Stop GMO Corn in Mexico… Again! – Mexican Court Overturns Biotech GMO Ban

2nd September 2015

By Jack Adam Weber

Contributing Writer for Wake Up World

If you’ve been to Mexico, you know how incredible the food and culture are. I grew up part-time in Mexico and have returned many times since, for the beauty of the land, the people, the culture and the food. Much of this food culture revolves around corn, or maize, as it is technically called. But corn does more than feed people. It’s part and parcel of Mexico’s way of life.

Mexico is the cradle, the birthplace, of maize. Thousands of varieties have been cultivated over thousands of years by indigenous and traditional Mexicans. Many of these varieties are specifically adapted to thrive in Mexico’s varied landscapes — far more effectively than the one or two genetically modified varieties that stand to wipe out this millennia-long heritage.

However, after years of staving off the proliferation of GMO corn in Mexico, we’ve just received news of a devastating blow to the protection of everything beautiful connected with Mexico and this culinary legacy. After intense lobbying by biotech companies of Monsanto, Dow, and Dupont, Mexico’s twelfth District Court just overturned a 2013 ruling which, until now, has prevented the chemicals giants from planting GMO maize in Mexico.

Mexican Court Overturns GMO Ban

In 2013, the biotech companies had hoped to plant an unprecedented 6,000,000 acres of GMO corn, with over 3,500,000 acres of this expected to be Monsanto’s herbicide-tolerant maize (Mon603). But we the people stopped that. But now the ban has been lifted, and even more GMO foodstuff stands to be seeded in Mexico, “the cradle of corn.” We can’t let this happen — for the corn, for the indigenous and other Mexicans, for us, and for the natural environment that is devastated time after time by toxic, monoculture GMO “farming.”

Most of Mexico’s corn is produced by small farmers (read: “poor”) who protect the biodiversity of corn through local seed exchanges and generational selective breeding, as they have nurtured for over 7,000 years. However, with GMOs introduced into the food chain, science shows that cross-contamination of GMO with traditional varieties of maize is inevitable, thereby eventually causing a wholesale contamination of Mexico’s indigenous and heirloom corn varieties. In fact, prior to the 2013 ban, GMO strains already contaminated some traditional corn strains.

If this ban is lifted, it means that many Mexicans farmers may soon find themselves in the same trap that we know so well in the United States: they can be found liable for patent infringement for inadvertently growing GMOs. In the words of Silvia Ribeiro, ETC Group’s Latin America Director:

“It would be a monumental injustice for the creators of maize – who have so benefited humankind – to be obliged to pay royalties to a transnational corporation that exploited their knowledge in the first place.”

The 2013 ban will not be lifted until the appeals have been heard and decided upon. In other words, we still can win this, as we have in previous years. And we need your support to do it.

What Can You Do?

Supporting the 2013 ban on GMO maize in Mexico, GMO Eradication Movement (“GEM”) created a petition via Avaaz that was eventually sent to all of Avaaz’s members in Mexico, where it gained almost 50,000 signatures. This petition, along with petitions and protests from other activist groups, were delivered to the Agricultural Cabinet of the Mexican government. As a result, the GMO corn plantings were halted for the next year. We have now revamped this petition to forces with other groups working to protect Mexico’s astonishing biodiversity, and to rally against the blasphemous decision by the Mexican courts.

• Please show your support by signing and sharing the petition to Mexican President, Enrique Peña Nieto. If you share it, please add a few words to introduce the post, such as, “Help Stop GMO Corn in Mexico!”
• Also, please remember not to eat or buy GMO foodstuffs. For an easy step-by-step guide on how to avoid GMOs in your food, click here.

Thank you for your care and passion to help stop corporate gangsters from taking over what’s left of our beautiful world and our food supply, and thank you to the wonderful people and land that is Mexico! Together we will win this battle … again

For more information, please join us here:

• https://facebook.com/pages/GMO-Eradication-Movement-GEM/317544958304228
• https://secure.avaaz.org/en/petition/Stop_Monsanto_in_Mexico/?tqdqIdb

Previous articles by Jack Adam Weber:

• Arrogance in Relationships: How to Deal With and Heal It
• 11 Reasons Why Hippies (Not Psychos) Should Rule the World
• The Monsanto Years: Singer Neil Young Rips Into GMOs, Big Biz and Conformity
• ReVOLUTION: When Enough is Enough
• Sex – Truth and Dare, Pleasure and Purpose
• Relationships: The Costs of Staying When We Should Leave
• Emotional Work
• Yin Yang — Ancient Wisdom for Personal and Planetary Transformation
• 11 Crucial Tips for Better Digestive Health
• Heartbreak – Loving Ourselves Through Difficult Times

About the author:

Jack Adam Weber, L.Ac. is a Chinese medicine physician, author, celebrated poet, organic farmer, and activist for body-centered spirituality. He is also the creator of The Nourish Practice, an Earth-based rejuvenation meditation. Weber is available by phone for medical consultations and life-coaching.

You can connect with Jack Adam Weber at:

• Facebook: Facebook.com/JackAdamWeber
• Twitter: Twitter.com/JackAdamWeber
• Email: [email protected]

The Nourish Practice

Jack Adam Weber’s “The Nourish Practice” is an easy, guided meditation-Qi Gong practice in radical gratitude and self-love. It is an Earth-based, body-centered practice — at once physiological and ecological — that is deeply relaxing and replenishing, especially for modern-day burn-out syndrome, and requires little physical effort. It “resets your nervous system” and fosters a rich inner life.

You can purchase The Nourish Practice as a CD or Digital Download here.