Transhumanists Vow to Destroy our Spirit and Nature

Futurists call merger of humans with androids Evolution

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | JUNE 27, 2012

Humanity has come to a halt, we are all doomed unless we adopt a new way of living and a new way of being. The world is rapidly racing towards a black hole where nothing is known, and where everything we as humans have achieved may be lost, unless we do what they want. For them, civilization is like an uncaptained ship that is now sailing in rough seas without any control whatsoever. The time humanity has to make the right turn is shorter and shorter. Humanity, they say, has brought itself to a dead-end that will lead us all to a new dark age.

Does this seem like a perfect plot for a doomsday movie or what? Well, it’s not. This is the vision held by the people who believe that humanity, despite all of its achievements, is like a giant mammoth that has slowed itself down because of its incapacity to see further than its nose. This humanity that traveled into space and is ready to reach for the stars is destined to suffer much affliction and degradation, they say. According to their plans, which we all need to follow to come out of the black hole we are in now, it is necessary to create a whole new kind of man. This new kind of human will also need new paradigms, says their propaganda. It will require the deepest social transformation, and they want to recruit the supposed world leaders to ‘encourage’ everyone to accept this new social contract.

How will they achieve this dream? By implementing a carefully calculated technological revolution, an experiment where we humans are the lab rats they will use to test their so-called advancements. They want to become the ship’s captain. “To focus of the technologies of the future… nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology, cognitive technology, genetics and robotics.” It is through the use of these branches of science and their applications that they intend to impose, not to offer as an alternative, the complete modification of the environment were all live in and the way a human looks and feels. Yes, it has already begun.

The official launch of the Global Future 2045 movement seems to have been founded in 2011, and it held its first global meeting in March of 2012, when they revealed their vision and plans for the next 30 years. It is interesting to see how they connect the need to abandon all current understanding about everything because of the growing awakening humanity is in, which seeks to challenge a centuries old system of government which has always worked for the social engineers and never for the governed. It is now that humans opened their eyes to what has been going on for hundreds of years that the globalists behind the GF 2045 movement come to us all with a conciliatory manner. This is no doubt an attempt to calm down the roaring lion that has awakened after a long period if hibernation. Now that humanity seems to be getting off their knees, the controllers want to offer us a new way of being slaves to a new global system.

The implementation of nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology, cognitive technology, genetics and robotics will no doubt help humanity progress into the future, the question is, in what forms? and, will it be for the best? The idea that world leaders have been already recruited to carry out the transhumanist agenda to their fellow citizens is a worrying start. When have world leaders actually worked for the betterment of their constituents? For those who shelter their hopes in the men of science, let me remind you that men of science have always worked with world leaders to carry out some of the most outrageous abuses against humankind. So neither our world leaders nor our men of science have the integrity to carry out their work, but according to the transhumanists, it is great that both groups are in a position of power when it comes to bringing about what they say is limitless human evolution.

The creation of new materials, starting at the nano scale, improvements in transportation, studying the power of the human brain, creating and using artificial intelligence, and other great promises made by the transhumnists are nothing new for the people who are mildly informed about the what happens in the real world. Perhaps the pinnacle of the transhumanists is their desire to be immortal, and then to achieve perfection, and that what the ultimate goal of their propaganda seems to suggest. The endgame for them is to be able to transplant a human brain into an android which will give it optimum conditions to operate. Later, this will permit the half humans to transfer their consciousness into a hard drive, which according to the GF 2045 will allow for new and never before seen cognitive experiences and feelings.

Before continuing, let’s be clear about something that is very important. Humanity has not been able to take off into the stars because there are a handful of social engineers, many of whom probably are behind the GF 2045 movement, who have posed limits to what humans can do, by keeping new technologies from seeing the light of day and hoarding the benefits of such technologies for themselves. Are we supposed to believe that those social engineers are now ready to share their wealth of knowledge with the rest of humanity so that we can all experience the reality of what technology can actually provide us? You be the judge.

