© Anne Wangalachi/CIMMYT
Joel Mbithi (left), farm manager of the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute's Kiboko Research Station, and Yoseph Beyene, CIMMYT maize breeder, discuss experimental plots. They are developing drought tolerant top-cross hybrids as part of the Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA) project. This is run by the African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF) in partnership with Monsanto and CIMMYT, which supplies germplasm and expertise.
Skimming the Agricultural Development section of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
web site is a feel-good experience: African farmers smile in a bright slide show of images amid descriptions of the foundation's fight against poverty and hunger. But biosafety activists in South Africa are calling a program funded by the Gates Foundation a "Trojan horse" to open the door for private agribusiness and genetically engineered (GE) seeds, including a drought-resistant corn that Monsanto hopes to have approved in the United States and abroad.
The Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA)
program was launched in 2008 with a $47 million grant from mega-rich philanthropists
Warrant Buffet and Bill Gates. The program is supposed to help farmers in several African countries increase their yields with drought- and heat-tolerant corn varieties, but a report released last month by the
African Centre for Biosafety claims WEMA is threatening Africa's food sovereignty and opening new markets for agribusiness giants like Monsanto.
The Gates Foundation claims that biotechnology, GE crops and Western agricultural methods are needed to feed the world's growing population and programs like WEMA will help end poverty and hunger in the developing world. Critics say the foundation is using its billions to shape the global food agenda and the motivations behind WEMA were recently called into question when
activists discovered the Gates foundation had spent $27.6 million on 500,000 shares of Monsanto stock between April and June 2010.
Comment: The above article is largely NATO propaganda along the lines of "history is written by the victors (or aggressors)". For a more accurate account of what has come to be called the "Bosnian war" see the articles at this link.