permaculture

[Lawrence London <lfljvenaura@gmail.com>]

On Fri, Sep 20, 2013 at 4:52 PM, Carolyn Anderson 
<cschampagne@gmail.com>wrote:

> Wow!  Yay Colombia!  I've posted the article on my facebook page to share
> the news around.  Do we, in the US, have the courage to implement this kind
> of pushback to the overlording pressure of Monsanto and other megacorps?
>  Perhaps it will take an act like that which happened in northern Colombia
> where the government stole and destroyed all the seeds saved by local
> farmers and implemented a law stating the government controlled all seeds,
> that no seed could be saved for any purpose, forcing farmers to buy
> patented seeds.
>
> Carolyn
>

My Facebook reply to a friend saying I might be naive regarding the power
of multinational corporations:

Not naive, just standing my ground as all my fellow independent gardeners
and farmers need to. I am fully aware of hypothetical collaborations of GS,
Monsanto & other biotech/chemical ag, private sector "nonprofits" and the
best government money can buy - dominate and control the food supply,
eliminate the competition: organic, sustainable, independent micro to large
gardens, small farms, family farms. This is NOT what I had envisioned at
the beginning of the natural/organic/sustainable agriculture movement. They
are as slick as lizard dung the way they have eroded our access to our fair
market share over the decades and they did it with plenty of help. They
began their magic with large farming, Earl Butz: "get big or get out" and
go into debt then face depressed market prices then go bankrupt. Then came
government takeover of organic labelling and certification, beginning the
process of undermining the entire independent natural farming community,
and it just goes on from there, the ones who are bankrolled (and corrupt)
control the marketplace, the rest have to struggle to survive even though
many if not most have committed themselves to a career of producing high
quality farm products; they do all the work and few hire any help.