US to Vatican: Genetically Modified Food Is a "Moral Imperative"

Wednesday 29 December 2010

by: Mike Ludwig, t r u t h o u t | Report

US to Vatican: Genetically Modified Food Is a "Moral Imperative"
Vatican City. (Photo: Argenberg)

Secret United States diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks detail efforts to promote genetically modified (GM) crops and biotechnology across the globe, including the Vatican, where US diplomats pushed the Roman Catholic Church to support biotech food in developing nations.

Cables from embassies in Spain, Austria and even Pakistan reveal the US diplomats have clearly sided with the biotech industry, even as court cases and public debates over GM food raged in the US and abroad.

In 2005, a US diplomat and a USAID official met with Catholic leaders in Rome to discuss biotech foods, according to a leaked cable. The diplomats reported that Catholic leaders said the science and safety of GM food would soon be a "non-issue" in the Vatican and signaled a cautious acceptance of biotech products despite active opposition among the faithful:

Preoccupation at the Vatican, they said, was tied more to economic arguments, as some fear that widespread use of GMO food in the developing world would subjugate its farmer population and become a form of economic imperialism simply serving to enrich multi-national corporations.

US diplomats pledged to continue pushing GM foods as a "moral imperative" to feed growing populations in order to counter opposition to the biotech food industry among Catholic activists and clergy.

A document drafted by scientists linked to the Vatican and leaked to the press in 2010 suggested the Catholic Church could have a moral obligation to promote GM food crops to combat world hunger, according to the British newspaper The Independent.

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Other cables reveal plans to counter anti-GM initiatives across Europe, and in 2008, US diplomats declared the Monsanto MON-810 corn crop in the biotech stronghold of Spain as "under threat" from a campaign to ban GM crops in Europe.

Spain was the first European country to approve the MON-810 corn variety, and by 2009, Spanish farmers were responsible for 75 percent of the MON-810 crop in Europe, according to the leaked cable.

Top Spanish officials warned US diplomats that Spain was under pressure from other European Union (EU) countries to ban MON-810, and Monsanto officials told the diplomats that acceptance of the product was threatened by an agreement between the French government and environmental groups.

Truthout recently reported that, in 2007, the former US ambassador to France wanted to "retaliate" against the French for creating anti-GM momentum in Europe and questioning the safety of MON-810 when the product was up for re-evaluation in the EU.

France suspended cultivation of MON-810 in 2008 despite a EU report that found no new risks associated with the crop. French and independent scientists initiated a rigorous debate with EU scientists over MON-810, and by 2009, bans were in place in France, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Greece and Luxembourg.

Additional cables from the Spanish embassy tracked the country's approval of GM corn varieties and identified Spain as a "country worth continuing to target" in efforts to promote acceptance of biotechnology.

MON-810 is engineered to excrete the Bt toxin, which is poisonous to some insect pests. A stacked version of MON-810 is also engineered to be resistant to glyphosate, an herbicide first popularized by Monsanto under the brand name Roundup.

This work by Truthout is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.

Comments

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"Monsanto should not have to

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 11:58 — Anonymous (not verified)

"Monsanto should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food. Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible."

~Phil Angell, Director Corporate Communications Monsanto

Monsanto and its accursed seeds are an abomination.
If myopic governments in developing countries buy into this it will be truly disastrous.

Grow your own food from Heirloom seeds, save and shae your Heirloom seeds, support your local natural farmer.

Read "The One-Straw Revolution" by Masanobu Fukuoka and take action now!

Despite the fear-mongering

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 13:11 — FR Tothus (not verified)

Despite the fear-mongering mythology, there is already plenty of food without these Franken-food crops. The issue is one of profits for the few, as is the case with all the other "problems" that will not be solved until the profit is driven from the non-solution solutions. A cure for cancer? Forget it! Too many people will be put out of work. Crime, war, disease, starvation.... these are all opportunities for profit for the elite, who will forever lie about their motives, and forever block solutions that do not make them money.

It does not follow that

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 15:02 — Bite (not verified)

It does not follow that because Monsanto makes a synthetic seed, that all the world will be fed, and what was lacking was Monsanto's poisonous invention. The problem has always been international trade agreements like NAFTA and other half-assed attempts at creating a global economy. The problem is also a meat eater's society. See John Robbins books for details. Everyone could be fed organically and even vegetarian style but there is no impulse to feed everyone. There's only this insistence that markets and corporations will solve all problems, even though corporations are designed from within the greed factor, the very thing that causes poverty and starvation.

We do not need more food.

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 15:18 — tyler_durden (not verified)

We do not need more food. We need a whole lot fewer people.

And monsanto, its government lapdogs, and investors all need to be ridden out on rails.