The transhumanists led by people like Ray Kurzweil want people to become more manageable, to function in a realm where they can all be completely controlled, where we will be intellectual property. This is a point that those who send hate mail calling the refusal to accept transhumanism an attempt to keep us all in the dark ages or obscurantism. In their pursue of immortality, transhumanists want humans to transfer their existence into a metallic box that will be their home for the rest of their existence. That is the vision of living they have for the future. They believe that by transferring their consciousness to a machine — if that is even possible in the time frame they envision it — will help them defeat the the tyranny of nature and the imperfection and affliction of their human spirit. It doesn’t matter how outrageous this sounds, or if you don’t believe it or find it too far fetched; the transhumanists believe it is possible and they want us all to be part of this system for the same reason that the social engineers have always cited when trying to impose a new paradigm: the collective welfare.

The implications of letting transhumanists manage the ship of humanity are greater than we could ever imagine. They talk about a new civilization paradigm which includes vast changes in philosophy, ideological affiliation, new ethics, new culture and a new psychology. The consequence of such drastic changes will be the emergence of a new reality and a new man that will arise to conquer the solar system and the infinite space. But for those of us who do not jump on the bandwagon, this new system doesn’t have any democratic alternative, to use a well know term. “It is not a matter of whether it will happen, because it will happen, and those who do not accept it will be left behind and will ultimately die off,” says Peter Diamandis, CEO of the X Prize Foundation on the film The Transcendent Man. “As we merge with machines, and I think that is inevitable that we will, we will transform into something new.” This is a key point, because that new thing we will all be transformed into will not be human anymore. It will be a brain inside a case to which programs and commands will be fed to carry out what its intellectual owners want it to do.

What transhumanists don’t seem to understand, or at least do not want to recognize publicly, is that being human is not only about thinking or reasoning; that is only one part of it. That is why putting our brains in metal cases where their are directed by software cannot be called evolution. The androids that will carry those human brains will not be able to think for themselves or have free will, which is indeed the things that make us all humans.

In their video 2045: A New Era of Humanity, the transhumanists label humans as lazy, conformist and incapable of affecting change. “Humanity does not have a master plan of its development. It seeks stability, it lives in the present and does not plan. It preserves the status quo and  tries to escape development. It does not tend to map the future centuries and take responsibility for evolution.” In a consumerist society culture there is no room for any of that. Fortunately, humanity is not completely doomed, because the Russia GF 2045 movement has taken the lead when it comes to engineering tomorrow’s reality. “We intend to create a new vector for civilization,” they brag while calling for a new everlasting spiritual paradigm which they believe will save us from any future state of conflict.

Next, they make use of a well-known tactic of the social engineers, which is to make people feel included and to tell them how their contribution will shape the destiny of humankind. This same technique is used by the fake environmental movement and the United Nations that created social and political fora in order to attract people who are usually lost in the limbo of disinformation and propaganda sustained by the corporate media and the entertainment industry. Under this new paradigm, the transhumanists say, “we’ll get away from the murder of nature and physical death.”

Now, in 2012, they’ve begun establishing themselves as the only possible solution to all problems faced by humankind. From 2012 – 2013, they predict, the global unrest caused by the current financial meltdown will increase the public debate about the future of human development. Actually, many of us had already predicted that outcome. So nothing new here. What is new is how they intend to use the search for a solution to present themselves as the differential that will transform it all for the best. They predict that new transhumanist movements and parties will emerge out of the chaos, and that those movements will help carry out the post-human agenda around the world. The way to maintain all those transhumanists together is by way of the 2045.com platform, which they advertise as the instrument to present ideas and innovative initiatives. There, people can vote and provide input on the best model of what they call an avatar, which in essence is the hybrid form of the first non human being.

The GF 2045 platform is supposed to be an outlet where scientists, academics, financiers and managers can get together with humans whose ideas may be used in the transformation of our natural world into a synthetic one, where nano robots will be in charge of keeping everything working to perfection.

