8/2/2019 Loosing Control of Our Seed Supply
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Loosing control of our seed supply
When Jared Diamond wrote Collapse he explained the reasons for
the downfall of almost every civilisation from Greeks to the
Romans, the Incas and more recently the Easter Islanders, was
caused by the impact ofoverpopulation on soil fertility. But a new
documentary on Apple Movies, also called Collapse, is a
frightening
prediction of economic and population collapse which will be
caused by the depletion of oil supplies.
Our recent dependence on oil is a major contributor to a rise in
population from 1 billion to our current levelof 6.5 billion in
just 110 years. The former CIA operative who wrote the script shows
a really scary graph ofthe rise of population and the exploitation
of oil. Of course now that we are beyond Peak Oil the
inevitableconclusion is that population will collapse in
conjunction with the dwindling supply of oil. (The CIA view is
thatthe US was so concerned about falling oil reserves that the
Republicans installed a puppet president George W.
to respond to the real power behind the throne - oil man Vice
President Dick Cheney. This explains George Wsstrategic decision to
move the focus of the 9/11 war from Afghanistan to oil-rich Iraq.)
The shattering conclusionof the lm is that the population collapse
will take rich Western countries back to the Dark Ages. His
concludingadvice is to stock up on seeds and gold!
Had the Americans not had such a blind spot for Castros Cuba
they would have realised that whilst cheap oiland cheap food are
inter-connected the collapse of population is not necessarily
given. The Cubans rejectedglobalism and became self sufcient in
food when their source of cheap oil was cut off after the collapse
of theBerlin Wall in the 1990s. Forced to grow food without Russian
oil, or fertilizers, or pesticides and global hybridseeds, Cubans
took over disused building sites, replaced tractors with horses,
recycled the manure, replacedhybrid seeds with farmer-saved seeds
and in a few years the capital Havana produced 60% of it food,
80%which is organically grown! (I doubt Melbourne or Sydney grew
more than 1% of their food within city limits!)
Oil is a global commodity that fuels our tractors and
semi-trailers allowing our food to be grown on huge
distantmono-culture farms and shipped across the world at the cost
of climate change. Cuba found a way to be not justself sufcient in
seeds but to be as energy independent as it is politically
independent.
Australia is totally dependent on global seed companies for up
to 95% of our vegetable seed supplies. Monsantowhich controls 90%
of genetically modied crops around the world has also acquired the
worlds largestvegetable seed company, Seminis, and the worlds
largest breeder of Glasshouse crops. Australia is so
totallydependent on overseas companies for supply of seeds that
when the looming food crisis happens then we are in aweaker
position than Third World countries like India and Africa whose
farmers have saved seed for replanting.
Global seed companies like Monsanto and Syngenta have in the
space of twenty years almost total ownershipof our food supply
either by patent on GM crops or by restricted re-sowing of F1
hybrid seeds. Our cargo cult
mentality has led to seed serfdom encouraged by our ignorant
government administrators.
In the lm Collapse we are urged to buy up seeds or gold. What
isnt explained is that many of these hybridseeds are now more
costly than gold and there is only one source global seed companies
like Monsanto.
Didnt you know that when you lose control of the seed supply you
lose control the food you eat?
By Clive Blazey
First published in Diggers Summer Garden 2011
www.diggers.com.au
