"Earth Democracy"- Vandana Shiva's Lecture

Today I went to a PHENOMENAL guest speaker. Dr. Vandermeer Perfecto, a former Alternative Nobel Prize winner, international ecologist, activist, and Western Graduate spoke about "Earth Democracy". She touched on a variety of issues.

She argued that a free market democracy means freedom for organizations not freedom of the people, and that the cost of farming has increased substantially but the income of those farmers in countries such as India has not. Companies such as Monsanto have taken the incomes from these farmers. She even sued the company for not going through regular bylaws and stopped them for four years in India. Monsanto is a monopoly that is putting many farmers indebt, and who’s products are negatively affecting the health of people, animals and the environment.

She also talked about the pesticide problem in India. This is the second time a speaker has brought up this point. Pants to Poverty also voiced their concern about pesticide use in places such as India. As well, FLOW, a movie I watched during a general EWB meeting on Tuesday, also touched upon this subject. Apparently, pesticides have caused male fish to switch genders, can demasculate a human, and could be the cause of pancreatic and breast cancer. In India, many people are dying from either cancer or suicide due to pesticides. The following is an article about the increase of cancer found in people who live in cotton farms in Punjab: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103569390.

Suicide rates have also substantially increased since international organizations have invaded LDC and caused their farmers to become more in debt. (Companies like Pants to Poverty are trying to decrease these statistics by eliminating the middle men and allowing locals to be empowered and gain more profit than regularly offered.) Seed diversity is being distinguished in a mere season. Modified seeds, which need to be bought seasonally are replacing them, causing monetary issues for farmers. Apparently, cotton is becoming cheaper to buy but is becoming more costly to produce, which is also causing an increase in debt and suicide rates. Maharashtra is one place that is finding this issue a reality: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/may2006/indi-m12.shtml

Dr. Shiva states that this is becoming the era of global genocide with a decrease in democracy, famine and water supplies, and debt increasing in LDC. She states that India is becoming an area of hunger. While some in India are facing hunger others are facing obesity, and subsequently diabetes, due to malnutrition. As well, companies such as Coke are also going into LDC and drying up the essential water supplies of the indigenous people. (Shiva helped women close a Coke location in India; a huge success for them.)

She touches upon the issue of agriculture using up water and how purchasing and supporting ecological (organic) and local foods instead of regular food will help decrease emissions. She also emphasizes the importance of completing the carbon cycle and focusing on increasing living carbon (used by organisms via photosynthesis) that can help our earth instead of dead carbon.

Once again highlighting problems in Monsanto products, Dr. Shiva brought up the rBGH, which is explained in this website: http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/rbgh/#
To summarize the article, the company made injections for farmers to use which tortured cows in order to get them to produce more milk. The cows became sick and people drinking the milk could potentially get cancer. In reaction to consumer concerns, some producers stopped using rBGH and started to produce labels on their milks saying "rBGH free" but Monsanto pushed to try and continue to sell their product. Bills are being passed to illegalize companies from putting labels on their products that will discredit or negatively effect the rBGH's reputation. Personally, this makes me sick!

Moreover, Dr. Shiva states that there is becoming a dictatorship in regard to the economy. She states that globalization is a crime against humanity. People are too greedy! Rich countries, like ours, are trying to dismantle Kyoto. Destruction of livelihoods is not being addressed. Instead the solution seems to be an increase in the exploitation of people, food and natural resources. There needs to be a change in people's consciousness. People need to remember that the fight for freedom and social activism comes from the bottom. People need to remember that "we are earth's community"/ "we are the citizens of the earth". We need to think globally and act locally, taking small steps. We need to stop thinking that we are 'just consumers'. We need to focus on increasing the freedom of the farmers to grow what they want, meaning that monopolizing needs to stop and power needs to be given back to the farmers. Moreover, by sharing seeds and creating open dialect and educating one another, we can positively repel against seed monopolies and patents.

Here are some additional materials she has either recommended or produced:

New Interactionalist: http://www.newint.org/
Mutual Learning as an Agenda for Social Development: http://tuweiming.com/article.1.html
Life Running Out of Control- Movie
Crimes Against the Future
Failure to Yield: Evaluating the Performance of Genetically Engineered Crops - Doug Gurian-Sherman: http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agriculture/science_and_impacts/science/failure-to-yield.html

Earth Democracy - Vandana Shiva
Breakfast of Biodiversity- Vandana Shiva
Manifestos on the Future of Food & Seed- Vandana Shiva
Soil Not Oil- Vandana Shiva





Here's some addition information on the lecture, which was sent out by those responsible for The UW Hagey Lecture Series:

"The UW Hagey Lecture Serieswith the support of Alternatives Journal and WPIRG presents the 2009 Hagey LectureVandana Shiva: Earth Democracy

LECTURE: Wednesday, Oct. 21, 2009 at 8 p.m.

Humanities Theatre, J.G. Hagey Hall of the Humanities, U Waterloo
Free lecture, no ticket required

COLLOQUIUM Soil Not Oil: Food Security in Times of Climate Change
9:30am, Thursday, Oct. 22,
Shiva will address a student colloquium.
Environment 1 building, room 221.

WPIRG and Alternatives will be present to offer students opportunities to become involved in local initiatives that Vandana Shiva brings to the fore in her lecture and colloquium.

Award-winning ecologist Vandana Shiva will propose a new form of democracy to counter financial, social and climate meltdowns in her talk: "Earth Democracy: Beyond Dead Democracy and Killing Economies"

Shiva will discuss her views on why democracy is under siege, yielding to both corporate dictatorship and violent extremism from excluded elements of society. "The triple crisis," she says, "needs a new imagination that transforms the dominant economic systems, political systems and socio-cultural systems into living systems that serve the planet and people. I call this re-imagining of society 'Earth Democracy'."

In India, Shiva established Navdanya, a movement for biodiversity, conservation and farmers' rights. Navdanya means the nine crops that represent India's collective source of food security. She also launched a school for sustainability on the Navdanya Biodiversity Farm in north India.

As well, Shiva is the founding director of the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology, a network of researchers specializing in ecology, health and sustainability. She serves on the boards of the International Forum on Globalization and the World Future Council. She is the vice-president of a global movement called Slow Food International.

Shiva, who completed her PhD at the University of Western Ontario in 1978, is a physicist and philosopher of science, as well as an ecologist, activist, editor and author of many books. Her most recent books are Earth Democracy and Water Wars.

Shiva was a recipient of the 1993 Right Livelihood Award - considered the Alternative Nobel Prize. The award recognizes "vision and work contributing to making life more whole, healing the planet and uplifting humanity."

Hagey lecturers have distinguished themselves in some scholarly or creative field and their work cuts across traditional disciplines and national boundaries. Previous lecturers have included Nobel laureates in various disciplines, internationally renowned scholars, architects, peace activists, and well-known artists."