[asia-apec 1417] Filipino rice farmers protest IRRI 40th anniversary of 'green revolution'

[PAN Asia Pacific]

Filipino rice farmers protest IRRI 40th anniversary of 'green revolution'

Los Baños, Philippines
4 April 2000

Hundreds of Filipino rice farmers protested against the Philippine-based
agricultural center the International Rice Reseach Institute (IRRI), home of
the 'Green Revolution',  which is celebrating its 40th anniversary today.
"IRRI out!" and "No to GMO" calls reverberated as hundreds of protesters
trooped to the President's place, where the celebration was moved due to
picketing protesters infront of the IRRI base station in Los Baños town,
some 65 kms south of Manila.

Protesters said aside from promoting the US agenda on counterinsurgency and
corporate domination of domestic agricultural production, IRRI's
much-flaunted Green Revolution Program "caused massive loss of biological
diversity in rice paddies throughout Asia".
Founded in 1959 under an agreement forged by the Rockefeller and Ford
foundations with the Philippine, IRRI's tenure in this Southeast Asian
country expires in 2003.

The Manila protesters also slammed President Estrada's official support for
the hybrid rice being popularized by IRRI, through the administration's
program Agrikulturang Makamasa. Though projected yields are high, seeds are
costly and cannot be saved for the next year, making it necessary for
farmers to keep buying the patented seed for each planting and prevents them
from breeding their own strains of rice.

Lorenzo Leongson secretary general of the Alyansa ng Magbubukid sa Gitnang
Luson said peasant groups in Central Luzon are continuing the campaign
against genetic engineering as they learned of planned tests of
blight-resistant rice strains in the Philippine Rice Research Institute in
Muñoz, Nueva Ecija.

Outside the Palace gate, farmers and civil society including representatives
from Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia, and Japan joined Filipino protesters
who marched through street after holding a vigil infront of IRRI's
headquarter in Los Baños which authorities said "compelled IRRI into moving
the celebration to Malacañang Palace."
Shamsul Haq of the Nayakrishi New Agriculture Movement of Bangladesh said
that today 3,000 Bangladeshis are marching in the streets of Dacca and other
cities in Bangladesh to support the Philippine movement to get the IRRI
closed.

Like the Philippines, Bangladesh has lost almost all of its traditional rice
varieties. IRRI's charter vows to save the world's vast legacies of genetic
materials for humankind.

The protest action was jointly organized by the Peasant Movement of the
Philippines (KMP), Farmer-Scientist Partnership for Development (Masipag)
and the Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Philippines.


PAN - Asia and the Pacific
P.O. Box 1170
11850 Penang
Malaysia    

Web     : http://www.poptel.org.uk/panap
Tel.    : 604-6570271/6560381
Fax     : 604-6577445