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Conor · Joined: 15 Dec 2006 Posts: 21 Location: Lost in suburbia

Thats what the bastards are doing now...patenting life. Corporations are being allowed to patent and therefore control food, water, and even life.

I read that RiceTec, some dastardly US corporation a little while back received a patent for the Basmati rice species. Aside from the blasphemy of this, the patent will have repercussions that are expected to harm the economies of Pakistan and India considerably. If you care to read more into it, the link is here: http://www.american.edu/ted/basmati.htm

Another, called Asgrow, sued a farming couple from Iowa (and they have enough problems as it is) into the dirt for selling some of their soybean harvest to their neighbors as seed for the next year's crop.
The issue? The beans were grown from the company's seed that the couple had bought when they sowed their land.

It is not uncommon now to hear of seed companies that genetically engineer their seeds to fail to produce seeds of their own, forcing the farmer to buy again next year.

Not to mention that sequences in DNA are being patented now as well. I believe I read that since the sequences are technically "patent pending" they cannot be researched until the patent is approved or denied, which takes several years. Think of the losses to common medicine and biology! And it's all for the money, the money, the money...

The commons are being privatized! Sad

Money - it's a gas!

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wayland · Joined: 14 Dec 2006 Posts: 1171 Location: Campile. Wexford

A good rant Conor Very Happy

. You are right of course. What I find emoral is that good ideas are stifled by big buisness so they can sell their products. For example I believe that a pharmacautical lab discovered a cure for arthritis. The rights for this drug was brought by a big drug company and they did nothing with it. The reason was plain to see. The got such a good revenue from their pain relief drugs that they want things to stay as they are. So people suffer for the sake of profits. I wounder how many other good ideas are held in company vaults just for the sake of their balance sheet.
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Conor · Joined: 15 Dec 2006 Posts: 21 Location: Lost in suburbia

It's probably better that we don't know... Sad

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Luke · Joined: 10 Apr 2007 Posts: 11 Location: Waterford

Its horrible stuff alright. I've been eagerly trying to get hold of as much heirloom seeds for the garden this year so as to avoid the non hybrid gm'd ones.

Monsanto are another evil one in the states. There the folks behind roundup weedkiller. Some of their 'patented' crops blew into a farmers neighbouring field and grew. So they took him to court and won his whole farm. Rolling Eyes

Moonwaves · Joined: 14 Dec 2006 Posts: 80 Location: Dusseldorf

This is one of my pet hates but to be completely honest I'm a bit scared to look into the whole area any further because it's all so scary! I hadn't heard those two names you mentioned, Monsanto are the company I've heard most about. I wonder if it's really true that they have a team of at least 75 lawyers working just to find and prosecute people like that poor farmer whose ordinary produce was contaminated by blowins from their GM crops down the road and then got sued for patent imfringement.

I'm going to make a big effort to collect as much seed as I can from what I grow this year. I've bought a few heirloom varieties and most of my seeds came from the Organic Centre this year.
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chook · Joined: 14 Mar 2007 Posts: 305 Location: North Clare

Good rant, Conor.
@all
Do you know the documentary "The Future of Food"? http://www.thefutureoffood.com/
We showed it at the Kilfenora Organic Fair in October 2005. RTE (finally) picked up on it and aired the documentary late last year or early this year, can't remember. Sparked some bile-spitting response in the Irish Farmers' Journal (in our household known as "The Agricultural Warfare Journal"). The documentary can be bought on DVD and a relatively cheap licence for showing in your community or at events is also available.

For some positive action, you could help/join the Irish Seedsavers Association www.irishseedsavers.org and/or support GM-Free Ireland http://gmfreeireland.org/. Also, check the labels of your animal feed. Most non-organic pellets/nuts contain GM maize and soya, maizemeal/parrata is likely to be GM. GM-rapeseed is also used in livestock feed. Tell your feed suppliers how you feel about the stuff and ask them for alternatives. Morrins organic feed is now being distributed by Red Mills and should be available on request from almost any creamery and feed merchant in the country.

chook