food

WHY do millions of people in the world suffer or die from lack of food, when the earth produces more than enough to feed everyone?
DOES the way we rear farm animals lead to unnecessary cruelty, disease outbreaks, and unhealthy, dangerous food?
WHAT happens to the millions of tonnes of chemicals that are used every year on the world’s farms?
DID there used to be less cancer and heart disease, before people began eating processed foods?
HOW long will it be before all our foods are genetically engineered?
HAVE you got any idea of what chemicals are winding up in your food, and what effects they may have on you?
IS there more to the solution than eating organic food?
WHO decides that we should have more and more large industrial farms producing standardised food, and who profits from this?
WHERE is most of the food we eat grown? Locally or thousands of miles away? Does it matter?
WHICH is the best option for people in Africa, Asia and South America: producing “cash crops” for export, or food for themselves?
WHEN was the last time you planted a seed, or ate freshly picked fruit and vegetables?
“Nature has enough to sustain us all, but nothing to satisfy the greed of a few.”
Gandhi

Who is this ‘Cargill’ company that has control over my food, anyway?
Never heard of Cargill? Not surprising really, though they shape the future of agriculture and what we eat around the world.
They are the biggest seed trader, 3rd biggest food & drink company in Europe, and dominate in food processing and other ‘invisible’ markets between farmer and shop-shelf. They are the biggest privately-owned company in the world; they pollute, exploit workers & farmers, control and price-fix. They aim to be the biggest and therefore most powerful; they make governmental policies, and push globalisation.
Cargill have been trying to establish themselves in India, where there is still much self-sufficiency, trying to push hybrid sterile seeds to farmers there, with aggressive and glossy lies. This would mean less crop, more vulnerability to pests, and that farmers would be dependent on them, and would lose their traditional knowledge and skills.
Indian farmers are reviving forms of struggle and protest dating back to the Indian independence movement, using non-violent direct action to break the unjust system. Farmers have repeatedly destroyed Cargill seed plants and have occupied Cargill offices, taking all the materials like the company documents and the seeds and having a bonfire in the street.
When a United States trade representative said they would use “crowbar tactics” to open up the Indian market, the farmers responded saying “we will use crowbar tactics”. And they pulled down every brick of Cargill’s building. The farmers do not attack or hurt anyone. All they are doing is destroying what is threatening their survival, and they’re not backing off. They will not stop their actions until Cargill leaves India.
Meanwhile in Liverpool, where all geneticallly engineered (GE) soya coming into Britain goes through Cargill’s mill, there was recently a week of actions & public meetings exposing their role. Their plant has been occupied before, and their grain silos marked with a huge X, as contaminated by GE.
Cremate Monsanto

This GE giant has been targetted many times in Britain, with offices occupied, phone & fax blockades, crop squats presenting alternatives and so-called ‘test’ fields decontaminated. Indian farmers again tried a very direct approach – uprooting & then burning fields of genetic crops. Their advice to potential investors in the biotech market: “YOU SHOULD RATHER TAKE YOUR MONEY OUT BEFORE WE REDUCE IT TO ASHES.” Similar actions, including the storming of research stations, have taken place in Brazil, the Phillipines, Bangladesh and many other countries where farmers’ and peoples’ movements of millions of people have united to defend the future of global agriculture and what we eat, and their very lives.

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For more background info on Cargill & others visit: www.corporatewatch.org.uk
To get actions going/get involved locally, Manchester Earth First!, 0161-226 6814