by Teresa L. Debuque

The Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives for Community Empowerment (SEARICE) has declared its support for Filipino farmer, Isidoro “Boy” Ancog, who started a hunger strike on March 2, 2010 in protest against what appears to be unanimous endorsement of the commercialization of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) at the 10^th FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation) international technical conference on Agricultural Biotechnologies in Developing Countries (ABDC-10) being held in Guadalajara, Mexico.

During a plenary session during which investments on agriculture research and agricultural biotechnologies were being discussed, Ancog took the floor and declared that he was going on a hunger strike because "I am against GMOs; my province, Bohol, publicly rejects GMOs as a policy; the organizations I represent, PAKISAMA – AFA, are fighting against GMOs. Why? Because we firmly believe it is not the solution to poverty and hunger, but rather a cause of more deprivation in the future.”

"GMOs are not the answer. Genetic engineering promoted by corporations will only make farmers dependent on proprietary seeds and technologies.. It takes away farmers’ basic right to save, sell, exchange and use seeds that have been the basis of agricultural for generations.

"Through centuries, farmers have been developing and adapting their own seeds through conservation, breeding and selection techniques building from their local knowledge and skills. These efforts have not only proven to meet the food needs of local farmers but have also helped enhance biodiversity and environmental protection in small scale farming communities.

"Farmers from across the world are re-claiming and asserting their rights to seeds in the face of technological and proprietary impositions. Communities and local governments have declared themselves GMO-free zones, farmers are conserving and improving seeds and varieties adapted to local conditions and needs, communities are exchanging seeds and knowledge to help improve their farming systems and farmers are turning to organic and sustainable agriculture to produce safe food and to protect the agricultural ecology.

"The FAO must recognize and support these efforts by farmers and farming communities to adapt to and to survive in changing environmental, economic and social conditions while feeding the rest of the world. The FAO should not promote genetic engineering as the answer to global food insecurity hunger. Indeed, the future of food and farming is much too valuable to leave in the hands of corporations."

Meanwhile, the Bohol province based NGO, BISAD, also expressed their support for Ancog's hunger strike. Their statement reads: “Like Boy, we do not believe that GMOs will solve the problems of low agricultural productivity, low rural incomes and widespread hunger across the world, especially in developing countries. Instead, we believe that GMOs exacerbate these problems by, among others, increasing agro-chemical use among farmers, aggravating insect pest immunity, upsetting the natural flow and evolution of biodiversity and undermining and threatening farmers' use of seeds (through application of intellectual property rights by corporations on GM crops),”

Eulalie Albuladora, BISAD president added, “In his hunger strike, Boy Ancog is making the voices of unheard farmers reverberate all the way to the FAO. He is making unseen farmers seen at the highest levels of policy discussions. Boy Ancog is helping farmers make that journey towards a greener and sustainable future for all free from GMOs.”