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  • From: Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Homestead] He who controls food controls . . . .
  • Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 11:34:21 -0700


On Dec 9, 2008, at 10:43 AM, Clansgian AT wmconnect.com wrote:

2) He who has the gold makes the rules. 'Just substitute " the most
guns," or "the most nuclear weapons" for "gold"

Very incorrect. He who has the food. Or better still, he who can produce
the food.

The food production system is controlled by a relatively small number of monster agribusiness companies. From patented seeds to consumers' tables, perhaps ten companies are largely in charge of worldwide food production and distribution. The following is just one source of this type of information. From:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8949
The profit system

The answer can be stated in one sentence. The global food industry is not organized to feed the hungry; it is organized to generate profits for corporate agribusiness.

The agribusiness giants are achieving that objective very well indeed. This year, agribusiness profits are soaring above last year's levels, while hungry people from Haiti to Egypt to Senegal were taking to the streets to protest rising food prices. These figures are for just three months at the beginning of 2008.[6]

Grain Trading

Archer Daniels Midland (ADM). Gross profit: $1.15 billion, up 55% from last year
Cargill: Net earnings: $1.03 billion, up 86%
Bunge. Consolidated gross profit: $867 million, up 189%.
Seeds & herbicides

Monsanto. Gross profit: $2.23 billion, up 54%.
Dupont Agriculture and Nutrition. Pre-tax operating income: $786 million, up 21%
Fertilizer

Potash Corporation. Net income: $66 million, up 185.9%
Mosaic. Net earnings: $520.8 million, up more than 1,200%
The companies listed above, plus a few more, are the monopoly or near- monopoly buyers and sellers of agricultural products around the world. Six companies control 85% of the world trade in grain; three control 83% of cocoa; three control 80% of the banana trade.[7] ADM, Cargill and Bunge effectively control the world's corn, which means that they alone decide how much of each year's crop goes to make ethanol, sweeteners, animal feed or human food.

As the editors of Hungry for Profit write, "The enormous power exerted by the largest agribusiness/food corporations allows them essentially to control the cost of their raw materials purchased from farmers while at the same time keeping prices of food to the general public at high enough levels to ensure large profits."[8]

Over the past three decades, transnational agribusiness companies have engineered a massive restructuring of global agriculture. Directly through their own market power and indirectly through governments and the World Bank, IMF and World Trade Organization, they have changed the way food is grown and distributed around the world. The changes have had wonderful effects on their profits, while simultaneously making global hunger worse and food crises inevitable.





  • [Homestead] He who controls food controls . . . ., Gene GeRue, 12/09/2008

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