Jul 30, 1998

DEVELOPMENT: GRAMEEN BANK ENDS TIE-UP WITH MONSANTO

Geneva, 29 July (Chakravarthi Raghavan) -- The founder and Managing Director of the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, Prof. Mohammad Yunus, has announced that the Bank is pulling out of its joint project with the agro-chemical and seed Transnational, Monsanto Corporation.  

Yunus founded the Grameen Bank to provide small credits for the poor and it became a pioneering effort that showed the poor don't default but pay their loans Its success generated a worldwide movement for micro-credit and it soon became a bandwagon on to which international financial institutions and private corporations based on maximising profit, have jumped.  

But the news of the joint project between Grameen Bank and Monsanto aroused concerns among several consumer and environment non-government groups.  

These were articulated by noted Indian ecologist and one of the founders of the international NGO group "Diverse Women for Diversity", Dr. Vandana Shiva, who in an open letter to Prof. Yunus, posted via internet, asked him to disassociate himself and his Bank from the joint project with Monsanto. The appeal attracted support from NGO groups in the North and the South, who appear to have sent faxes and emails to Yunus.  

According to media reports, Yunus announced that the Grameen Bank was pulling out of the joint project with Monsanto because of opposition from environmental groups.  

The environmental groups had become concerned that through the joint project, Monsanto would introduce genetically-engineered seeds into Bangladesh, by using the Grameen Bank's network of rural borrowers to market its seeds and fertilizers.  

While environmental groups welcomed Yunus's action and congratulated him, they seem to have become upset over the public relations job on this done by Monsanto, and a spokesperson at the bank, quoted by the English Language BBC world news.  

The Grameen Bank spokesperson appears to have side-stepped the core of the controversy, namely, the introduction of genetically-engineered seeds into a country reliant on rural small-scale agriculture, and making the impoverished rural peasantry dependent on seeds (and the needed fertilizers and pesticides) on Monsanto.  

Instead the bank spokesperson appears to have given as the reason for terminating the project, the Bank not having the administrative or managerial time to deal with 'the fuss' created by the NGOs.  

Monsanto, for its part, said this was an instance of "the MYTHS" perpetuated by critics having more influence than they deserved. This was why Monsanto has begun a mega dollar advertising campaign to tell consumers the "truth" about genetic-engineering.  

Monsanto and other agri-chemical companies undertaking genetic engineering and new seed 'varieties' with genes of one species implanted into seeds of other unrelated species, despite backings of governments for their corporations, have found themselves meeting increasing consumer and public resistance.  

Most of these genetically manipulated seeds have been created for their ability to resist herbicides that kill off weeds, or other qualities.  

Most of these processes use the e-coli or other such bacterium, as also some antibiotics.

This has given rise to concerns in sections of the medical profession that people allergic to particular plants and products, may find themselves imbibing some others containing the gene of the plant they are allergic to, and without their knowledge become victims, and even doctors might not be able to help them.  

Hence the demand from the public and consumer groups, and quite a respectable group of scientific opinion backs them, that the introduction of such genetically manipulated organisms (GMOs) or new genetically manipulated seeds shouldn't be allowed -- without extensive research and tests on longer-term effects. 

But the proponents argue that these GMOs and genetically-manipulated seeds etc are "safe", and that no causal effects have been proved.  

In this process and debate for high corporate profits, the entire Earth Summit and ecological concept of "precautionary principle" has been turned on its head by aggressive trade promotion tactics of the US and its corporations at the WTO, in insisting that trade restrictions should be based on "scientific" opinions.  

Before the Uruguay Round, developing countries finding their exports of agricultural and animal products restricted in industrialized world, on grounds of sanitary and phyto-sanitary conditions or technical standards, joined in writing WTO rules to safeguard their interests, and the view that restrictions must be based on scientific opinions.  

Instead of corporations putting new products on the market, asked to prove their safety and health effects, things have been turned around into corporations claiming products are "safe" and asking their critics to prove otherwise. 

And in some disputes, the leading industrial nations have taken the view that cent per cent safety cannot be assured, and so imports should be allowed, in the absence of 'scientific opinion'.  

But with industry now funding many such 'research' activities of scientists in academia and other institutions, and the publicly announced policies by heads of agencies of working closely with corporations and business, putting them under the ubiquitous 'civil society' label, there is a growing public distrust of such opinions, whether from corporations or the inter-governmental bodies, and from the UN system itself.  

Reassuring statements that international organizations and their officials -- some of whom make no secret of their efforts to promote general corporate interests -- do what the constituent member-governments ask them to do, is increasingly challenged, more so by the "new breed" of NGOs who are "professionals" and are experts in and read current literatures in economics, health and other 'specialised' areas where once the "views" of the system were accepted and conveyed to their constituencies.  

Press releases and announcements of 'reassurance' to the public, seldom identify the "experts" and their association or affiliation with corporations and business interests, and the scientific bodies that have refereed this "research finding".  

This has already led to problems at the ILO and WHO over asbestos-related 'safety' reports on health and at work-place which has come under strong criticism from public health experts at the US. 

And the opinions used in various UN specialized agencies to enable corporations to 'market' goods without establishing by independent scientific opinion public health safety issues and the precautionary principle, rather than statements such as health complaints not having been proved causally, has resulted in uneasy public and consumers rejecting whole-sale views from international organizations in such matters.  

This has forced European governments and the EC Commission for example to go slow on introduction of such 'seeds' and provide for labelling requirements, but because of industry pressure there is an unwillingness to push the labelling requirements not only for initial products, but the processed stages of products.  

Even more, health and safety exceptions are being sought to be undermined, firstly through the WHO-FAO Codex Alimantaire (where corporate expertise dominates) and the WTO's technical barriers to trade agreements which has similarly provided great reliance on the International Standards Organization (ISO) processes and standards.  

Contrary to what the name suggests, the ISO is not an inter-governmental organization. Not much attention was paid in the past to its work and standards, but with the WTO agreement and the ISO being often cited or used against consumer and public concerns, its activities have started to attract NGO attention, and not very favourably received.

And activities of major corporations like Monsanto and others in agri-chemicals, seeds and other sectors is now being carefully monitored.  

Corporations are trying to hit back through heavy advertising and "scientific research" funded by them.  

But this is creating its own reactions. The world may not be near another Luddite movement against science and technology, but it does not seem to be too far away either.