The years of 2013 to 2014 will see the rise of the human spare parts industry, where science will finally figure out a way to use advanced robotic parts to fit into human bodies whenever they need to replace a leg, an arm, fingers or feet. Have you seen this scenario in Fringe; the propaganda show which presents one of the main characters, Nina Sharp, using a robotic arm and hand? It looks very convenient. “The race to immortality starts,” says their video. By 2014, the envision the creation of robotic human copies, a new kind of hybrid human. This new class will turn into servants. They also talk about flying cars, brain implants to help humans control machines with their own minds.

A big jump, say transhumanists, will occur by 2025, when artificial intelligence will support brain activity. Human brains will then be transplanted to the bodies of hybrids, which will provide a whole new set of sense driven experiences. By 2030, transhumanists intend to have completed the reverse engineering of the human brain, although to many that outcome is closer from happening. This will help transhumanists understand the meaning of “consciousness” and to apply in later phases of their plan. By 2035, those who seek immortality plan to have nano robots that can take any form they want. These nano robots will also exist in forms like holograms.

The years of 2040-2045 will bring the beginning of the end for the authentic human race, which by 2050 will have been submitted to a new social structure where science and technology will control all aspects of life.  In the spiritual side of things, the new age religion will have substituted all other religions in what the United Nations has dubbed the end of war and the start of “spiritual self-improvement”. In their own words, 2050 will bring drastic changes in our social structure. “A new era dawns, the era of neo humanity”

According to Alan Watt, this concept of neo-humanity is nothing more than neo-eugenics and a part of the war against humanity. As explained on one of his numerous interviews “culture is created from the top down and used by the elite to manipulate and pervert natural human instincts towards their own ends. Every change in culture, right down to fashion and music, had to be authorized and promoted from the top. This science of mass mind control is still taught today by the insiders and mediums such as television are used as weapons of social control to prevent humanity from ever realizing its full potential.”

Watt has for a long time studied how the technocrats planned what they wanted to do with humanity for periods of hundreds of years at the time, and how they would implement such agendas. According to Watt, each and every cultural change was carefully put in place and imposed through a very effective cultural bombardment before the arrival of every cycle of planetary eugenics. Well, the people who are at the head of those plans are also behind the transhumanism movement. If you are a supporter of transhumanism and do not believe your leaders could be capable of taking advantage of yourself again, look back at history and you’ll realize that this is not only true, but that the description herein falls short to what their plans actually intend to achieve.

Examples of what you’ll find is evidence of how sperm counts have dropped up to 80 per cent over the past 50 years, and not by chance. Perhaps that won’t be bad enough for some people, so maybe they’ll be interested to know how Bisphenol A in plastics and cosmetic products contribute to the intoxication of our bodies. The transhumanist agenda is just part of the master plan which has been public for decades and centuries in globalist papers and writings created by people like Bertrand Russell and the Aldus Huxley’s Brave New World. Those were not fiction books, but blueprints for the future of humanity.

We are far from the days when the elite wanted that every human behaved as a slave or a servant and into an overdrive mode where they will simply control each and everyone who willingly accepts their trendiest solution to adopt a mechanical body for the sake of immortality. The heads of the transhumanist movement understand very well that in order for their bosses to achieve their ultimate goal of total control, they’ll need voluntaries, not violent opposition to their plans, and the best way to recruit millions of volunteers is by offering what every human being dreams about: a free and easy path to illumination. They will not get to that state of course. Instead, every human that enters that new era of neo-humanity will simply become a servant who will accept his or her slavery as the natural form of existence.

We can’t take them seriously because of the insanity of their suggestion — to impose transhumanism on everyone — but we can’t dismiss them either because they are dead serious about it.

Monsanto Trying to Indoctrinate Kids about GMO’s

By ANTHONY GUCCIARDI | NATURAL SOCIETY | MARCH 23, 2012

Facing direct opposition from the public, biotechnology giants like Monsanto and Dow are now making a disturbing attempt to brainwash developing minds into accepting their genetically modified foods using blatant lies and propaganda. In a last ditch effort to potentially sway public opinion, the Council for Biotechnology Information (CBI)  has launched the “Biotechnology Basics Activity Book” for kids. With the intent to be used by ‘agriculture and science teachers’, the activity book spreads absurd lies about GMO crops — even going as far as to say that they ‘improve our health’ and ‘help the environment’.

