I recently came across this very gruesome and graphic article, after following a link in a post Robbyn made.
What was originally estimated to be a few thousand farmers, now recognized as 125,000, have killed themselves after getting into financial trouble growing GM crops. According to Monsanto, regardless of the problems of individual farmers, cotton yields have doubled in the last seven years and suicide is a part of life in rural India. So what’s the problem here?
The problem is Monsanto and other seed giants are promoting their products in a misleading way, leading farmers to expect larger yields and higher profits than are realistically possible. Farmers are also promised, or the suggestion is made in promotion of the products, that pesticides will not be needed, which couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact the GM crops grown by farmers often promote insecticide resistant pests, meaning farmers have to buy even more expensive insecticides than would otherwise be necessary. This leads to financial ruin of the farmers, who escape their debts by killing themselves.
Prince Charles of the UK, mentioned in the article, really deserves a lot of credit for drawing attention to the problem as well as setting up a trust fund to help impoverished farmers in India. Of particular interest to readers of this blog may be that Prince Charles is also an avid gardener and seed saver, who has also drawn attention to the loss of heritage crop varieties.
