Several women’s NGOs, including Women for Diversity, Guild of Services, Diverse Women for Diversity and Gene Ethics Australia, have launched a combined campaign against genetically-engineered (GMO) bananas.
Dr Vandana Shiva has questioned why India should finance the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Australia to develop GMO bananas when research in this area has already been done by the a team from the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (Barc).
Addressing a press conference, Dr Shiva declared that despite researchers at Barc having worked extensively in this area, India’s biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) will give $1.4 million to QUT and another $1.43 million to several Indian institutes, including the National Research Centre for Bananas, the Indian Institute of Horticulture Research and the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University to help develop GMO bananas with a high quotient of iron.
Barc scientists who have worked in this filed admit they can achieve a six-fold increase in iron content in GMO bananas bringing it to 2.5mg levels which is 3,000 less than iron levels in turmeric and 2,000 per cent less than amchur.
“Women possess a knowledge of food diversity and also how to transform it. The solution to malnutrition lies in increasing nutrition through growing diversity,” said Dr Shiva, highlighting a Navdanya report Health per Acre which showed that, “One acre of organic farmland in which mixed cropping is done helps produce 39 gram of extra iron that can nourish 17,250 lactating mothers with iron for one day.”