The book can be seen on the organization’s website, and makes it extremely apparent that it is full of misinformation and propaganda that completely ignores scientific research surrounding genetically modified organisms (GMOs). In fact, let’s examine some claims made by this book that serves as an ‘educational’ tool to be used by teachers. The first claim by the activity book is that genetically modified seeds actually grow more food than traditional seeds, and is followed by even more ridiculous statements. The activity book reads:

“Hi Kids! Welcome to the Biotechnology Basics Activity Book. This is an activity book for young people like you about biotechnology — a really neat topic…. You will see that biotechnology is being used to figure out how to: 1) grow more food; 2) help the environment; and 3) grow more nutritious food that improves our health. As you work through the puzzles in this book, you will learn more about biotechnology and all of the wonderful ways it can help people live better lives in a healthier world. Have fun!”

Disproving Monsanto’s Propaganda

According to 900 scientists, GMO crops actually do not grow more food than traditional farming practices. In fact, they are simply not an effective tool to fight starvation in any capacity, thanks to their excessive costs and immense failure to yield crops. Funded by the World Bank and United Nations, an organization was created known as the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD). Made up of 900 scientists and researchers, the group — whose mission was to examine the issue of world hunger — found that genetically modified crops were not a meaningful solution to the problem.

Instead, the group found that the genetically modified seeds were outperformed by traditional “agro-ecological” farming practices. Therefore, to say that biotech seeds and crops produce more food than traditional agriculture is not only scientifically incorrect according to these 900 scientists, but it is an outright lie.

Read Full Article →

Brazil will become first Transgenic crop producer

France 24
February 7, 2012

Brazil is on course to overtake the United States as the world’s top producer of biotech crops in the coming years, a leading promoter of farm biotechnology said Tuesday.

The United States currently holds the lead with 69 million hectares (170 million acres) under biocrop cultivation in 2011, ahead of Brazil with 30.3 million, Argentina with 23.7 million and India with 10.6 million, the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA) said.

But USAAA, a government-funded international body promoting the use of farm biotechnology, particularly in developing countries, said that for the third year in a row, Brazil was last year the engine of global biocrop growth, with 4.9 million hectares added, a rise of 20 percent from 2010.

Speaking in a teleconference from the Philippines, ISAAA president Clive James said that while the United States was currently well ahead, “Brazil is closing the gap very quickly” and bringing in new biotech crops like sugar cane.

Brazil has eight million hectares of sugar cane, the largest in the world, and is expected to increase it by 50 percent in the next five years for both ethanol and sugar production, he noted.

“I believe that in the long term, Brazil, will become the number one country in the world in terms of total soybean acreage,” James said.

“It will take some time, but I think the political will (in Brazil) is there and the target is to increase productivity through biotechnology for the domestic market and also for large export markets, particularly China,” he added.

ISAAA meanwhile highlighted a 94-fold increase in biotech crop cultivation around the world from 1.7 million hectares in 1996 to 160 million hectares last year.

Of 29 countries planting transgenic crops last year, 19 were emerging or developing nations and 10 were in the industrialized world, the group said.

A record 16.7 million farmers, up eight percent from 2010, grew biotech crops, including 15 million who were resource-poor farmers in developing countries.

The five top biotech crop producers in the emerging world were India and China in Asia, Brazil and Argentina in Latin America and South Africa on the African continent. Together they represent 40 percent of the global population.

Six European Union countries planted a record 114,490 hectares of genetically modified maize, up 26 percent from 2010 while in China, seven million farmers grew a record 3.9 million hectares of genetically modified cotton.

Brazil is GMO Country

PRNewswire
August 3, 2011

The area in Brazil planted with transgenic seeds is now growing at a faster pace than the growth of the entire planted area for crops of soybeans, corn and cotton – the three crops with genetically modified varieties that have been approved, as indicated by the 1st review of the adoption of biotechnology in the 2011/12 harvest, conducted by the consulting firm Celeres.

