CounterPunch April 24, 2008

In recent days, we have seen the rising price of oil and the devaluation of the dollar create two quantum shifts in the economy: the beginning of the collapse of the air travel industry and a global crisis of food-price inflation. These are related in ways that are crucial to understand — because we are seeing the outlines of an historic opportunity to change the terms of theory and practice for a politics of resistance. As air carriers have gone bankrupt, the knock-on effects on travel agents, airports, airport-colocated hotels, “package” vacation resorts, etc. are considerable. (Keep reading…)

April 28, 2008 The Nation

The only surprising thing about the global food crisis to Jim Goodman is the notion that anyone finds it surprising. ‘So,’ says the Wisconsin dairy farmer, ‘they finally figured out, after all these years of pushing globalization and genetically modified [GM] seeds, that instead of feeding the world we’ve created a food system that leaves more people hungry. If they’d listened to farmers instead of corporations, they would’ve known this was going to happen.’ Goodman has traveled the world to speak, organize and rally with groups such as La Via Campesina, the global movement of peasant and farm organizations that has been warning for years that ’solutions’ promoted by agribusiness conglomerates were designed to maximize corporate profits, not help farmers or feed people. The food shortages, suddenly front-page news, are not new. Hundreds of millions of people were starving and malnourished last year; the only change is that as the scope of the crisis has grown, it has become more difficult to ‘manage’ the hunger that a failed food system accepts rather than feeds. (Keep reading…)

The Nation May 12, 2008 edition

The only surprising thing about the global food crisis to Jim Goodman is the notion that anyone finds it surprising. “So,” says the Wisconsin dairy farmer, “they finally figured out, after all these years of pushing globalization and genetically modified [GM] seeds, that instead of feeding the world we’ve created a food system that leaves more people hungry. If they’d listened to farmers instead of corporations, they would’ve known this was going to happen.” Goodman has traveled the world to speak, organize and rally with groups such as La Via Campesina, the global movement of peasant and farm organizations that has been warning for years that “solutions” promoted by agribusiness conglomerates were designed to maximize corporate profits, not help farmers or feed people. The food shortages, suddenly front-page news, are not new. Hundreds of millions of people were starving and malnourished last year; the only change is that as the scope of the crisis has grown, it has become more difficult to “manage” the hunger that a failed food system accepts rather than feeds. (Keep reading…)

