102/YOUR MONEY OR YOUR LIFE!
the seeds, the countries or local communities in question. For
example, a variety ofwild tomato was taken out of Peru in 1962, and
made S8 million per year for American canning companies thanks
to the variety's higher concentration in soluble solids. None of the
profit was shared with Peru, from where the genetic material
originated.
According to Vandana Shiva (Shiva, 1994), between 1976 and
1980 wild varieties taken from the South brought in S340 million
annually for the American agricultural sector. Wild seed varieties
have contributed some S66 billion to the American economy.
Since the beginning of the 1970s, agrochemical companies have
taken over more than 400 seed companies, mainly through the
toughening of legislation defending intellectual property rights.
MNCs work for homogeneity and uniformity through genetic
engineering, with the specific aim of dominating the markets. It is
easier for a laboratory-engineered variety of rice to be traded on
stockmarkets than for the innumerable strains of rice that correspond
to local conditions and tastes the world over. This is especially true
when the laboratory-engineered variety in question becomes private
property thanks to 'intellectual property rights'. It can then be the
object of a production monopoly, as can all its subsequent
generations. Indeed, a farmer who buys wheat seeds cannot use the
seeds from the harvest to replant for the following season.
Furthermore, the monopoly extends to an entire range of related
products. It is no coincidence, for example, that the only herbicide
tolerated by the variety in question is produced by the same MNC.
The thirst for 'captive' markets is so great that 'sterile' varieties of
seeds are created in order to oblige farmers to purchase a new batch
each year - since each batch loses its genetic characteristics with
each harvest. Thus, the circuit is complete: small farmers are no
longer producers and owners, but rather buyers and consumers.
They become slaves of patents and of the MNCs that hold them.
Property rights are said to improve the product and preserve bio
diversity. In fact, biotechnologies are used to harness properties that
have already been attained by nature - primarily in order to create
uniformity through the selective breeding of high-yield varieties.
Such uniformity is disastrous for crops. Plants become clones, all
share the same weaknesses. In 19 70-71, a rust infestation destroyed
15 per cent of the US's corn crops, whose genetic uniformity made