Probably the most famous environmentalist and farmer’s rights advocate involved in issues of GM and patented foods, Dr. Shiva, recently made a statement ahead of the G8 summit. Her main point was this:
“By protecting seeds und[sic] intellectual property laws, the G8 is encouraging the privatization of life, providing monopoly market access to multinational corporations and driving thousands of Indian farmers to suicide.”
In the last decade or so in India, about 150,000 farmers have committed suicide, currently at the rate of about 6 per day.
Patents on seeds and monopoly markets for their products, force Indian farmers into a cycle of poverty and debt. Faced with bankruptcy and repossession of their land by financial institutions, leaving them with no means to support themselves, farmers turn to suicide. Many farmers do this by drinking the pesticides they bought with the money they borrowed, usually leading to a slow and painful death for which there is little or no treatment.
