Wake Up Ghanaians! Say No To GMOs!

Feature Article by Dr. Martin, MD.

I have been following this GM debate for some time now and I realize that a lot of our leaders,academicians and many Doctorate degree holders in Ghana accept and promote so called new ideas without having researched the issues themselves.

Most of our decision making processes are influenced by powerful foreign interests,and so we just look around and think because some countries are doing something, it means there is nothing wrong with it, without realizing that those countries may have been unduly influenced,or even bullied into accepting some of these ideas.

I am a Medical Doctor, I live in the US, the world capital of GM food if you ask me, and I have conducted an extensive research on GM foods to be able to say that the introduction of GM crops is the worse thing that ever happened to the worlds food supply.

For lack of space, I will just give a few highlights.

1.Monsanto, DuPont,Syngenta and the other GM giants do not care about feeding people. Their aim is to own and control all the seeds of the world, through international patents. I hope you understand the implications of this point. What this means is that, to be able to grow these crops, the farmer will have to buy the seeds from Monsanto or whoever the provider is,cannot save seeds(Monsanto has sued farmers across the US and Canada for saving seeds)and has to buy their proprietary chemicals for spraying in order for the seeds to grow.

2.GM seeds are not engineered to withstand any adverse environmental factors,nature does a better job at this,they are engineered to withstand excessive spraying of proprietary pesticides and herbicides.Research has shown this to be the case. In fact GM crops do very very bad in severe weather conditions.

3. Most people are confusing crop breeding with genetic engineering. In crop breeding, which even our uneducated farmers understand, there is no introduction of foreign DNA material, but a selection of and crossing/grafting of the best plants within the same species over a long period of time until the best seed or crop is produced.

4. The GM crops are so domineering that once they are introduced into an ecosystem, they take over, and dilute the indigenous crops, pushing the pure breed to extinction. Monsanto knows this and takes advantage of it however it can.

5. Americans are waking up gradually and are demanding more accountability so these companies are looking for alternative markets,especially soft targets in the third world like Ghana.

As a Doctor, I know first hand,the toxic effect of GM food to our health and I won't even go into that here. Why do you think, GM crops are not allowed in the EU? they know the Americans are not telling the whole truth on this issue. Europeans( except the British of course) are more honest and driven more by true science than profits and power. Sadly most food,drug and health policy here in the US is driven by money and lobbyists rather than science and so can not be trusted. Scientific research if often faked, experimental design specifically selected to produce the desired conclusions, and negative results deleted from the final report, hidden or unreported. But when the people become aware and protest, or when the deleterious effects begin to show up the companies just pay a few million dollars in fines, and keep the billions already made in profits.

The information is there for all who are honestly looking for the truth to see. As a Doctor who has conducted medical research, I consider myself a scientist so I am not against the innovations of science. what I am against is dubious science and so called innovations that do more harm than good, in order to line the pockets of some faceless multinational companies whiles poor helpless ignorant, or naive nations and people suffer the consequences. So Dr Adofo, and Dr. Annor-Frempong, please do your due diligence and don't just promote GMOs because Ghana is counting on people like us, the educated to help her navigate these GMO waters.

There are lots of research resources, but anybody interested can begin his or her research , by reading the book;SEEDS OF DECEPTION BY Jeffrey M. Smith and if you are motivated, follow that up with the Genetic Roulette, by the same author. Read these books, and double check the references and you will be amazed how much information is out there and how hard the Biotech industry is fighting to keep it from us. Also watch the free well produced documentary; The world according to Monsanto on YouTube.