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Green Revolution 2.0 for Africa?

Submitted by ETC Staff on

This time the “silver bullet” has a gun

Issue: Everybody’s trying to jump-start science – and, especially, agricultural science – in Africa. Starting with the G8 meeting in Canada five years ago – and pledges by four of its members to build new centers of scientific excellence in Africa – the Syngenta Foundation, CGIAR, Jeffrey Sachs’s Earth Institute, and now, Google, Gates, and Rockefeller are all pushing new initiatives for the continent. While there is no denying that Africans deserve support in their struggle to address hunger, disease and climate change, science and technology are no “silver bullet” to resolve Africa’s problems. Yet, when the G8 meets this June in Germany they are expected to announce a new research agenda that will again propose scientific solutions to the world’s – and, particularly Africa’s – social problems.

Monsanto's Soybean Monopoly Challenged in Munich

Submitted by ETC Staff on

European Patent Office Will Decide Fate of Species-Wide Soybean Patent on 3 May 2007

On 3 May 2007 ETC Group (a Canadian-based international civil society organization - formerly known as RAFI) together with "No Patents on Life!" and Greenpeace will continue a 13-year legal battle against one of biotech's most notorious patents. At an appeal hearing at the European Patent Office in Munich, civil society organizations will argue that Monsanto's patent (European Patent No. 301-749) on all genetically engineered soybeans - unprecedented in its broad scope - must be revoked. "No patent symbolizes the brokenness of the patent system better than Monsanto's species-wide patent on genetically engineered soybeans," said Hope Shand of ETC Group. "Monsanto's patent is both technically flawed and morally unacceptable," said Shand.

5-4-3-2-1! GM Crop Countdown.

Submitted by Jim Thomas on

5-4-3-2-1! GM Crop Countdown.
English

The biotech industry claims that the global area devoted to GM crops in 2005 was 90 million hectares - or 222 million acres. ETC Group does not endorse or agree with the validity of annual statistics on GM crops compiled by the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA).

We agree with civil society critics who charge that ISAAA's statistics are inflated and unreliable. However, even using industry-generated statistics, the biotech countdown is revealing. Here are the vital statistics:

News Release: Food Sovereignty or Green Revolution 2.0?

Submitted by ETC Staff on

This time the “silver bullet” has a gun

ETC Group released a 16-page review of five new initiatives intended to launch what ETC dubs “Green Revolution 2.0” in Africa. Leading the charge is a plan to construct four Centers of Excellence together with a second initiative called the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. “The Green Revolution that followed World War II focused on semi-dwarf, high-yielding plant varieties” says Pat Mooney, ETC Group’s Executive Director. “It was a one-size-fits-all, take-it-or-leave-it silver bullet,” Mooney adds, “Africa left it.” In other words, Green Revolution technologies were inappropriate for the needs and resources of African farmers. ETC Group’s communiqué warns that, in Green Revolution 2.0, “big-box” science is being buttressed by a strategy to restructure African agriculture. Although the cornerstone of the new revolution will still be high-tech seeds, the G-8 and private foundations also want continental changes in market structure, intellectual property laws, and seed regulation so that agribusiness suppliers can profitably sell seeds, chemicals, and other inputs to farmers. “Big-box science will be linked to small box suppliers,” Mooney argues, “This time, the silver bullet has a gun.”

Civil Society/Labor Coalition Rejects Fundamentally Flawed Dupont-ED Proposed Nanotechnology Framework

Submitted by ETC Staff on

Urges All Parties To Reject The Public Relations Campaign

To All Interested Parties:

We, the undersigned, submit this open letter to the international nanotechnology community at large. We are a coalition of public interest, non-profit and labor organizations that actively work on nanotechnology issues, including workplace safety, consumer health, environmental welfare, and broader societal impacts.

DuPont Chemical Company (DuPont) and Environmental Defense (ED) jointly have proposed a voluntary “risk assessment” framework for nanotechnology. These groups intend to circulate their proposed framework both in the U.S. and abroad for consideration and/or adoption by various relevant oversight organizations, including the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

2006 and the plutocracy

Submitted by Silvia Ribeiro on

2006 and the plutocracy
English

In this article the author makes a very enlightening summary of corporate concentration during 2006, and how this affects our lives as simple citizens even though we think its something happening far away by Silvia Ribeiro Corporate concentration through global mergers and acquisitions reached a record at the close of 2006.

