“This changes everything”–the line that Donald Trump stole from Naomi Klein (who referred to climate change, not emails) can only be authentically used in relation to one amazing news story this week: The front page Sunday NY Times article by Danny Hakim “Doubts About a Promised Bounty: Genetically Modified Crops Have Failed to Lift Yields and Ease Pesticide Use.”
Hakim confirms what Chuck Benbrook has documented for over a decade: herbicide use is increasing with GMO adoption not decreasing. This is in part because herbicide tolerance in weeds is increasing & being found in many more super weeds, and in part because of heavy-handed marketing by the agrichemical & biotech salesmen who claim that farmers’ workloads will be less and yields will be higher.
But as numerous studies document, farmers are worried that they are now addicted to a tech package that is decreasing not increasing their income. I noted this in a Des Moines Register op-ed over a year ago: those who are being hurt the most are farmers themselves, since they see few viable options that the ag industry has given them!
If you are concerned about such issues in Arizona, contact John Moffat of Pima County Economic Development through deseret.romero@pima.gov to ask that the Tucson Metro Area’s Pima County set up a citizen’s task force to carefully review the agrichemical industry’s purchase of land in the county that would be potentially granted a “subsidy of sorts” through being part of the international free trade zone in Tucson. Ask whether super weeds will be monitored around the site and how the siting may potentially impact Tucson’s status as a UNESCO City of Food Cultures for its 4100 year history of native desert agriculture!
Brother Coyote, OEF