The area planted with transgenic soybeans for the next harvest will be 13.4% greater than it was in the 2010/11 harvest, occupying 20.8 million hectares (82.7% of the total area projected). With the approval of a new event in 2010, there are now four technologies that have been released in Brazil, including herbicide tolerance (TH), insect resistance (RI) and combinations.

“This growth is the result of constant improvement of the biotechnological varieties, which are increasingly well adapted to the different productive regions of the country,” observes Anderson Galvao, managing partner at Celeres and coordinator of the study. He emphasizes that for the first time in the history of Brazilian agriculture, with 8.8 million hectares, the Central Western region – traditional producer of conventional soybeans – has exceeded the Southern region in absolute terms for area allocated to transgenic soybeans.

GM cotton, for its part, which had three new events approved in the past year, will occupy 606 thousand hectares, equivalent to 39% of fields under cultivation (an increase of 62.7% over the previous cycle). Cotton seeds with RI, TH and combined technologies are currently available to growers. “The growth in the adoption of biotechnology for cotton crops shows that certain gaps that existed in the supply of technologies are beginning to be filled, supplying the real needs of cotton growers. When the producer sees competitive advantages in the technology, he adopts it immediately,” Galvao says.

In the case of corn, GM hybrids will be present in 9.1 million hectares, or 64.9% of the area under cultivation, including summer harvests (4.5 million hectares, or 54% of the area under cultivation) and winter harvests (4.6 million hectares, equivalent to 80.4% of the area under cultivation). Brazil now has 16 GM events approved (including RI, TH and combined technologies), five of them having been approved by the CTNBio in the last 12 months.

To Galvao, corn cultivation has been the most successful by far in adopting biotechnology in Brazil: in four years, it already occupies more than half of the land where corn is grown. He also notes that a substantial portion is planted with materials thought of as low-tech, especially in the Northern and Northeast regions. “Considering only the hectares planted with high-tech materials, transgenic hybrids account for more than 70% of the area planted,” he underscores.

“This rapid pace in adopting biotechnology for the growing of corn is a reflection of the direct and indirect benefits that transgenic hybrids reap for growers, who can now compete as equals in the international market,” he stresses. A second review of the adoption of biotechnology for this harvest is scheduled for December, after work on the summer harvest crop is finished.

The Shocking Reality About GMOs

by Dave Opiyo
AllAfrica.com
July 12, 2011

The spectre of people developing new and strange allergies, indigenous seeds losing their genetic codes and disappearing altogether, farmers making bumper harvests — or no harvests at all — is in the air.

Two weeks ago on July 1, Kenya became the fourth African nation to permit imports of GMO crops, joining South Africa, Egypt and Burkina Faso.

Supporters of the move say it is essential in helping to stabilise prices and feed millions of hungry Kenyans, but matters are not that straightforward.

The online encyclopedia Wikipedia defines a genetically modified or genetically engineered organism (GEO) as one “whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques.”

These techniques, generally known as recombinant DNA technology, explains the encyclopaedia, use DNA molecules from different sources, which are then combined into one molecule to create a new set of genes.

This DNA is then transferred into an organism, giving it modified or novel genes. Transgenic organisms, adds Wikipedia, are a subset of GMO organisms which have DNA that originated in a different species.

To put it more clearly, think of an orange with tomato genes. The coming into force of the Bio-Safety Act, 2009 on July 1 that allows the growing and sale of genetically modified crops has elicited mixed reactions.

GMOs are modified in the laboratory to enhance desired traits such as increased resistance to herbicides or improved nutritional content.

But, as expected, anti-GMO lobbyists have kicked up a storm, saying the safety of genetically engineered crops has not been proven beyond reasonable doubt.

“The developers of GMOs have exerted great pressure to ensure that the Bio-Safety Act serves the interests of foreign agribusiness, rather than farmers and consumers,” Ms Anne Maina, an advocacy coordinator for African Biodiversity Network (ABN), says.

Recently, anti-GMO lobbyists, mainly from the ABN, Unga Revolution and Bunge La Mwananchi, protested the move, urging the government to revoke it.

