Zimbabwe refuses GM food

The New York Times reports in U.S. Urges Zimbabwe to Accept Corn that Zimbabwe president Mugabe said “We certainly abhor sinister interests, which seek surreptitiously to advance themselves under cover of humanitarian assistance”. Whereas many see this as an ignorant refusal to take tainted GM food, I think the message is more that GM foods have such burdens of intellectual-property rights and patents that they cannot be accepted without spelling out the whole bargain. Many of the seeds from such foods cannot be re-used and simple acceptance of help of this type (which will benefit the corporations sooner rather than later, and will put the people in an even more subservient position) is to become subjugated even further.

The BBC also has GM dispute threatens famine relief which notes that “…aid agencies worry that the United States might not accept conditions being imposed on it donations”. This is, of course, a real concern, because history should have taught us by now that Mugabe, despite the fact that he is a despot, at least understands that the U.S. pretty much never gives anything without strings attached. The goal of most U.S. aid is to serve multi-national corporations, not the people to whom aid is being given. If help from the U.S. were need-based, why does Israel get $3 Billion, whereas all of Africa, the poorest continent by far, gets $300 Million? In fact, most foreign aid is given with explicit agreement to spend the aid on either specific corporations’ products or on specific loan packages, all of which amounts to a grand money-laundering scheme on the part of the U.S. government, with our tax money, benefitting large corporations and their board of directors. Don’t even ask, as a taxpayer, where your cut is. You’re to provide capital for these schemes without so much as a thank you.

This type of aid, sending GM foods, is even more insidious, because it truly looks like a helping hand. However, Mugabe is correct in pointing out that the aid comes with even more strings attached since the corn is actually intellectual property. This IP can be enforced to prevent farmers in an already starving country to not re-use seeds or keep crop from one year to another. It will also cross-pollinate with existing crops there, rendering it all actionable by U.S. law, as has already been held true in cases in the U.S.

As if Zimbabwe didn’t have enough food problems, Zimbabwe White Farmers’ Fate Uncertain on the New York Newsday talks about ongoing attempts by Mugabe to nationalize farming. Apparently most of the farm land in Zimbabwe is owned by 4000 white farmers/farming families. Again, Mugabe is trying to rectify a bad situation instilled by decades of colonial rule (namely that a tiny ruling elite controls the resources of an entire nation). Land reform is an important step in stabilizing the economy of a nation and keeping money locally rather than letting foreign landowners funnel profit to other nations.

However, in both these cases, though Mugabe has correcly identified two problems facing his nation (whatever his other despotic problems), his solution is too heavy-handed and quick and causing “half [of] Zimbabwe’s 12.5 million people [to] face a severe hunger crisis, according to the World Food Program”.