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Here's an amusing consequence of the hippy paranoid mindset infecting people who can't well afford it:
Angola's Plan to Turn Away Altered Food Imperils Aid
By MICHAEL WINES
Published: March 30, 2004
JOHANNESBURG, March 29 — A United Nations effort to feed nearly two million hungry Angolans, most of them former war refugees, is imperiled because Angola's government plans to outlaw imports of genetically modified cereals, officials of the World Food Program here said Monday.
Most food assistance from the United States, which at last count provided more than three-quarters of United Nations aid to Angola, consists of genetically modified corn and other crops that apparently would be barred under the new rules.
That includes 19,000 tons of genetically modified American corn now bound for an Angolan port. The corn — roughly a month's supply for the United Nations feeding program in Angola — must be cleared for unloading by Wednesday, said Mike Sackett, the World Food Program's director for southern Africa.
It remains unclear whether the new ban on genetically modified foods, issued March 17 but not yet formally put into effect, will prevent the unloading of the shipment, Mr. Sackett said.
Angola follows four drought-stricken southern Africa nations — Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique — in refusing foreign donations of certain genetically modified foods despite widespread malnutrition and even starvation among their citizens.
Zambia has barred genetically modified foods outright, saying their safety is unproven. Other nations, including Angola, are insisting that cereals and seeds be milled first so that they cannot germinate in local soils and therefore potentially alter the genetic makeup of local crops.
The United States, which provides well over half the food aid in southern Africa and the vast bulk of genetically modified foods, has accused governments of placing political and theoretical concerns above the survival of their own people.
Both the United Nations and the Americans have sidestepped the bans elsewhere by milling grains before they are delivered to needy nations, a costly process that reduces the amount of food donated.
Angola's case is unusual, Mr. Sackett said Monday, because the suddenness of the government's prohibition leaves no time to mill grain intended for Angola before it is shipped. Mills are so scarce inside Angola that it would take 11 weeks, using every mill in the nation, just to grind the 19,000-ton shipment of American corn now under way.
Furthermore, international relief donations to Angola are dwindling because the government is widely perceived as deeply corrupt — awash in oil revenues that it refuses to spend to feed its own people.
Angola is second only to Nigeria among Africa's oil-producing states. But the watchdog group Human Rights Watch charged in January that from 1997 to 2002 alone, $4.2 billion in oil money — one-fourth of the total — was unaccounted for.
The World Food Program feeds 1.9 million Angolans, or about one in eight. About 1.5 million of that total are former war refugees trying to resume their prewar lives.
Angola's Plan to Turn Away Altered Food Imperils Aid
By MICHAEL WINES
Published: March 30, 2004
JOHANNESBURG, March 29 — A United Nations effort to feed nearly two million hungry Angolans, most of them former war refugees, is imperiled because Angola's government plans to outlaw imports of genetically modified cereals, officials of the World Food Program here said Monday.
Most food assistance from the United States, which at last count provided more than three-quarters of United Nations aid to Angola, consists of genetically modified corn and other crops that apparently would be barred under the new rules.
That includes 19,000 tons of genetically modified American corn now bound for an Angolan port. The corn — roughly a month's supply for the United Nations feeding program in Angola — must be cleared for unloading by Wednesday, said Mike Sackett, the World Food Program's director for southern Africa.
It remains unclear whether the new ban on genetically modified foods, issued March 17 but not yet formally put into effect, will prevent the unloading of the shipment, Mr. Sackett said.
Angola follows four drought-stricken southern Africa nations — Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique — in refusing foreign donations of certain genetically modified foods despite widespread malnutrition and even starvation among their citizens.
Zambia has barred genetically modified foods outright, saying their safety is unproven. Other nations, including Angola, are insisting that cereals and seeds be milled first so that they cannot germinate in local soils and therefore potentially alter the genetic makeup of local crops.
The United States, which provides well over half the food aid in southern Africa and the vast bulk of genetically modified foods, has accused governments of placing political and theoretical concerns above the survival of their own people.
Both the United Nations and the Americans have sidestepped the bans elsewhere by milling grains before they are delivered to needy nations, a costly process that reduces the amount of food donated.
Angola's case is unusual, Mr. Sackett said Monday, because the suddenness of the government's prohibition leaves no time to mill grain intended for Angola before it is shipped. Mills are so scarce inside Angola that it would take 11 weeks, using every mill in the nation, just to grind the 19,000-ton shipment of American corn now under way.
Furthermore, international relief donations to Angola are dwindling because the government is widely perceived as deeply corrupt — awash in oil revenues that it refuses to spend to feed its own people.
Angola is second only to Nigeria among Africa's oil-producing states. But the watchdog group Human Rights Watch charged in January that from 1997 to 2002 alone, $4.2 billion in oil money — one-fourth of the total — was unaccounted for.
The World Food Program feeds 1.9 million Angolans, or about one in eight. About 1.5 million of that total are former war refugees trying to resume their prewar lives.
I believe you are deliberately missing the point. Certain people in this thread have demanded all GM crops be proven to be 100% nonharmful before any can be planted or used. This is impossible to do with anything and you know it.
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