Roundup is the herbicide this company makes and has become widely, more than widely used. Everybody should know it’s name. We should know better. In the United States there is a cancer epidemic among farmers, due to exposure to such chemicals as Roundup.
In India, the chemical have destroyed the ecosystem to the point where even the trees don’t make fruit anymore because heavy use of pesticides caused the extinction of pollinators as bees and butterflies. Dr. Vandana Shiva is an Indian environmental activist who works on exposing all the damaged caused by Monsanto. Apparently, this company already “owns” 70% of the world’s food. We don’t get our food from God and nature anymore, see? We get it through the grace of Monsanto.
Dr. Vandana Shiva shows that in Punjab (but also in Warangal, Andhra Pradesh) there is an epidemic of farmer’s suicides because they cannot support the cost of the seeds and pesticides on which their crops have become dependent and more scary, because of ecological breakdown of water and soil systems. It was called The Green Revolution in the ’60. It was aimed at large crops of rice and wheat. And it gave that. For a while. Now, after 50 years, it’s resulting in desert lands and despair, because it was not sustainable in any way, financial or ecological.
In the United States, “cancer morbidity and mortality investigations have documented excess rates of specific cancers among agricultural workers. These cancers include non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, soft tissue sarcoma, leukemia and Hodgkin’s disease, multiple myeloma and cancers of the lip, stomach, skin, prostate, brain, testis, and connective tissue. The occurrence of such cancers has been investigated using death certificate and case control designs, among a variety of agricultural workers and across several geographic regions of the U.S. in addition to nine other countries. Excessive and repeated exposure to pesticides is one of the etiologic factors hypothesized to contribute to these increases in cancer incidence among farmers.” From Perceptions of pesticide associated cancer risks among farmers: A qualitative assessment
What else can I say? There is too much. Should we be scared? I am. I will be starting to save the so-called “heirloom” seeds starting this year. I also have to urge everybody to watch the documentary The World According to Monsanto – A documentary that Americans won’t ever see, by French film-maker Marie-Monique Robin. It is world-blowing. “We cannot afford to lose one dollar of business” – Monsanto. Human lives are not worth one dollar for them. Let’s keep believing and buying into it. Right?
If you are interested to find out more, Watch “Dirt! The Movie”, a heart-wrenching documentary about the destruction of soil and the fate of farmers.
