PRESS CONFERENCE at INDORE
April 10, 2005

Question: Do you want to say that genetically modified food is not good for mankind?

Bharat Mitra: I don't know how much knowledge you have about genetically modified foods, about this whole issue, in this country or globally. One of the things that some of the big multi national company do here is to promote and sell termination seeds. They give farmers 'support' with seeds genetically modified against pest control and insects, promising that they will give them better crops, as if they are serving the interests of the farmers. What they forgot to say is that the next year when he wants to plant some of the seeds of his crop, nothing will grow. He will have to go again to buy from the same company. So they create dependence, and control the whole seed supply. Second, the producers of the worst poisons that are given to farmers as insecticides and herbicides are the same ones that sell the genetically modified seeds. They give you seeds and tell you to spray with their chemical products such as "round up", and everything else will die except for your crop. So you are guaranteed that your crop will succeed, for a time.

The same companies that sell the seeds also sell the chemicals. They are making money by promoting their own chemicals, which poison and deplete your land. Then you have to buy their chemical fertilizers, because the land is so depleted, nothing will grow. The next year you have to use more chemicals because pests develop resistance, and the land is weaker and then more fertilizers are needed as well, and by the end of third or fourth year the marginal farmers specifically are unable to support themselves any longer. This is a very brutal cycle, which doesn't take into consideration anything except the bottom line of those companies, which are promoting it.