No act of rebellion against the pesticide empire remains unrewarded. Giant agrochemicals file a lawsuit against the big Island Hawaii for passing regulations on GMOs and pesticides
Recently, the big Island Hawaii passed a bill that prohibits the biotech corporations and farmers from planting new GE crops. The law is set to be effective in August 2014, however, recently the three largest Agribusinesses and chemical corporations including DuPont, Syngenta and Agrigenetics Inc. (a company affiliated with the Dow AgroSciences) have filed a lawsuit against the Kauai law claiming that the Kauai law is unconstitutional.
The Kauai law requires farmers and biotech companies not to plant new GE crops and disclose pesticide use and create buffer zones between fields that are sprayed with pesticides and public places like homes, hospitals and schools.
According to huffingtonpost, Paul Minehart, the spokesman for Syngenta earlier said that "The ordinance is invalid. It arbitrarily targets our industry with burdensome and baseless restrictions on farming operations by attempting to regulate activities over which counties in Hawaii have no jurisdiction. These activities are already regulated by governmental agencies under state and federal laws."
However, Gary Hooser (Kauai County Councilman who was one of the co-introducers of the bill) says that the county has simply been asking for basic disclosure and buffer zones and the big agrochemical companies are simply trying to bully islanders:
Apparently the biotech corporations and their buddies do not believe that any state in America including Hawaii has a right to protect its agricultural heritage against the invasion of "Frankenfoods".
"They chose to use their money and legal power to bully us in the courts," says Hooser. "These companies do not want our county to set a precedent that other communities are going to follow."
Hooser also warns that the companies are using the lawsuit to hide the toxicity of the pesticides that they are using. "We do not know and cannot properly research and evaluate these impacts because the companies will not tell us what chemicals they are using," he said. "Instead, they choose to ignore the decision of our local community and take us to court."
Because of its favorable year-round climate, Hawaii has been turned into a battle field for testing new GE crops and pesticides that are linked to many health problems.
Biotech has invested for so long in Hawaii and the lawsuit states that the climate of Kauai gives biotech companies "the invaluable opportunity to triple or quadruple the pace of development of GM crops and it is "crucial" for the companies to win this lawsuit. Syngenta leases 3,000 acres on Kauai, DuPont Pioneer leases about 5,000 acres and Agrigenetics leases 3,500 acres for two farms on Kauai.
The biotech companies say that if they are forced to disclose the locations of their GMO crops, they could face a great risk of "commercial espionage, vandalism, and theft". They also say that disclosing the pesticide zones will hurt them economically because they will lose the land for seed production.
Why instead of a shameful lawsuit and bunch of bogus statements (on how disclosing the location of GE crops or pesticide zones could lead to commercial espionage, vandalism, and theft), the giant Ags won't come out of the closet and admit that they are in the business of selling and subsidizing sickness?
There are so many regulations and laws on organic farms and in order to get USDA organic certification, a farm has to go through so many hassles and pay so many ridiculous fees (while your tax dollars go to biotech companies and become GMO corn, obesity and diabetes).
However, you would never hear that an organic farmer is concerned about disclosing "free pesticide zones" on his farm, because such information could put him and his farm in risk of "commercial espionage, vandalism, and theft". I guess it's because many farmers know that not a lot of people are in the business of destroying and raiding organic farms, unless they work for Federal agencies including FDA and USDA (find out how FDA has been wasting your tax dollars on governmental raids against organic farmers and local producres: http://www.seattleorganicrestaurants.com/vegan-whole-food/Texas-SWAT-team-raids-organic-farm.php)
So, why all of a sudden the rules are reversed when it comes to evil chemical and biotech companies and disclosing basic information like pesticide zones could put them at the risk of "commercial espionage, vandalism, and theft"? I guess it's because the biotech and chemical companies know that despite the incompetence of US regulatory agencies (to impose a ban on GMOs and toxic pesticides), more and more people are becoming aware about the harms of biotech toxic pesticides and Frankenfoods.
No act of rebellion against the pesticide empire remains unrewarded. Biotech companies have to make an example out of Hawaii, so other states in America won't rise up against biotech and pesticide tyranny.
In fact, the GMO battle goes beyond Hawaii. No wonder why biotech has been pouring millions of dollars to kill GMO labeling movement in California and Washington:
Despite the harms of GMOs, the biotech and chemical corporations have been saying that Frankenfoods and pesticide ridden foods (that are highly contaminated with toxins and heavy metals) are essential for global food production and can improve the environmental sustainability. They have argued that there is no way to feed the world with sustainable and environmental friendly methods. They have also insisted that Frenkenfoods (linked to a wide range of health problems), are perfectly safe and well-regulated by state and federal agencies.
However, thanks to social media, more and more people are waking up to the fact that biotech companies have been lying, brainwashing and manipulating the public by using all kinds of insidious methods and corporate cunning techniques. The fact is that there are hundreds of independent scientific studies out there linking GMOs and pesticides to a wide range of diseases. The US regulatory agencies can no longer be trusted since they have been bought and paid for by this industry. Even recently, Harvard come out and revealed the Institutional Corruption of Pharmaceuticals and how FDA cannot be trusted with public safety: http://seattleorganicrestaurants.com/vegan-whole-food/institutional-corruption-of-pharmaceuticals-how-FDA-cannot-be-trusted-with-public-safety.php
More and more people are waking up to the fact the biotech and chemical companies are in the business of selling sickness and thanks to such great movement, even various lawyers are providing pro-bono assistance to Kauai County, while not directly representing them.
"You've got three very big corporations all ganging up to bring this lawsuit," said Earthjustice attorney Paul Achitoff. "If it costs them a little more money to beef up their security, rather than using secrecy, that's what they need to do," he said.
Sources:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/14/kauai-anti-gmo-lawsuit_n_4593043.html
http://news.yahoo.com/agrichemical-companies-sue-block-anti-gmo-law-hawaii-171141482--sector.html
