It is not only people that are bearing the brunt of biotech greed, though; the environment in South America is suffering tremendously as well. Sensitive ecosystems like the Amazon Rainforest and the Cerrado, a large and very fragile savannah, have been bulldozed in many areas to make room for more GMO soy. And there is no end in sight to this practice.
In Brazil, 1.2 million hectares of rainforest have already been leveled to cultivate GMO soy. And in Argentina, about 18 million hectares of land are now growing the crop, which represents more than half of the nation's entire growing areas. And all of the GMO crops, as well as many non-GMO crops, are regularly doused in highly dangerous chemical pesticides, which ruin both the environment and human health.
"In Brazil, the toxic and hazardous pesticides paraquat and endosulfan are still used," explained Jaime Weber, a friend of Geleano that works to promote sustainable and non-toxic organic agriculture in Brazil. "It is a myth that these are not used on GM crops. GM soybeans are sprayed just as much with paraquat [as non-GM]."
Paraquat is linked to Parkinson's disease and other neurological disorders (http://www.naturalnews.com/026177_P...) while endosulfan is known to disrupt the endocrine system.
"Both the spraying of conventional farming and GMO cultivation [pose] severe health risks to farm workers and those living around the fields," added Weber, noting that the large, industrial farms routinely violate safety standards and spray in irresponsible and dangerous ways because they know they can get away with it without penalty.
Unsustainable growing methods are causing desertification throughout South America as well. The land used to grow GMO soy is heavily burdened with rigorous chemical applications and is also overused. So much of it becomes infertile after just a few years, which leads growers to continually seek out new land while abandoning the old land. Eventually, there will be no more fertile land available.
No comments:
Post a Comment