|
U.S.-dominated "free trade" has decimated local food production, in South Korea, Mexico, Jamaica and other places. That's what its aim is--to undercut the price of locally produced, fresh food, by dumping U.S. corporate ag imports on the market. And that includes not just beef, but also dairy, wheat, rice, vegetable produce and other foods. Many South Korean small farmers have committed suicide, because their way of life, and their living, have been destroyed. Families and communities have been destroyed. Small farmers' ability to pass their farming skills to their children has been destroyed--skills that have sustained the country for thousands of years--gone in less than a generation. This is not really an isolated political issue. It is tragedy. And not just for Korea, but for the world--because it is happening in so many places.
Mad Cow and other problems with globally transported food, of course, is a globalisation issue. How do you know what it is in food that has come half way round the world? But food globalisation is a much bigger economic and environmental issue--in South Korea and elsewhere--than just potential diseases and toxins. It is an assault on the world's food chain that could wipe the human race off the face of the earth. When you destroy local farmers, and a country's food self-sufficiency, you are laying the foundation for catastrophic starvation. When you infuse GMO crops into a local economy, and into a local ecology, you could well be creating the Irish potato famine, writ large. Small farmers are conservative by nature. They save seed. They cherish and foster biodiversity. And they are accountable, locally, for the qualities of their food. Rip this system apart--and you not only destroy specific lives and businesses and family and community traditions--you seriously endanger whole countries and all of humanity.
---
On another issue, AP reported the June 11 protest at 80,000 (which means 160,000). The NYT is now saying that the protest has "dwindled." But that's not how it works. You can't keep 160,000 people in the streets for weeks and weeks. What happened in Seattle '99, for instance, was that 50,000 people marched on one day, then, a day later, 10,000 people, committed to civil disobedience, shut down the WTO by a peaceful sit-in in intersections. It's not that the 50,000 weren't with the 10,000 in spirit (and often in support). They were. It's that people with kids, people with jobs, people who are caretakers, elderly people, people who had traveled long distances to get there, people with farm animals and farms, people too poor to rent hotel rooms, etc.--lots of people can't just stay and keep protesting. It's all they can do to get to the big march and get home. To say that the protest has "dwindled" is a fundamental mis-characterization of what is occurring. But the NYT, of course, couldn't give a fuck if poor people have nowhere to stay Seoul, or don't have a limo to get them home. "Dwindling" is what the NYT desires, for the world's poor. Pay U.S. corporate ag for beef--at the risk of Mad Cow, hormones, superbugs, heart disease, and the end of South Korean food production--and then "dwindle, peons!"
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
