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Vandana Shiva on Seed Saving

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Permalink Reply by Sentient Biped on August 29, 2012 at 10:39am

Joan, thanks for posting.

For some reason the link didn't work for me, so I googled. Maybe it's this one? Vandana Shiva?

"The desire to save seeds comes from an ethical urge to defend life's evolution" says Vandana Shiva, activist, author and scholar.

150,000 farmers in India have committed suicide in areas where seed has been destroyed...where they have to buy the seed every year from Monsanto at a very high cost"

Is that true - 150,000 farmer suicides? It's a mind boggling number!

This year I'm doing more seed saving than in previous years. Seems trivial compared to worldwide food issues, but it's something I like to do. My yellow wax bean seeds are dry now, and some snow peas. Also some chives and garlic chives. Not seeds, but I save starts of multiplier onions and garlic, which I've been doing for a decade. Since I replant the ones that do the best here, and they seem to be getting bigger, maybe there is some somatic mutation involved for adaptation. I don't know about that.

My attempt at getting garlic to bloom failed. Always experimenting.

In the past I saved tomato seeds. Maybe I should this year too. My varieties are not super-unusual but the Lemon Boy and Cherokee Purple are very good open pollinated varieties. I don't have tomatoes widely separated so the varieties might wind up as unintended hybrids. Not a prpblem for me, but obviously not wanted in any seed savers exchange.

I also saved some plum seeds and have one growing that was sent by another member. The growing one is a native American plum the size of a sweet cherry. If it's like the ones I've tasted here, it's quite tasty. I will try to help it survive the winter, then plant it in the ground in the Spring.

Then there's the many ginkgos I've grown from seeds. I'll collect more this year.

I also saved some flower seeds. Most of those are hybrids I'm playing with creating - Daylilies and Bearded Iris.

Thank you for inspiration on this topic. This is the perfect time of year to get going on saving seeds.

Permalink Reply by Joan Denoo on September 3, 2012 at 11:05am

Yes, I agree,

Permalink Reply by Joan Denoo on September 3, 2012 at 11:15am

Farmer Suicides Rising in India as GM Bt Cotton Crops Fail

"The record suicide rate among farmers in India continues to rise, with one farmer now committing suicide every 30 minutes. Many media reports blame failed GM Bt cotton crops for the crisis.

"More than a quarter of a million farmers have killed themselves in the last 16 years in what is the largest recorded wave of suicides in history. An article for Sky News reports that one farmer who committed suicide "had been persuaded to use genetically modified seeds by the possibility of a better harvest. What he wasn’t told was that they needed more rain than the region provided."

GMO, India suicide funeral pyre

Permalink Reply by Sentient Biped on September 4, 2012 at 9:59pm

Too horrible. If the Monsanto execs know that their policies and products have led to 150,000 suicides and they can still sleep at night, then they are not the same Homo sapiens that I am. How do they sleep?

Permalink Reply by Tonya Wynn on October 10, 2012 at 2:34pm

Could it be a few greedy sales people and not the co. itself? There will always be some cropp failures. Diversify.. grow a bit of this and that.

Permalink Reply by Joan Denoo on October 10, 2012 at 4:21pm

Tonya, these were not crop failures due to natural causes. Monsanto sold treated seed, it required more water and fertilizer and the seeds had to be purchased each year because they were not able to act as new seed stock. When the treated seed came into bloom, pollen drifted by wind or insects to fields with untreated seeds and those heritage seeds became pollinated by Monsanto pollen and Monsanto sued and won from those farmers. Not only were farmers who planted Monsanto seed but also farmers using heritage seeds were bankrupt. Whether Monsanto knew that before selling the seed is deniable. All in all, Monsanto bankrupted those farmers, not weather or poor farming techniques or lack of water or lack of good soil. The farmers had no options.
Vandana Shiva has been reporting about this for at least five years; I shall try to find an old video of her interviews with farmers, but it was a long time ago.

Permalink Reply by Joan Denoo on October 10, 2012 at 4:27pm

Vandana Shiva on Farmer Suicides, 2006

DECEMBER 13, 2006

"VANDANA SHIVA: Indian farmers have never committed suicide on a large scale. It’s something totally new. It’s linked to the last decade of globalization, trade liberalization under a corporate-driven economy. The seed sector was liberalized to allow corporations like Cargill and Monsanto to sell unregulated, untested seed. They began with hybrids, which can’t be saved, and moved on to genetically engineered Bt cotton. The cotton belt is where the suicides are taking place on a very, very large scale. It is the suicide belt of India."

The video is no longer available, but the transcript is there.

Permalink Reply by Joan Denoo on September 3, 2012 at 12:01pm

Chicken Poop

A nice homey video of making chicken poop compost. Not rocket science, but then most things we do and need to do are simple.

Permalink Reply by Idaho Spud on September 3, 2012 at 4:34pm