnology and the Myth of Human Performance Enhancement"
29th January 15.30pm - 18h30. Room: J102.
"New Enclosures and the New Faces of Biopiracy"
30th January 15.30pm - 18.30 - Room B201.
"Rocking the Boat - again: Global campaign against Craig Venter's Biopiracy expedition"
- (contact ETC and Centro Ecologico for time and venue).
***see below for full details of these events and also any changes at http://www.forumsocialmundial.org.br ***
****************************** Other Events at the World Social Forum 2005 at which ETC researchers will be speaking:
- "Panel on New Technologies and neoliberal models for agriculture" Hosted by Via Campesina and Brazil Landless Movement/MST
26th January, 8.30am-12.30 Tesourinha
- "Neoliberal practices of the merchandisation of science" Hosted by Fondation Sciences Citoyennes and others inc ETC Group.
28th January, 8.30am - 11.00 - Room A105100 (this may be changed to 29th January 8.30 - 11.00 room A105100)
- "New Technologies for a possible new world: Is nanotechnology a solution?" - a Debate. Hosted by Network Renanosoma, Sociologist Federation of Sao Paulo (SINSESP), University of Sao Paulo
28th January, 12.00pm - 18.30 Room A101.
- "Strategies to Dismantle the Power of TNCs" Hosted by Focus on Global South with a wide range of CSOs, including ETC Group
29th January, 12.00pm - 18.30 Room I103
- "Farmers Biodiversity" (workshop and exhibition) Hosted by Via Campesina Seed Campaign/CLOC/ CBDC and others
29th January, 8.00am - 12.30 - venue tba.
- "The What Next Project" Hosted by Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation,
30th January, 12.00pm - 15.00 - Room H104
- "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man: How the U.S. Uses Globalization to Cheat Poor Countries Out of Trillions" Hosted by Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation and Focus on Global South
30th January, 12.00pm - 15.00 - room I603
The following ETC researchers will be at WSF2005:
Pat Mooney, Silvia Ribeiro, Jim Thomas, Kathy Jo Wetter and Veronica Villa.
ETC can be reached in Porto Alegre at Continental Hotel tel (51) 30 27 1900, by email etc@etcgroup.org or by cellphone:
Silvia Ribeiro +52 55 2653 3330,
Pat Mooney +1 613 261 0688,
Jim Thomas +44 7752 106806.
We look forward to seeing you at the forum...
The ETC Group
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Full Details of ETC's Workshops at WSF2005:
"Brave New World: Converging Technologies at the Nano-scale" Hosted by ETC Group, Amigos de la Tierra America Latina y Caribe, FOEI (Friends of the Earth international) and Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation
28th January 8.30am - 11.00 - Room: F101.
While peoples' movements, CSOs and communities throughout the world are still trying to grasp the implications of genetic engineering for their lives, a series of new and powerful technologies is rapidly emerging and converging at the nano-scale. (A nanometer is one-billionth of a meter, the scale of atoms and molecules.) These technologies include nanotechnology, nanobiotechnology, genomics, robotics and information technologies. New nano-engineered materials look set to replace natural commodities (eg metals, rubber and cotton), with a profound impact on all sectors of the economy and emerging novel environmental and health hazards. Other concerns such as the increased ability for social control and surveillance, new nanoweaponry and human improvement technologies that eradicate human difference should be raising alarm in civil society. This workshop will present the realities of this new set of technologies and discuss the consequences of their application.
Languages: English/Portuguese/Spanish
"Down on the Farm: The Impact of Nano-scale Technologies on Food and Agriculture" Hosted by ETC Group and Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation
29th January 12.00pm - 15.00pm - Room: F209.
After the Green revolution and the Gene revolution here comes the Tiny revolution - New powerful technologies developed at the scale of atoms and molecules, such as nanotechnology, biotechnology, genomics, robotics and information technologies are converging to create new materials, substances, enclosures and control mechanisms that will once again transform agriculture and food systems pushing them further towards a an industrial corporate model of production and removing the need for farmers. Nanomaterials, Nanopesticides, nanobiotech seeds, nanosensors, nanofood and new breeding technologies will have profound impacts on all sectors of rural economies, (e g by replacing traditional agriculture commodities with new 'nano-engineered goods) and pose new potential environmental and health hazards while increasing control by over the food chain by technology corporations. Languages: English/Portuguese.
"Genomics, Nanotechnology and the Myth of Human Performance Enhancement" Hosted by ETC Group and Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation
29th January 15.30pm - 18.30 - Room: J102
Genomics, together with other converging new technologies such as nanotechnology, promises to cure diseases and "enhance human performance". In the current dominant trend of commodification of all aspects of life, everything and everybody can be "improved" to increase consumption of corporate products or enhance military power. Drugs targeted for particular racial groups is one of the many problematic aspect of genomics research as are eugenic attempt to elimate the disabled and diverse.
Languages: English/Portuguese.
"New Enclosures and the New Faces of Biopiracy" Hosted by ETC Group and Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation
January 30th 15.30pm - 18.30 - Room: B201
The privatization of biological resources and related knowledge through intellectual property regimes is called biopiracy/ Even with a "lost decade" of international and national legal regulations that disguise it, new technologies such as genomics and nanobiotechnology are being used to develop new forms of appropiation of the commons. At the same time, corporations are developing new mechanisms to secure monopoly control of biotechnology and other emerging technologies. These new mechanisms - what ETC Group refers to as New Enclosures - supplement or even replace intellectual property as a means of strengthening corporate monopolies. In this workshop we will assess the state of biopiracy - a decade after the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), and the different ways of privatizing the commons, including control technologies (aka Terminator technology), contracts, national government royalty-collecting schemes and satellite surveillance.
Languages: English/Portuguese.
"Rocking the Boat (again): Global campaign against Craig Venter's Biopiracy expedition around the world" Hosted by Centro Ecologico (Brazil) and ETC Group 27th January - contact ETC and Centro Ecologico for more details. A meeting to develop a common global campaign to monitor, denounce and prevent one of the largest biopiracy projects of all times, with far reaching implications. Craig Venter, the genomics mogul who led the private initiative to map and commercialise the human genome, has now embarked with his lab-yacht, "Sorcerer II", on a global expedition to collect the microbial diversity of world's megadiverse seas. This enterprise is financed by US Department of Energy as part of a larger project to create new artificial nanobiotech lifeforms for energy production.
Languages: English/Portuguese/Spanish
