In Colombia they have been lobbying hard for the past 20 years or so and they are starting to see the genetically modified fruit of their labor. (pun intended)
It all started in the mid 90's with a huge contract to supply: glifosato aka Roundup® to spray large coca fields throughout the country. The outcome of this experiment has been a new super strain of Roundup resistant coca crop known as "Boliviana negra." A toxicologist, Camilo Uribe, who studied the coca, said: "The quality and percentage of hydrochloride from each leaf is much better, between 97 and 98 per cent. A normal plant does not get more than 25 per cent, meaning that more drugs and of a higher purity can be extracted."
In addition to this Colombia recently signed a free trade agreement with the U.S that introduced a law known as:"Ley 9.70" This law basically forces farmers to only grow food crops from semilla certificada (patented seeds) and guess which companies are supplying these patented seeds? Monsanto, Dupont and Syngenta. This is causing great financial hardship among campesinos as they can't afford to buy seeds every growing season and this has already resulted in peasant protests late last year which resulted in over 40 civilian casualties. As if farmers didn't have it bad enough being stuck in the middle of an armed conflict they now need to comply with this new law or disappear.
If you were genuinely interested in this subject you could do a little independent research of your own and you would see that Colombia is not an isolated incident by any means. Monsanto has been taking advantage of corrupt elected officials all over the developing world to maximize their profits.
In addition to this Colombia recently signed a free trade agreement with the U.S that introduced a law known as:"Ley 9.70" This law basically forces farmers to only grow food crops from semilla certificada (patented seeds) and guess which companies are supplying these patented seeds? Monsanto, Dupont and Syngenta. This is causing great financial hardship among campesinos as they can't afford to buy seeds every growing season and this has already resulted in peasant protests late last year which resulted in over 40 civilian casualties. As if farmers didn't have it bad enough being stuck in the middle of an armed conflict they now need to comply with this new law or disappear.
If you were genuinely interested in this subject you could do a little independent research of your own and you would see that Colombia is not an isolated incident by any means. Monsanto has been taking advantage of corrupt elected officials all over the developing world to maximize their profits.