Two horns of one dilemma: I

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 15:25 — Anonymous (not verified)

Two horns of one dilemma:

I think the U.S may have tried to trade its support for condoms in Africa for the Vatican's support of genetically modified foods.

For once, just once, I want

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 15:27 — bogglesthemind (not verified)

For once, just once, I want the Vatican to hold it's ground and not cave to Big Government/Monsanto,

They are evil, incarnate, and a glaring example of what is wrong with the corporate stooge this country has become.

So, yes, let's shove it sown the throat of others and use the Vatican as our handmaiden.

again we see fOOd causing

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 16:07 — not verified (not verified)

again we see fOOd causing big MANA,your superior grappling arm,,,i du knot understand,,,other than that ,does anybody got any numbers on acres per drop and of course the still as yet not born American Solar Unit,?alias (1-BTU)textile manufacture and well need pounds per square inch,my people will call your people and they/them can all du lunch,by the way were almost outta horse sh_t ,can ya pick some up on the way out the Door,?,hmmm,got no tyme for an Acme America GRULL "BOMB"THANXS ANY HOW/WAY

Janine Benyus has a project

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 19:44 — JadeQueen (not verified)

Janine Benyus has a project in Long Feng, China. Her project will compete with on-line permaculture videos that are anti-dotes to the monster plans. Obama has appointed monsters to every food position he could. JB has a whole valley that needs its surface aquifers recharged from mono-crop terror. For those looking for Catholic-light, the Episcopalians have been told not to use biocides on soil. Some piskies remember bounties on dandelions (1 cent for tops, 5 cents for tops with roots). Dandelions break hard pan, allow water down, and mine sub-surface calcium, which dandies share with other plants. Some people want to cultivate good soil, on more levels than one.

Monsanto be damned!

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 20:27 — Anonymous (not verified)

Please note that pre-1970's

Wed, 12/29/2010 - 22:32 — Kootenay Coyote (not verified)

Please note that pre-1970's genetic management was by selective breeding, a cellular-level technology used at least since Neolithic times. GM involves modification of an organism's DNA, a molecular-level technology of quite a different order. Monsanto & its toadies are eager to obscure the radical difference.

Monsanto is evil. Fight them

Thu, 12/30/2010 - 01:35 — steve (not verified)

Monsanto is evil. Fight them by joining the organics consumer association (OCA) You can sign up for free email alerts and a one mouse click way to send emails to local politicians, The President, FDA, etc

Join the fight!

Well it's nice to see that

Thu, 12/30/2010 - 09:28 — Droslovinia (not verified)

Well it's nice to see that Glen Beck has such a strong following on these pages. Yet somehow, in the midst of all these "frankenfood" and "the government is trying to control us through the food supply" rants, at least one of you has the knowledge or integrity to admit that humans have ALWAYS conducted what you call "genetic management" of their food crops.

Now take it one step further and tell us about all the opportunities that existed to work in modifying DNA before the 1970s. The point is that people have, for a long time, done whatever they needed to do in order to create the best food possible. In the midst of all this high-minded "integrity" of doing your utmost to prevent this, since there are only a few companies who do this well, you miss an important point: there are hungry people in the world. If you are watching your children starve to death in front of your eyes, you're probably not so uptight about how Monsanto makes its money.

Here's your problem: you're at the point that you'd rather let people starve to death than feed them with nutritious food, because you don't like where it comes from or who profits from it. That's just sick. Fight Monsanto, the government, and big corporations all you like. There's a lot of good in it. But you have NO right to give up other people's lives for your personal cause.

When something like food can

Thu, 12/30/2010 - 11:40 — needful things (not verified)

When something like food can be controlled such that each year to plant food, new seeds have to be purchased, then it is just another insidious part of corporate america imperialism. That also means there is NO foundation of a 'moral imperative' it is all profit motivated. And it takes the rights and abilities of people to grow their own food. Just think of the possibilities of the 'food' giants being dictated to stop providing seeds for the next year's crops. That is no difference in the price gouging that is going on in the oil industry. The whole political and economic scheme is just stupid and since when did corporations have a moral of anything except profiting? Wonder how well these crops, if they are planted and grown outside, will endure or produce when the climate changes from year to year, in drought or floods.

It is amazing how it is thought that science and technology will carry the day and the age to the next when on the other side the destruction of the environment and the sinks being filled with poisons at ever increasing rates will all be taken care of by science and technology, or just 'welcome to the next love canal. I wish I would still be around when the figure out how to deal with the 4.5 billion half life of uranium-238 or some of the others with not so long half life while human populations just grows and grows and grows.

