Coastal Post Online
MARIN COUNTY'S NEWS MONTHLY - FREE PRESS
(415)868-1600 -
(415)868-0502(fax) - P.O.
Box 31, Bolinas, CA, 94924
October, 2004
|
|
Vote Yes On Measure B
By Karen Nakamura
Congratulations are
in order for GMO Free Marin for getting Measure B, the ban on genetically
engineered organisms in Marin, on the November ballot. Get out and vote.
The latest blurb from the Organic Consumers Association (OCA),
(organicconsumers.org.) out of Minnesota and
connected to GMO Free Marin brings out the fact that organic foods are at a
crossroads. No matter the outcome of the presidential election, millions of
Americans from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to the Mississippi Bayous are
eating and demanding more and more organic foods. They are saying no to the
junk foods that have dominated their diets for the past fifty years. Farmers
from Arizona to North Carolina are cutting their pesticide use either out of conviction or
a need to sell their products. Europe and
parts of Asia are less than accepting of American
genetically altered foods.
According to the OCA. "In terms of organic food, demand is growing so fast
that most grocery items sold in North American and European supermarkets will
likely be labeled 'organic' within 20 years." The growth of the organic
food and holistic health sector suggest millions of consumers are starting to
realize their family's health is directly related to what they consume,
breathe, wear or apply to their skin.
The question that has arisen recently is how "organic" will these
products actually be? Already genetically engineered crops such as corn,
cotton, and soybeans, are contaminating fields and seed stocks of organic and
traditional farmers. Big corporations are lining up to buy out organic
companies and retail outlets and work with government bureaucrats to lower
organic standards.
"Congress doles out $25 billion a year to subsidize biotech and industrial
agriculture, while family farmers, who desperately need help to convert to
organic and sustainable practices, are getting next to nothing," says OCA.
"Most activists realize that global treaties such as NAFTA and the WTO are
designed to help biotech and industrial agriculture, while driving two billion
farmers and rural villagers from around the world off the land and into urban
slums.
"We need to meet up and move together, as a massive organic consumer bloc
and body politic, and change course. We need to raise significant funds and
raise mass consciousness. We need to reward the farmers, the organic companies,
and the politicians who are doing the 'right thing.'"
They urge supporting products and businesses established on Fair Trade and
sustainable agriculture, "putting your money where your mouth is," in
other words. And they urge us to vote in November to ban GMO in Marin.