Unease among Brazil's farmers as Congress votes on GM terminator seeds
Source: The Guardian
Unease among Brazil's farmers as Congress votes on GM terminator seeds
Jonathan Watts in Rio de Janeiro and John Vidal
theguardian.com, Thursday 12 December 2013 15.39 GMT
Brazil is set to break a global moratorium on genetically-modified "terminator" seeds, which are said to threaten the livelihoods of millions of small farmers around the world.
The sterile or "suicide" seeds are produced by means of genetic use restriction technology, which makes crops die off after one harvest without producing offspring. As a result, farmers have to buy new seeds for each planting, which reduces their self-sufficiency and makes them dependent on major seed and chemical companies.
Environmentalists fear that any such move by Brazil – one of the biggest agricultural producers on the planet – could produce a domino effect that would result in the worldwide adoption of the controversial technology.
Major seed and chemical companies, which together own more than 60% of the global seed market, all have patents on terminator seed technologies. However, in the 1990s they agreed not to employ the technique after a global outcry by small farmers, indigenous groups and civil society groups.
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Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2013/dec/12/brazil-gm-terminator-seed-technology-farmers
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