Gambling with Gaia

Submitted by ETC Staff on

ETC Group Warns that US Government’s Push for Geoengineering is Unacceptable

On the day before the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) sounds its loudest alarm yet, ETC Group warns that some OECD states, led by the United States, are betting on a pie-in-the-sky techno-fix to address climate change. “Geoengineering” refers to the intentional, large-scale manipulation of the environment to bring about environmental change. With no hope for Kyoto, little political will to ask industry or voters to change lifestyles and a growing recognition that carbon trading is a farce, some governments are concluding that massive earth restructuring is the only way out. The Guardian reported earlier this week that the US government is lobbying the IPCC to promote geoengineering activities, such as deliberately polluting the stratosphere to deflect sunlight and lower temperatures. (1)

Gambling with Gaia

Submitted by ETC Staff on

With hopes for Kyoto dimming, some governments may conclude that massive earth restructuring is the only feasible way out

Issue: Kyoto is fading and carbon trading is a farce. Recognizing this, OECD states can either “bite the bullet” and adopt socially-responsible policies to dramatically cut fossil fuel use and useless consumption or, they can hope for a “silver bullet” – some new techno-fix that might let them have their cake and eat it too. The silver bullet may be winning. At the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the US government is lobbying for “geoengineering” activities such as deliberately polluting the stratosphere to deflect sunlight and lower temperatures. At least 9 national governments and the European Union have supported experiments to spread iron filings on the ocean surface to nurture plankton and sequester carbon dioxide. At least a dozen additional countries are involved in stratospheric weather/climate modification. Commercial carbon traders are engaging in ocean fertilization as well. The scientific debate and the government/commercial experimentation is taking place, once again, in the absence of public discussion.

Extreme Genetic Engineering: An Introduction to Synthetic Biology

Submitted by ETC Staff on

ETC Group Releases Report on Synthetic Biology

A new report by the ETC Group concludes that the social, environmental and bio-weapons threats of synthetic biology surpass the possible dangers and abuses of biotech. The full text of the 70-page report, Extreme Genetic Engineering: An Introduction to Synthetic Biology, is available for downloading free-of-charge on the ETC Group website.

"Genetic engineering is passé," said Pat Mooney, Executive Director of ETC Group. "Today, scientists aren't just mapping genomes and manipulating genes, they're building life from scratch - and they're doing it in the absence of societal debate and regulatory oversight," said Mooney.

ETC Group: A Brief History

How we began: We began as a conversation about seeds in 1977. Four and a half decades later, we are still talking about seeds, but the world has grown infinitely more complex: new technologies have developed, economies have globalized, multinational companies have expanded their reach, and wealth and capital are concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer giant corporations. Life itself has been manipulated, picked apart, re-assembled – and then patented.

Vlandas' comment

Dr. Alexis Vlandas is Nanotechnology spokesperson for International Network of Engineers and Scientists for Global Responsibility.

In addition to esthetical criteria I based my choice on symbols which conveyed the impression of loose particles freely dispersing. I indeed believe that the main worry comes from material that can easily disperse and thus easily enter the human body. It should be noted that even if particles are initially embedded in a media, great care has to be taken to assess the whole cycle of life of the product so that even when it is disposed of the nano-particulate remain trapped.

ETC Group testifies at US Food & Drug Administration's public meeting on nanotechnology

Submitted by ETC Staff on

“100 Years after The Pure Food & Drug Act: FDA’s current regulatory framework inadequate to address new nano-scale technologies”

Presentation of Kathy Jo Wetter on behalf of ETC Group

Thank you for the opportunity to present the views of ETC Group. We are an international civil society organization based in Canada. Our work focuses on the social and economic impacts of emerging technologies and their implications, especially for marginalized communities. I’m based in ETC Group’s North Carolina office.

En Estados Unidos, abierta irresponsabilidad para regular la nanotecnologia

Submitted by ETC Staff on

El verano pasado (2006), la Agencia de protección al ambiente de Estados Unidos dio luz verde a 15 productos químicos nanoescalares, aunque anteriormente había sancionado el uso de nanopartículas para limpiar un tiradero de plaguicidas y había prometido consultar con el público la regulación de los productos.

Nanotech Rx

Submitted by ETC Staff on

Medical applications of Nano-scale technologies: What Impact on Marginalized communities?

Issue: Medical applications of nano-scale technologies have the potential to revolutionize healthcare by delivering powerful tools for diagnosing and treating disease at the molecular level. But the current zeal for nano-enabled

medicines could divert scarce medical R&D funds away from essential health services and direct resources away from non-medical aspects of community health and wellbeing. Although nanomedicine is being touted as a solution to pressing health needs in the global South, it is being driven from the North and is designed primarily for wealthy markets. Using nano-scale technologies, the pharmaceutical industry’s ultimate goal is to make every person a patient and every patient a paying customer by “medicating” social ills with human performance enhancement (HyPE) drugs and devices. Nanoenabled HyPEs could usher in an era of two-tiered humans – Homo sapiens and Homo sapiens 2.0.

Related Issues: 
Corporate Concentration
Patents & Biopiracy
Nanotechnology
Genomics & Biotechnology
Synthetic Biology
Other technologies

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