The Chinese learned long

Thu, 12/30/2010 - 16:01 — Anonymous (not verified)

The Chinese learned long ago, more food means more people, not fewer hungry.

Droslovnia, some points to

Thu, 12/30/2010 - 17:13 — Floresta (not verified)

Droslovnia, some points to consider...
Hmm, the problem with getting food to those who need it is NOT because we don't have enough, but due to political systems that constantly create poverty, ya know that great gaping space between the rich and poor.
Monsanto does not allow seed sharing, a time honored tradition among all peoples, creating a monopoly and creating dependency on high cost soil inputs(umm, that would be petroleum products, which leach and deplete soil!).
They coat seeds with poisons and that has been proven to greatly reduce the number of necessary pollinators, especially the bees!!!
Their crappy genetically altered foodstuffs (corn & soy in particular) contaminate organic and non-GMO food!
What are you choosing to eat???

@22:13 I don't want to share

Thu, 12/30/2010 - 21:10 — Bite (not verified)

@22:13

I don't want to share Monsanto's seeds. They're dangerous and inappropriate for any organism to consume.

The problem is not a lack of

Fri, 12/31/2010 - 09:33 — Anonymous (not verified)

The problem is not a lack of food in the world but a lack of money by many to pay for it. The famous Green Revolution and now GM foods actually add to world hunger by driving poorer farmers off the land because they haven't the money to buy the expensive seeds, fertilizers, herbicides these so-called advanced agricultural practices require. True, Round-Up ready Monsanto seeds require less herbicide but if I were pregnant I would not want to eat food with built-in weed killer. I also think it is criminal that American consumers have no idea that the foods they eat contain these potentially hazardous substances. What happened to informed choice?

Who says Monsanto food is

Fri, 12/31/2010 - 09:39 — Anonymous (not verified)

Who says Monsanto food is nutritious and healthy? True, mankind has manipulated and improved crops to give greater yields, but this is not what those of us who object to GM food are against. To quote Michael Pollan, there is no way in the world that a fish is going to lay down with a tomato and make a baby. This is done solely to make a tougher tomato with longer shelf life and therefore be more profitable. Taste and nutrition have nothing to do with it.

My previous post ("..it will

Fri, 12/31/2010 - 22:41 — edgar valderrama (not verified)

My previous post ("..it will prove to" belongs in:
Bushwacking Obama: Conservatives Seek to Trap President on Social Security. Sorry.

If you want to feed 10

Sat, 01/01/2011 - 10:10 — Anonymous (not verified)

If you want to feed 10 billion people (which we are going to have to do, unless you want to commit mass murder) with less environmental impact than farming currently requires (which would be a good idea) you will need to genetically modify some of your crops. There is simply no way to feed even the current population of Earth using so called 'organic' foods.

Especially with global warming likely to make a lot of land less productive for farming.

As for safety, there have been no negative safety or environmental effects from any GM foods.

Please people, stop being conservatives for once and start being progressives.

Now many of the problems with GM foods are due to over regulation making it too expensive for small companies to get approval (and if you wait 20 years or so those gene patents expire and anyone can use them).

Not to mention that subsidies would work, the ability to produce more crop with less work and chemical input means you would probably only need to supply the subsidies (and probably also some training) to most farmers once for them to be able to afford to buy more later.

Still, I have to wonder at the kind of immorality (displayed by many people here) that would condemn billions of people to starvation because they are conservative and unwilling to accept progress, you who oppose the use of needed technology are every bit as bad as the Catholic church.

"If you want ot feed 10...."

Tue, 01/04/2011 - 12:38 — Anonymous (not verified)

"If you want ot feed 10...." author- who are you working for?? Monsanto? Many India farmers bought into the Monsanto crap and when the yields we FAR less that what their own seeds produced they didn't have enough money to pay for next years roundup ready seeds and the roundup to go with it and they went bankrupt with MANY committing suicide. Now there are many places in India that are dependent on food being brought in where before they were self-sufficient. This is happening now in more places than India. If there was such concern about the people why would they not be allow to harvest and store their own seeds. And regulations, that is a laugh. Many of Monsanto lawyers have worked for the USDA and EPA helping to get their toxins passed. Isn't it interesting Monsanto fought to keep any GMO mentioned ingredients off food packaging? Don't you think we have the right to know or right to choose? And then you play the morality game and try to make it the issue. 'If you don't think like me your are immoral'...It is the same issue they use to force fluoride in the water systems. 'You must think of the poor masses." Please...Let's talk about the money. Let's follow the money.... It all leads to some very interesting places. Turn the TV off and read people- that is what needs to spread since the media is all controlled.

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US to Vatican: Genetically Modified Food Is a "Moral Imperative"

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