What happens when you inject fish genes into the chromosomes of corn? This is just one of many questions that new student group Wesleyan BioJustice seeks to answer.
Biotechnology awareness has increased in the United States in response to the development of the industry, in which plants and crops are genetically modified to produce greater yields.
“We’re looking to bring awareness to these issues, encourage participation, and encourage activism,” said Brian Brotman ’07, founder of Wesleyan BioJustice.
Although many negative issues surround the biotechnology industry, it does have positive aspects.
“On the one hand it’s kind of amazing,” Brotman said. “You can grow crops in a drought.”
But Brotman argues that biotechnology has not been used for such noble purposes as solving world hunger, despite claims to the contrary.
“It is a profit industry that relies on planting cash crops,” he said.
The Monsanto agricultural corporation is one of the major proponents of biotechnology. The company is infamous for its exploitation of farmers through deliberately selling only terminator seeds, or seeds that do not re-grow and thus need to be re-purchased the following season.
“Terminator seeds in Mexico have destroyed farming there,” Brotman said.
Though biotechnology can produce greater crop yields, it has been proven to cause substantial environmental degradation. As Brian Tokar, director of the Biotechnology Project at the Institute for Social Ecology in Plainfield, Vermont, argued in a Philadelphia Inquirer op-ed in June 17, 2005, the dominance of large-scale, cash crop monocultures over small-scale, sustainable organic farms has resulted in the need for millions of pounds of additional chemical pesticides.
Furthermore, according to Brotman, biotechnology has been known to uproot indigenous communities due to the clear-cutting of residential areas for large-scale agricultural purposes in many developing countries. There is also significant concern in the scientific world regarding the effect of genetically modified food on human health.
In order to raise awareness and generate activism surrounding for biotech issues, Wesleyan BioJustice members are organizing BioJustice Week on campus, which will take place from April 22 to 29. The event will coincide with Earth House’s Food Politics Week, and the two groups are working together to create a week devoted to environmental awareness.
The week will include the Global Farmers Tour, screenings of relevant documentaries, a “workday” at Long Lane Farm, and hopefully a visit from Tokar, a leading BioJustice activist and expert on the Monsanto corporation.
The week will culminate on April 29 with the visit of the Rising Tide Road Show, a collection of activists and performers touring the country in a bus that runs on bio-fuel. Members of the Rising Tide Road Show will discuss global warming and the close relationship between environmental and social justice. They will perform in WestCo and hold workshops in the Science Center.
The group is also preparing for BioJustice 2007, a weeklong conference in Boston that will celebrate sustainable foods and alternatives to corporate health care.
“Ultimately, we want to organize a Wesleyan-Middletown contingent for the BioJustice convergence in May,” said Harris Cooksey ’07, a member of BioJustice.
Brotman recently met with the Environmental Organizers Net-work (EON) to discuss Wesleyan BioJustice.
“It is really time for a massive movement against corporate bio-imperialism. What’s at stake is the survival of the planet,” he said at the conclusion of that meeting.
For more information on BioJustice 2007, visit www.biodeve.org
Leave a Reply