Jeffrey Gogo Climate Story
AS hunger stalks the land, forcing Government to seek to import more than 700 000 tonnes of the maize to feed 4 million people, we find ourselves locked in that difficult situation again: to eat genetically modified foods (GMs), remain strictly organic, or eat both. The question is: What you would like to eat? At a time of food shortages, what choices, if any, are available to hungry consumers over the food they can or cannot eat? That choice is severely limited, am guessing that should have been your answer.
Indeed, empty stomachs tend to abdicate decision making to the giver, reluctantly. That giver is the Government, the global aid agencies, and the multiple individual and corporate groups that have been authorised to bring in maize or maize meal from South Africa, Zambia and elsewhere.
And herein lies the risk. Private organisations have in the past imported genetically modified maize from South Africa for food and processing with ease, contravening Government policy against GM foods. Authorities remain reasonably uncertain of the true impacts of genetically modified foods on human health and that of the environment.
By banning GMOs, Zimbabwe appears to be playing it safe, especially in an area that continues to be a subject of deep scientific conjecture. But that may be all that Government can do. In addition to its 700 000 tonnes maize import target, the Agriculture ministry has recently permitted nearly 70 entities and individuals to import 140 000 tonnes of maize meal mainly from South Africa, potentially opening the floodgates for GM food.
South Africa is not only southern Africa’s bread basket, but also Zimbabwe’s biggest trade partner, and one of a handful of African countries that have legitimised the production of genetically modified foods – those kind of foods produced from seed whose genes have been altered to build resistance against disease, supposedly.
Squeezed for cash, authorities here have sent out a $1,6 billion SOS to the world to help feed a quarter of the 13 million population that are at risk of hunger following a drought influenced by the El Nino phenomenon — the worst in 25 years.
While the 70 importers aim to spend $60 million buying maize meal for domestic consumption, the absence of clear and effective monitoring mechanisms will likely make it tough for Government to track all the food coming in for GM contamination.
And even when that food was found to contain traces of GMOs, it is highly unlikely that it would be turned back on that basis alone when millions of people are threatened with starvation, and according to UN agencies, 33 000 children are at risk of severe malnutrition.
In 2014 when some 1,5 million people were going hungry, three civil society organisations (CSOs) — GAPS, Louis Dreyfus and Toepfer International — brought in a combined 121 000tonnes of GM maize from South Africa without detection at border control.
Nothing has from ever since changed in terms of risk assessment to suggest banned GM imports will face increased tighter monitoring and restriction today, more so in a year of severe drought.
Now, with the current food shortages, a 50 percent deficit over the 1,6 million maize tonnes needed each year for food only, GMO crusaders have no doubt found ammunition. Evidence abounds Zimbabweans are already eating foods with traces of GMOs anyway, hunger or no hunger, they say — with some truth.
Weak capacity
Seriously though, we must question: should this be the time that authorities begin to consider a relaxation of the bio-safety laws on a very controlled basis; times of food scarcity where people, and even the Government itself, have little say over what enters the stomach?
It is difficult to imagine a situation where Government is going to allow the domestic production of GMs, and or imports, without satisfying itself with science-backed merits or demerits of a scheme that has been completely rejected by many of the world’s most advanced economies.
But the sad reality is that Zimbabweans have indeed been exposed to GM foods, and Government lacks the capacity to bring its anti-GMO law to effective implementation. Instead, it relies on the goodwill of private grain importers to play the responsible corporate citizen that upholds and respects Zimbabwean laws without the need for coercion.
This has not been the case, however. CSOs that have imported GM maize in the past did so with full knowledge of what it is they were buying, and with full knowledge of the national bio-safety laws banning genetically modified foods.
The South African authorities made it clear to the CSOs they were buying genetically modified maize. Regardless, they brought the maize still. Clearly, it is difficult for Government to control importers who use their own money to bring in food into the country without risking a complete cut off of that supply.
We wonder, though, whose interests the civil society organisations are serving when importing products they know very well to be banned not only in Zimbabwe, but also in their home countries in Europe.
Would Louis Dreyfus distribute GM foods in its native Netherlands, where such foods are outlawed, all in hunger’s name, for instance? Or Toepfer do the same in Germany?
There is little guessing such entities may as well be fronts for the global food movement led by US seed company Monsanto plc — the world’s biggest GM seed maker — and its acolytes, DuPont, Dow Chemical and Syngenta, to redefine Africa’s bio-safety laws and agriculture practices for private profit.
With Europe rejecting GMs, this unholy alliance is seeking to pressure African governments to legalise GM production by any means possible under the lie of boosting food production and food security.
Some studies endorsed by the World Health Organisation blame GM foods for causing various cancers, but GM seed companies have dismissed the assertions as unfounded. And while this chaos continues, what exactly are we going to eat in this drought, GM or non-GM?
I would really like know. Manufacturers and retailers can help by labelling their products clearly, what is and what is not GM-based food.
God is faithful.