Subject: Re: harpers article on agriculture

From: Victor Guest <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 22 Sep 1997 10:10:49 WST

>
>The October 1997  Harpers carries an article on page 13 by Davis Ehrenfeld
>which is excerpted from "A Cruel and Transient Agriculture"
>Here is a snippet-

 There is no doubt in my mind that the push to control food suplies was an
 engineered phenominom.

>--------------------
> The primary problem is that Green Revolution agribusiness requires vast
>amounts of energy to grow and sustain these "miracle crops." Oil must be
>burned to make the large quantities of nitrogen fertilizer on which these
>plants depend. Farmers also must invest heavily in toxic herbicides,
>insecticides, and fungicides; in irrigation systems; and in spraying,
>harvesting, and processing machinery for the weakened, seed heavy plants.
>Large sums of money must be bor rowed to pay for these "inputs" before the
>growing season starts in the hope that crop sales will allow farmers to repay
>the debt later in the season. When that hope is frustrated, the farmer often
>loses his farm and is driven into a migrant pool of cheap labor for
>corporate-farming operations or is forced to seek work in the landless,
>teeming cities. 
>---------
I represent this remark. What got me was interest rates driven up to 25%.
Farming numbers went down in Australia from 172,000 to 125,000 in 3 years.
These farmers I am led to believe now owe $18billion.(1997/90
My 5,000 acre farm was sold for $180,000 when in 1982 this property would 
have been valued at $720,000

> Excluding military spending on fabulously expensive, dysfunctional weapons
>systems, there is no more dramatic case of people having their needs
>appropriated for the sake of profit at any cost. Like high-input agriculture,
>genetic engineering is often justified as a humane technology, one that feeds
>more people with better food. Nothing could be further from the truth. With
>very few exceptions, the whole point of genetic engineering is to increase
>the sales of chemicals and bioengineered products to dependent farmers, and
>to increase the dependence of farmers  on their new handlers, the seed
>companies and the oil, chemical, and pharmaceutical companies that own them.
>---------

Read what Bill Mollinson has to say about agriculture in the opening address
 http://www.cowan.edu.au/~paustin/ipc6 for the proceedings of the 1996
               Permaculture Convergence on line.
 I haven't read it but I believe one Keynote speaker was from India and 
spoke on the disaster of the Green Revolution in India.

Two books which speak about this control are the Controversy of Zion by 
Gordon Reed, and the Protocols of Zion. from the British Museum.

Regards,
          Vic
--
Victor Guest   V.G.Guest                       Perth, Western Australia
[email-masked]                  11 Carew Place Greenwood 6024 
                ----: Sustainable Agriculture :----   Tel. (09) 2464674
--: The Land Management Society & The Permaculture Association:---
           --:http://www.eepo.com.au/permacul.html:--
                 -----: Men Of The Trees :------
           ------: Revaluation Co-Counseling :------
                -----: AAEE  and Greenteach :-----
                 http://www.eepo.com.au/~victor/
   http://www.cowan.edu.au/~paustin/ipc6 for the proceedings of the 
               Permaculture Convergence on line