To Hell With The Gate's Foundation

[nosmokes]

Perhaps i'm being too harsh, but it seems to me that while bill may wish to do good and i imagine his heart is in the right place, his methods, at least in this case are most assuredly misguided. And this is not the first time that the gates fndn. has gone corporate over appropriate, technology wise.
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Monsanto vice president joins the Gates Foundation

* Monsanto vice president joins the Gates Foundation
By GM Watch
10/19/06
Straight to the Source

GM WATCH daily
http://www.gmwatch.org
Oct. 19, 2006
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1.Monsanto vice president joins the Gates Foundation - GM Watch
2.Want to work for the Gates Foundation? - Seattle Times
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1.Monsanto vice president joins the Gates Foundation - GM Watch

The Gates Foundation has hired Rob Horsch, Monsanto's vice president for international development partnerships.

As the piece below from the Seattle Times notes:

"The foundation... has hired... Monsanto vice president Robert Horsch, a scientist who led genetic engineering of plants at the seed giant. As senior program officer, Horsch will apply the technology toward improving crop yields in regions including sub-Saharan Africa..."

Horsch's most famous project for Monsanto was also a GM project for Africa. The GM sweet potato project was dreamt up by Horsch with his Monsanto colleague, Robert Fraley, and Joel Cohen from USAID. The three men then recruited Florence Wambugu to come to Monsanto and front the project for the company. Wambugu, incidentally, has also been involved with the Gates Foundation.
http://www.gmwatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=131

And Horsch's GM sweet poatato project really exposes the cras and misguided character of much of Gates' philanthropy, because in actual practical terms the project totally failed to deliver. (See 'Monsanto's showcase project in Africa fails', New Scientist)
http://www.gmwatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=2561
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complete article with links to other sourceshere

[Ellis Wyatt]

1. What am I missing?

Is it because the Gates foundation shouldn't hire anyone who has worked in corporate america? Is it specificially that guy or Monsanto or something?

Seems to me that any time you can get a captain of industry on the board of a company whose job it is to give money away to those less fortunate, it's a good thing.

[Warpy]

2. The problem is Monsanto and what they've done to GM crops

They've made absolutely certain that seed can't be saved for the next year's crops, more seed has to be PURCHASED at whatever Monsanto decides to sell it for.

Most of the third world and especially Africa survives because seed can be saved from season to season. Getting GM crops in there for a single year could conceivably put a farmer into debt for the balance of his life, as he'd have to keep purchasing GM seeds year to year. Because the GM crops would be cross pollinated with non GM crops, other farmers would see their seeds' germination rate fall. This could lead to widespread famine, not the abundance Monsanto promises from bigger yields from GM crops.

That's why it's inappropriate to have a Monsanto honcho on the board of the Gates foundation.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

4. Warpy...

If Monsanto doesn't want farmers to save those seeds, they make it clear when the farmers buy the seeds in the first place. Nobody's being forced to buy Monsanto.

[Warpy]

6. Read again about cross pollination

and try to understand: big agribusiness outfits in those countries will use GM seed.

Subsistence farmers will notice poor germination in seed as time goes by.

Famine.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

8. Yuh huh.

And with there Terminator gene, sooner farmers will be faced with armies of robots bearing striking resemblance to Arnold Swartzenegger.

:eyes:

[Ian David]

5. Then start a non-proffit organization that breeds open-source GM Crops n/t

[applegrove]

9. Well good that they can lead at least one expert in the "field" astray

and start building a green revolution for Africa. Cause it hasn't had one in about 60,000 years.

[AtomicKitten]

3. Gates is immunizing children against Rotavirus on a country-wide basis.

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2002/06/23/stories/2002062301180200.htm

I tend to be more lenient in my criticism of philanthropists.

[MrCoffee]

7. To Hell With Proper Punctuation!!11!