Eat local, save the seed, and grow your own food

[Jeri Di Pietro]

One of our important common resources is seed. Seed is the basis of life and of our food supply. He who controls the seed, controls the food and controls the people. Unfortunately, in the 1990's, multinational chemical companies like Monsanto, DuPont, Syngenta and Dow, bought thousands and thousands of seed companies. This monopoly gives them enormous control of all the plant species.
Once they map the genome they can genetically modify it. Currently the only successful genetic modification on the market are seeds that are tolerant to agricultural chemicals that these companies produce (Round Up Ready), and seeds that produce their own pesticide as the plant grows (Bt). What makes them appealing to the chemical companies is that they can sell seed and pesticides as a package deal. This insures the sale of their chemicals. It does not feed the world nor help the farmer, consumer or environment.
When these GMO seeds are developed, they are patented and the plant and subsequent seeds produced,
are the patented property of the chemical company. Farmers enter into a contract, and they promise to not save the seed from the crops they grow, rather they must dispose of the seed in their fields and go back to the chemical company and buy more. The Monsanto seed police pay surprise visits to the farms and lay lawsuits onto anyone caught saving seed.
Hawai`i is the #1 spot in the world for the testing and development of this patenting of life. The permits to grow these transgenic food crops (corn, soy, sunflower, canola, wheat, rice, papaya and cotton) are granted from the USDA. Our state and county governments have no right to know where these plants are growing, nor the nature of the experiments. There is no assignment of liability when organic farmers get contaminated and lose their crops.
The unique thing about genetically modified plants is that by utilizing cell invasion technology, it is possible for biotech scientists to cross commodity crops with unrelated plants, with animals, viruses and even human DNA. Nature has put many measures in place to block the crossing of unrelated species. As we know, interspecies sex usually produces a weak off spring. Genetic engineering uses viral promoters (to turn on latent cells) and antibiotic resistance (as a marker to see if they got the DNA insertion into the host plant). Also, it is totally random as to where the foreign DNA lands within the double helix. God help us if it lands on a DNA sequence that is vital. God help us if it turns on cells that are better left off (like cancer).
These open air field tests are being conducted in the Hawaiian islands due to our remote location and year round growing seasons. Monsanto refers to our counties as a sacrificial zone, if things get out of hand, it won't effect the mainland.
That's the problem, but the solution is that communities are coming together to educate themselves and others, introduce local laws, and grow their own food.
While so many here dream of a self sufficient and sustaining system, it has been slow to start. 95% of the food locals and visitors eat here is shipped in from thousands of miles away. When the price of oil skyrocketed, food costs went up and people began to act. Concern over food sovereignty and security has jumped start our efforts to go forward.
We have begun our own grassroots community seed bank, and have free seed exchanges twice a year now. These events are simple, low cost and widely attended. We provide seed from our gardens, a venue, some informative speakers, and little envelopes. The people who attend bring seed if they have, but all are welcome to come and help themselves to whatever they can grow. The enthusiasm bubbles, as growers help themselves to free seed and plant material, and share stories with each other about their gardens. Some of each seed is banked for our future security.
It is a simple event, but has become an important part of our architecture of a new dawn for our little, remote islands. The awareness it promotes is huge. I call it my favorite event because it is a positive and empowering action (it balances out the protests and defeats at the state legislation). Better to be for something, than against something! It is hands on, people meet one another, and is not dependent on trying to match funds with a giant like Monsanto.
People always ask "isn't it expensive to live in Hawai`i?" and I always say no, not if you eat local. Neighbors share the abundance by dropping bags of citrus, bananas, avocados, mango on you doorknob!
As organic and traditional seed becomes harder to obtain, and in some cases illegal to possess (if it is cross pollinated with patented GMO varieties) we urge everyone to save seed, and grow food on your property. If you are not a grower, buy locally grown food to support the farmers in your area. Local grown food has more mana and less chemicals. Know your farmer and know where your food comes from. Eat healthy and be well. Change the world by caring for the soil and water. Minimize the pollution of shipping and packaging, and the reliance of trucking our food for thousands of miles. Local grown is fresh and it tastes better! Create the change we desire
Eat well, be healthy and malama `aina (take care of the land)
Jeri
hawaiiSEED.org

[Peace Portal]

I couldn't agree with you more!!! Kudos and thank you for this posting.
People need to start growing gardens at home where lawns are, getting together as communities to create public permaculture gardens, we must live sustainably because a natural law applying to our spiritual and mental aspects is that "the way you do one thing is the way you do everything."

This is why so much conflict and competition in the world, we are taught to compete as nations and teams, and states, and religions, and just every affintity possible - it's a competitive socio-economic system we live in, it's the "One Way" people are taught to perceive the world. Corporations like monsanto tell us what is "Right" - but we are becoming smarter than that, through global telecommunication we are finding the truth for ourselves; this is paralleling the Reformation instigated by the printing press, heralding the industrial age, since people could read the bible directly without priestly interpretation/intervention just as they may read the Internet today.

If we were more self responsible (sustainable) we'd grow gardens wherever we could, nourish seeds, share our passions in freedom from fear or reproachment. That day is upon us, come forth ye Bringers of the New Dawn, or whatever you call your Self - the horn has blown and you are called to action. Time is with us, the stars (horoscopic patterns) support us, and society cries for a change. For a short time the governments will try to bail out the Industrial Age complex/economic system, swimming against the tide of new Information Age socio-economic structures being formed, then in the end they will yield by joining together with the new systems for mutual benefit. Seeds, are that the basis of mutual benefit as food is the most fundamental need man must produce himself, without the seed you have no garden, no future, no hope.
Namaste