Hi All,

Here is a mail that I am forwarding from the Tissue Culture List serve that
shows how parallels are bing drawn between fight for software freedom and
freedom to make the technology to produce Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs)
more widely available. Monsanto Inc. has been compared to Microsoft corp

Read on
-Tarun


-----Forward Message-----

> From: Greg Naylor
> Reply To: Plant Tissue Culture
> Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2004 6:29 PM
> To: PLANT-TC@...
> Subject: [PLANT-TC] A new spin on genetically modified organisms
>
> The establishment of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) in our crops
> will eventuate due to the powerful political lobby and financial
> investment of the major players such as Monsanto and Bayer. By patenting
> their processes that produce sterile plants and/or make the collection of
> seed illegal, they will own the future of the world's food supply. Whilst
> the process of creating GMOs is against the natural order, they are not
> difficult to produce. Tissue culture hobbyists around the world are doing
> it every day for the simple reason that it can be done.
>
> We need to put this knowledge in the hands of the farmer so that he can
> produce his own herbicide resistant seeds, or frost resistant strains, and
> the control and ownership of nature by the Monsantos of the world could be
> prevented.
>
> There is a precedent with Bill Gates and Microsoft who all-but-owned the
> personal computer market. You will recall that Microsoft intended to
> control the Internet through the Microsoft Network. A group of computer
> "nerds" who recognised the danger of this established a path of
> collaboration and built a new operating system called Linux to replace
> Microsoft Windows.
>
> Their work was done under a copyrighted General Public Licence (GPL) that
> prevents commercial profiteering by putting the sofware in the public
> domain. Today, the Linux operating system (the Windows alternative) and
> all of the software programs (office suites, internet software,
> bookkeeping, etc) are available to us all free of charge and are outside
> the control of Microsoft.
>
> The Linux operating system has now matured and is used by govrnments,
> businesses and private individuals. Indeed. the Internet itself now
> operates under the Linux system and remains free of controls by the
> commercial software developers such as Microsoft. The computer world
> retains the freedom of choice that Microsoft wanted to prevent.
>
> The development of Linux under the GPL preserves our right to chose the
> information that enters our minds. Don't we deserve the same freedom of
> choice over the food that enters our bodies?
>
> The tissue culture professionals and hobbyists are already organised with
> Internet forums just as the computer "nerds" were. This message has been
> posted to both of these forums as well as the anti-GMO forums in the hope
> that enough tissue culture practitioners recognise that GMO control by the
> giant corporations is detrimental to the future of our freedom to farm the
> crops and eat the foods of our choice.
>
>

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tarun Kant, M.Sc., Ph.D. -o)
Scientist C /\\
Biotechnology Laboratory _\_V
Forest Genetics & Tree Breeding Division
Arid Forest Research Institute
New Pali Road
Jodhpur 342005 India
Phone: +91-291-2722269 ext. 162
Home Page: http://www.geocities.com/bobkant/
I'm Registered Linux User # 284692
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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