  Ottawa, April 17 2008.  The rush to get into biofuels production has ignited a major crisis for the planet.  This according to the Canadian and global farm leaders and agriculture specialists from around the world speaking across Canada April 28-May 1 at public forums entitled “Crops, Cars and Climate Crisis”.   The world is on the brink of a major food crisis, exacerbated by rising grain prices, seriously depleted food supplies, and land being used to produce ethanol fuel instead of food, the organizers say.  According to the UN World Food Programme, rising food prices are already causing conflict in 33 countries.    “Food-related clashes in Mexico, Haiti and the Philippines are clear signals that the world needs to wake up fast and deal with the problem”, says Pat Mooney of the ETC Group.  “We’re heading into a perfect storm without even an umbrella,” he says.  “Climate change, agrofuels and alarming food shortages are a deadly combination for the planet.  We’re going to see hunger and social unrest affecting hundreds of millions of people, at a scale not seen in decades.”    In Latin America, expanding soy monoculture is causing violence against farmers, and widespread human rights abuses.  “Where do companies get the land needed to produce agrofuels on a large scale?  In Colombia, Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina, people are being kicked off their land to make way for soy, sugar and palm oil plantations for agrofuels,” says Javiera Rulli, of Base Investigaciones Sociale, based in Paraguay.    “Farmers in our countries pay with their blood so that people in rich countries can feed their cars,” says Rulli.  The grain used to fill one SUV tank with ethanol could feed a person for a year.   “To grow biofuels, agricultural corporations are eating up forests and water resources at an alarming rate,” says Ditdit Pelegrina of the Philippines-based organization SEARICE.   In Indonesia and Malaysia alone, millions of hectares of forest have been cut down for agrofuel production. Forests are our biggest defence against climate change since they absorb carbon, says Pelegrina.   Lucy Sharratt of the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network sees agrofuels as one more way our food supply is falling into corporate hands.  “Corporations claim they can fix the failing dream of agrofuels with ‘second generation’ technologies, like genetically engineered crops and trees,” she says.  “Genetic engineering and synthetic biology will only add to the nightmare of corporate control and environmental risk.”  Corporations are pursuing GE trees for ethanol at a time when there is an international call for a ban on transgenic trees, says Sharratt.   Pat Mooney says we need a whole new framework in which to view agrofuels.  “Instead of speeding ahead with mandatory agrofuel targets, subsidies and tax breaks, we’re asking governments and corporations to put the brakes on agrofuels,” says Mooney.  “Where are the policies and incentives needed to help Canadians, the world’s biggest energy consumers per person, face the global reality?”   CROPS, CARS AND CLIMATE CRISIS:  PUBLIC FORUMS ON AGROFUELS: Monday April 28:  Saskatoon Monday April 28:  Charlottetown Tuesday April 29:  Halifax Tuesday April 29:  Winnipeg Wednesday April 30:  Ottawa Thursday May 1:  Montreal     GUEST SPEAKERS:    Wilhelmina “Ditdit” Pelegrina, Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives for Community Empowerment (SEARICE), Philippines Javiera Rulli, Base Investigaciones Sociale (BaseIS), Paraguay Soledad Vogliano, CEPPAS, Argentina Alberto Gomez, La Via Campesina, Mexico Peter Rosset, Global Alternatives, US and Mexico Ousmane Samake, COPAGEN, Mali Melaku Worede, USC Canada/Seeds of Survival, Ethiopia Marilyn Machado, PCN, Colombia Helena Paul, EcoNexus, United Kingdom Sharon Labchuk, P.E.I Coalition for a GMO-Free Province, Charlottetown, Canada Devlin Kuyek, GRAIN International, Montreal, Canada Darrin Qualman, National Famers Union, Saskatoon, Canada Pat Mooney, ETC Group, Ottawa, Canada   - 30 -   For more information, and to arrange an interview with speakers:   Faris Ahmed, USC Canada  613-234-6827 ext. 223; fahmed@usc-canada.org fahmed@usc-canada.org   Lucy Sharratt, Canadian Biotechnology Action Network 613-241-2267; coordinator@cban.ca coordinator@cban.ca Eric Chaurette, Inter Pares  613-563-4801; echaurette@interpares.ca echaurette@interpares.ca     Presented by: Beyond Factory Farming, Canadian Biotechnology Action Network, ETC Group, Inter Pares, Partnership Africa Canada, The Ram’s Horn, USC Canada, and many local partners.   FOR MORE DETAILS VISIT  www.cban.ca/agrofuels http://www.cban.ca/agrofuels
    (Keep reading…)

Georgia Straight
April 3, 2008

“This is the new face of hunger,” said Josette Sheeran, executive director of the UN’s World Food Programme, launching an appeal for an extra $500 million so it could continue supplying food aid to 73 million hungry people this year. “People are simply being priced out of food markets. We have never before had a situation where aggressive rises in food prices keep pricing our operations out of our reach.” (Keep reading…)

International Herald Tribune December 17, 2007

ROME: In an “unforeseen and unprecedented” shift, the world food supply is dwindling rapidly and food prices are soaring to historic levels, the top food and agriculture official of the United Nations warned Monday. (Keep reading…)

Winnipeg Free Press Oct 11 2007

AT the beginning of the summer, the National Farmers’ Union of Canada put out a press release that included the headline Global food crisis emerging. The release is scary reading. Based on early predictions by the United States Department of Agriculture on world grain supply and demand for the 2007-08 crop year, the NFU’s director of research, Darrin Qualman, broadcasts a dire warning that “we are in the opening phase of an intensifying food shortage.” (Keep reading…)