 On May 25, Jeffrey Smith, who describes himself as a “consumer advocate promoting healthier, non-GMO choices”, argued in a blog:

“When US regulators approved Monsanto’s genetically modified “BT” corn, they knew it would add a deadly poison into our food supply. That’s what it was designed to do.

“The corn’s DNA is equipped with a gene from soil bacteria called BT (Bacillus Thuringiensis) that produces the BT-toxin.

“It’s a pesticide; it breaks open the stomach of certain insects and kills them.” Monsanto is a market leader in bio-technology and production of GMOs.

According to the blogger, Monsanto and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) swore up and down that it was only insects that would be hurt.

The BT-toxin, they claimed, would be destroyed in the human digestive system and not have any impact on all of the trusting, corn-eating consumers.

“Now,” he continued, “doctors at Sherbrooke University Hospital in Quebec found the corn’s BT-toxin in the blood of pregnant women and their babies, as well as in non-pregnant women.”

This is one of the many fights in Monsanto’s hands. In its website, the firm says food derived from authorised genetically-modified (GM) crops is as safe as the conventional (non-GM-derived) version.

Putting the matter into perspective, Monsanto says the first large acreage plantings of GM crops — herbicide-tolerant soybeans and canola — took place in 1996 after successfully passing US regulatory review.

Since then, additional GM crops with herbicide tolerance, insect tolerance and virus resistance have been given clearance for planting and consumption.

 These include varieties of corn, sugar beets, squash and papaya. All of these crops have been assessed for food and feed safety in producing countries, “and many more countries have approved the import of food or food ingredients that contain GM products”.

Hundreds of millions of meals containing food from GM crops have been consumed. There has not been a single substantiated instance of illness or harm associated with GM crops, the company argues.

According to Monsanto, some of the negative health effects associated with GMOs could be caused by other considerations.

In one response, it says: “There has been an increased interest in food allergies. Unfortunately, there are no stable diagnostic criteria for testing for food allergies and food intolerance.

“Together, these two factors have probably resulted in an increase in reporting of allergies. Therefore, rates of allergies may not have actually increased as much as it would appear.”

Implications on health

Such is the nature of the GMO controversy Kenyans will soon find themselves embroiled in. Anti-GMO groups say scientific evidence has shown that continued consumption of GM food is likely to have serious implications on not only health, but also the environment and food production.

Studies such as the one by Sherbrooke University Hospital have shown that those who eat genetically modified foods tend to see an increase in their allergic reactions to the types of foods they are already allergic.

Further, by eating these genetically modified foods, people also form allergies to foods which they were never allergic to before.

 Naturally, Monsanto refutes such findings with its own, sometimes poking holes on the research methodology and the findings by its critics.

In lab tests done on animals, there were cases where once the animals ingested genetically modified food, they became completely sterile in a matter of weeks.

In other cases, experimental animals died in a matter of weeks of liver, kidney and pancreatic complications. But that’s one side of the story.

The University of Nairobi’s Centre for Biotechnology and Bio-informatics Director, Prof James Opiyo Ochanda, was quoted in the Business Daily recently as saying that the use of GMOs could be beneficial to Kenya’s attainment of food security because genetically engineered crops are resistant to pests and diseases that often require expensive and harmful chemicals to eradicate.

“Instead of applying chemicals, scientists have engineered the plants to introduce genes or molecules that allow the crop to protect itself.

This is better than the application of chemicals that pollute the environment and harm the body, thus posing dangers to our systems,” he said.

Similar remarks were also made by Prof Samuel Gudu, a plant breeding specialist and Moi University’s Deputy Vice chancellor in-charge of planning and development.

In an interview with the same paper, Prof Gudu reckons that GM technology could help Kenya increase the production of key crops such as maize.

“GMOs are meant to improve the quality of maize. They can protect the crop against insects and what Kenyans should be asking for are the details of the consignment to be brought in as opposed to fear-mongering,” he says.

However, increasing yields and food safety are come at a risk, as the Sherbrooke University Hospital findings show.

