GMO in RP’s agriculture slammed anew

THE Pambansang Kilusan ng mga Samahang Magsasaka (Pakisama) said it firmly believe that Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) are not the solution to poverty and hunger, but rather a cause of more deprivation in the future.

“GMOs exacerbate these problems by, among others, increasing agro-chemical use among farmers (through herbicide tolerant GMO crops), aggravating insect pest immunity (through pest resistance GMOs), upsetting natural flow and evolution of biodiversity (through GMO contamination) undermining and threatening farmers' use of seeds (through application of intellectual property rights by corporations on GM crops), Pakisama said in a statement.

"The Manny Pacquiao Blog". Click here for stories and updates on the Filipino boxing champ.

Pakisama (National Confederation of Peasant Organizations in the Philippines), is a national confederation of small farmers, marginal fishers, rural women, indigenous peoples and rural youth in the Philippines.

The Asian Farmers’ Association for Sustainable Rural Development (AFA) meanwhile is a regional organization of nine national farmers’ federations from eight countries in Asia, representing more than 10 million small scale men and women farmers.

“We do not believe that GMOs will solve the problems of low agricultural productivity, low rural incomes and widespread hunger across the world, especially in developing countries,” Pakisama said.

Isidro Ancog, an organic farmer from Bohol, went on hunger strike during the second day of the 10th FAO international technical conference in protest the heavy bias of the conference towards the use of GMOs in agriculture.

“Most of the documents I have come across [in this conference] deal with genetic engineering, and for that, I have this feeling that this conference has defined biotechnology to zero in towards massive commercialization of GMOs,” said Ancog.