Thursday, October 13, 2016

First Agent Orange, now Roundup: what's Monsanto up to in Vietnam? Ecologist Special Investigation

With the International Monsanto Tribunal beginning this week (14-16 October) in The Hague, MICK GRANT reports from Vietnam with this special investigation for The Ecologist five decades after the company's lethal herbicide Agent Orange first devastated the country - and discovers the agribusiness giant is sneaking its way back into Vietnam with modern herbicides and 'Roundup-Ready' GMO crops.

Today, seed has become the ultimate weapon in a war against the Earth and her people. In this war, if corporations win, we will all lose our food and our future." - Dr Vandana Shiva, Who really Feeds the World?
Flying into Saigon at night - after an absence of more than a decade - I am struck by the American corporate logos lighting up the landscape, especially those related to food and drink.
Golden Arches are sprinkled along the boulevards, and Starbucks mermaids flash their twin tails everywhere. A neon Colonel Sanders even takes on Ho Chi Minh portraits, sporting the same wispy white goatee.
As Vietnam embraces American culture, the US food gang is back in force - McDonalds, Starbucks, KFC, Coca-Cola.
And Monsanto.

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