“In Aug 2002 the vice president of Zambia provisionally turned down all imports of GM maize, even though nearly 3million of his citizens faced a pressing need. Zambian leaders had been importing GM maize as food aid for a number of years, but now they were refusing it, even in an emergency…. “the head of the local UN World Food Programme (WFP) implored the Zambian government to change its policy, but without success. WFP was thus obliged to begin removing from Zambia the GM food aid supplies it had delivered earlier, and in January 2003 this lead to an embarrassing incident when a mob of villagers in the town of Sizanongwe, 300 kms from the capital, overpowered an armed guard and looted several thousands of bags of food aid before it could be removed (IRIN News 2003)”. http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32014 “French news agency AFP reported that George Mpombo, the minister for the hard-hit Southern Province, said about 4,600 50kg bags of GM and non-GM staple maize had been stolen in Sizanongwe, 300km from the capital Lusaka. The starving villagers overpowered the lone police officer after word got out that the maize was to be returned to Lusaka, the news agency quoted him as saying.”

I think you are conflating differentissues : this issue is clearly about GE food; there was no opposition to the non-GM food. We would not be having this discussion if the food aid delivered had not been GM.

I am not claiming that direct deaths can be attributed to the refusal of the GM food aid, but there is a clear moral issue here: millions were hungry, possibly some under threat of starving; a complex logistical operation to distribute food aid was made a lot harder by refusing the food aid that was already in the country to people who were already hungry, apparently some of them desperate. You are clearly defending this viz “(it’s not a simple dichotomy of grub first, then ethics).” Since there are no scientific reasons to reject GM food aid (its the same food that American eat) this can only be for ideological reasons, a position I find indefensible and abhorrent.

Ever been hungry Tom? Ever involuntarily missed more than a meal or two, or not known where your next meal might be coming from?

“if it is delayed for any reason, some of them may very well starve to death.” I repeat, there is no evidence, or good reason to think that mortalities increased in Zambia. It wasn’t even technically a famine (it was a food crisis), despite your misleading images of people “starving” to death. Malnutrition in general across the country rose marginally in the previous year, but Unicef studies showed that malnutrition, in fact, decreased among the worst areas, and increased in the best areas. There was a surplus of certain crops which could have been locally procured. The GE corn was completely unnecessary and we shouldn’t even be having this debate if certain groups weren’t so self-interested.

“That doesnt make USAID perfectly moral either, but there are no good reasons for opposing GE.” There are plenty, but we are discussing the food aid and Africa here, it’s too big a debate and there are far more knowledgeable people than us around to have it.

“GE is a tool that should not be opposed because in Africa farmers need all the help they can get. ” Graham, correct me if I’m wrong but you studied sociology didn’t you? The only good thing I can see coming out of your unquestioning acceptance of the necessities and positives of GE foods is that hopefully you’re causing people whose only previous problem with them was that they’d seen them called Frankenfoods in the Sun to clarify their position. Surely you must get that hunger and malnutrition in Africa is SO much more complicated than just agriculture. By all means, let’s let them use GE if it’s wanted, appropriate, safe and necessary (that last one must be the major fallacy) but if your concern is hunger then please put your primary emphasis in other places than pushing inappropriate centralised technological fixes..

On the GE food aid. My knowledge isn’t perfect but it is something I’ll be looking into more, to get a clearer picture – During the Southern African food crisis of 2001, it wasn’t as black and white as “these governments (encouraged by international NGOs) stopped GE food aid entering their countries and therefore may have killed their own citizens”. All countries involved, excluding Zambia, came to a reasonable compromise agreement whereby the GE grain would be milled to prevent sowing, and thus distributed solely as a food crop. These governments had what would seem to them to be legitimate concerns for not allowing the crops in, primarily the long-term viability of their agricultural sectors were their domestic varieties to become contaminated by GE (it’s not a simple dichotomy of grub first, then ethics). Besides, supposed pressure placed on the governments by NGOs is surely only comparable to the pressure put on the same governments to accept the in-kind GM food aid. This is a bigger debate than can be carried out here but the GE aid should have been a non-starter anyway due to the potential for local procurement. Once again, USAID was unabashedly used as a political tool and to subsidise US farmers and enact corporate policy objectives, whatever the democratic rights may be of overseas states. Discussion of this food crisis misses the broader question of whether GE is necessary in the first place. The case of Southern Africa at the turn of the century is a prime example of where, instead of buying into the much publicised “need” for GE, less risky and contentious alternatives were subsequently explored such as diversifying crops and going back to varieties displaced by colonialism, which were much better suited than the omnipresent corn in terms of drought resistance etc. This, as well as the aforementioned local procurement. It could be a good idea to get your facts right on this issue if you are to attempt to assert that NGOs discouraging GE food aid had a role in increasing mortality in the afflicted countries. There is no evidence for this (seeing as your obsession is with rationality and evidence), and the country that actually did ultimately hold out against the GE corn (due to possibly justified fears, not just for its agricultural sector but also for the health of its undernourished populace) ended up receiving GM-free aid anyway.

It’s getting hard to escape the conclusion that civilisation (at least in its current multi-billion person manifestation) has run its course, and no amount of eco-tweaking is going to alter the trajectory our actions (however unintentional) have already determined.

If “going green” makes you feel better, fine, it’s a harmless, if irrelevant pursuit, and morally has much to commend it.

Graham, hope you’ll consider dual-posting over on Climatechange.ie on pieces like this (am currently reading ‘Climate Wars’ by Gwynne Dyer. So far, it’s a terrific read, and hope to post a review of same when completed).

The concerns about ownership of the commons and the role of corporations are important; Brand discusses these issues at length; he feels that the technology is already becoming rapidly decentralized, and he is also critical of Monsanto’s secrecy.

None of this tells us anything about the value or otherwise of the technology itself. These issues are relevant to all technologies- think of the all-pervasive presence of oil in our lives- they are not unique to GE.

I agree with Brand when he argues that the way to address these issue is to engage with the technology and with the issues. The opposition to GE is completely discredited by association with pseudo-science and ideologies; I find Brand convincing when he says that GE is best regulated from within the industry.

I have not yet seen any response from the anti-GE side on the issue of the US sending GE crops to feed the starving in Africa in 2001:

http://www.worldpress.org/Africa/737.cfm

This is a serious ethical issue; it would be good to see some reasoned debate around it.

@ Graham I agree on the point of pragmatism, as I said I’m an engineer and I think it goes with the territory, life and by extension technology and systems are never perfect you have to work with what you have. Otherwise you achieve nothing.

Personally so far I’m against GE as I see it as an opportunity for some companies to stitch up another part of the commons. With some reasonable checks and balances in place to limit the time for recovery on investment (five to ten years?) as well as no ownership of second generation seeds bred through conventional methods I’d reconsider. Again my issue isn’t so much based on belief but on concern based on the patterns of behaviour I see (quite close up) in multinational companies.

@ Andrew I agree 100% on broadening your mental map and on the importance of stories in this sorry if perhaps I wasn’t clear enough in my original comment.

@ Susan You say engineers are detail oriented and larger questions are not our speciality but in this case I have to defend my profession. I work in the scope of a problem defined, if this is fixing and problem with a hinge I look at the hinge, if it is a product system I look at that, if it is a factory or business I look at that, If it is a garden or home the approach is the same. You draw the scope, define the requirements and limits, find the controls and feedbacks and work from there. It’s not so far from Permaculture. Most people in the UK or America only come across engineers who work in a limited role because our business tend to have a very functional structure.