Golden Rice: GM Silver Bullet that Misses the Target
Promoters of genetic modification (GM) in agriculture have long argued that genetically engineered Golden Rice is a practical way to provide poor farmers in remote areas with a subsistence...
Asia-Pacific Trade Deal: Trading Away Indian Agriculture?
Colin Todhunter On the back of Brexit, there are fears in the UK that a trade deal will be struck with Washington which will effectively lower food and environmental...
Bayer Shareholders: Put Health and Nature First and Stop Funding This Company!
Colin Todhunter Campaigner and environmentalist Dr Rosemary Mason has just written an open letter to Bayer Crop Science shareholders and Chairman of the Board Werner Wenning. She has also...
Pesticides in the Dock: Ecological Apocalypse but Business as Usual
It is worrying to think that, globally, sales of synthetic chemicals are to double over the next 12 years with alarming implications for health and the environment if governments...
GMOs: Magic Seeds and Broken Promises
Colin Todhunter Political posturing aligned with commercial interests means that truth is becoming a casualty in the debate about genetically modified (GM) crops in India. The industry narrative surrounding...
Offering Choice but Delivering Tyranny: The Corporate Capture of Agriculture
Colin Todhunter Many lobbyists talk a lot about critics of genetic engineering technology denying choice to farmers. They say that farmers should have access to a range of tools...
Sick to the Stomach: Pesticides and the Cocktail of Toxicity
Colin Todhunter Dame Sally Davies is the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) for England and recently released the CMO annual report for 2019. The report focuses on UK engagement with global health...
Life Expectancy Falters in the UK
Colin Todhunter A special report in the Observer newspaper in the UK on 23 June 2019 asked the question: Why is life expectancy faltering? The piece noted that for...
From Mad Cow Disease to Agrochemicals: Time to Put Public Need Ahead of Private Greed
Colin Todhunter The first part of this article documenting the development of BSE in Britain was written by Rosemary Mason and is taken from her new report ‘Why didn’t...
From the Green Revolution to GMOs: Toxic Agriculture Is the Problem Not the Solution
Colin Todhunter Why did the European Food Safety Authority claim that glyphosate was not ecotoxic? This is the question environmentalist Dr Rosemary Mason poses in her new 23-page report...
Illegal Bt Brinjal In India
Colin Todhunter What is the point in central government orders and carefully thought out regulatory norms if government officials and regulators act with blatant disregard? This is precisely what...
Post-Brexit Farming, Glyphosate and GMOs
The following is an edited and abridged version of an open letter recently sent by Dr Rosemary Mason to Michael Gove, the British Secretary of State for Environment, Food...
Bt Brinjal Illegally Growing in India: Who Is Really Pulling the Strings?
Colin Todhunter In February 2010, the Indian government placed an indefinite moratorium on the commercial release of Bt brinjal. Prior to this decision, numerous independent scientists from India and...
As the 2019 Indian General Election Takes Place, Are the Nation’s Farmers Being Dealt a Knock-Out Blow?
Colin Todhunter In 1830, British colonial administrator Lord Metcalfe said India’s villages were little republics that had nearly everything they could want for within themselves. India’s ability to endure...
India’s Agrarian Crisis: Dismantling ‘Development’
Colin Todhunter In his 1978 book ‘India Mortgaged’, T.N. Reddy predicted the country would one day open all sectors to foreign direct investment and surrender economic sovereignty to imperialist...
Capitalist Agriculture: Putting Soil on a Diet of Snake Oil and Doughnuts
Colin Todhunter In their rush to readily promote neoliberal dogma and corporate-inspired PR, many government officials, scientists and journalists take as given that profit-driven transnational corporations have a legitimate...
The Stomach-Churning Violence of the Agrochemical Oligopoly
Colin Todhunter As humans, we have evolved with the natural environment over millennia. We have learned what to eat and what not to eat, what to grow and how...
GM Crops & the Agrarian Crisis
Father of Green Revolution in India Rejects GM Crops as Farmers Demand Justice in Delhi Colin Todhunter Genetically modified (GM) cotton in India is a failure. India should reject...
India’s Farmers Plan Mass March to the Nation’s Parliament as Agrarian Crisis Reaches “Civilization Proportions”
Colin Todhunter With over 800 million people, rural India is arguably the most interesting and complex place on the planet. And yet it is also one of the most...
End of an Era: Big Agriculture and the Fall of American Dairy
J Birchfield The ongoing American dairy farmer debacle deeply bothers me, and every time I see another reference to it I’m forcing myself to think it through. Extra cheap...