And, as the debate rages, the National Bio-Safety Authority (NBA), which is tasked with ensuring that GMOs imported into Kenya are safe both to human beings and the environment, has called for caution.

“Propaganda should not be used as justification as to whether to accept or deny individuals from using GMOs in the country…. We are solely relying on scientific facts,” says NBA chair Prof Miriam Kinyua.

“We have to make sure that what is brought into the country is safe. By doing so, we have to ensure that the risk assessment is well done scientifically,” adds Prof Kinyua, who is also a lecturer at Moi University’s Department of Biotechnology.

“If the importer proves to us that the GMO is good, we approve it and inform the public of the same. If we have reservations because of some findings, we shall say ‘Sorry’.”

According to the Bio-Safety Act, the regulatory authority will communicate its final decision of approval or rejection of an importing license after three months of receiving the application.

After allowing an importer to place a genetically modified organism on the market, the law also allows any person to submit a written opposition within 30 days from the date the notice is posted.

Organisations and individuals opposed to the importation of GMOs will most likely seize this opportunity.

“Is Kenya ready for GMOs?” we asked Prof Kinyua, and she curtly replied that the fact that the government had created a specialised institution and “put in place systems means that we are moving somewhere”.

But “moving somewhere” certainly doesn’t mean full capacity. According to Prof Kinyua, the authority is yet to publish regulations that will guide the process, but that will be done soon.

How will the authority ensure that GM seeds don’t end up in the stomach unprocessed — or the shamba, because Kenyans tend to eat what they grow?

Dr Roy Mugiira, the acting head of the National Bio-Safety Authority, says millers licensed to import genetically modified maize must ensure that this does not happen to avoid the possibility of anybody planting them as seeds. A tall order, this one.

Any lapse on their part that could allow the seeds to be planted will lead to a fine of more than Sh20 million or 10-year prison terms or both. If this happens unintentionally, they will have to meet the cost of removing such seeds from circulation.

According to Dr Mugiira, one of the options being considered is to have the maize milled at the point of landing and then transported as flour, hence avoiding any deliberate or accidental escaping of seeds.

 Widespread opposition

GMO seeds, just like conventional maize, have the capacity to germinate and produce.

Initially, bio-technology firms sterilised GM seeds to forestall germination; but the technology, called terminator, was never commercialised following widespread opposition.

The maize being targeted by the millers has been engineered to develop resistance against weeds and pests.

Another type of GM maize is being tested in Kenya for drought resistance, but it is not yet ready for commercialisation.

If the current bio-safety laws are to be followed strictly, then the earliest the first GM maize can land in to the country legally is around October.

 In 2008, The Daily Mail published a story to validate a claim by Prince Charles that Indian farmers were killing themselves after the improved yields promised by a bio-technology firm failed, therefore ruining the farmers economically.

Some had borrowed heavily. A farmer, Shankara Mandaukar, couldn’t take it anymore when a promised unheard-of-harvest turned into two crop failures after he abandoned indigenous seeds.

“Ranged against the Prince” reported the papers, “are powerful GM lobbyists and prominent politicians, who claim that genetically modified crops have transformed Indian agriculture, providing greater yields than ever before.”

Humanitarian crisis

“However”, wrote the paper, “official figures from the Indian Ministry of Agriculture do indeed confirm that, in a huge humanitarian crisis, more than 1,000 farmers kill themselves here every month.

“It seems many are massively in debt to local money-lenders, having over-borrowed to purchase GM seed.”

Pro-GM experts blamed the suicides on rural poverty, alcoholism, drought and ‘agrarian distress’.

Back to Monsanto, the bio-technology market leader says claims from anti-biotechnology activists that genetically-modified crops don’t increase yields, and that GM crops actually have lower yields than non-GM ones are simply false.

“In agriculture, desirable crop characteristics are known as traits. One of the most important traits is yield.

“Improving crop yield can be accomplished through both breeding and bio-technology. GM crops generally have higher yields due to both breeding and bio-technology,” explains Monsanto.

True, but Indian farmers will tell you of the other side of increased yields.

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