which Engdahl is probably referring to in the above Asia Times article refers to finance from the Gates Foundation to assist efforts by the Mexico-based
International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, a sometimes-GM plant breeding research center (* see link & below), to develop Ug99-resistant wheat. The Bush administration, however, is threatening cuts:
...On Wednesday, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced it would give $26.8 million over the next three years for research to breed new wheat strains that resist the fungus.
At the same time, though, the US government looks likely to withhold a grant to the crop breeding institutes leading the battle worth double that.
Ug99 is a strain of black stem rust, a lethal fungal disease of wheat, first detected in Uganda in 1999. Virtually none of the commercial wheat now grown worldwide has any resistance to it.
The fungus recently invaded Iran faster than predicted and could cause mass starvation if it hits India before new resistant strains are ready.
...
The Gates award was announced in Ciudad Obregón, a town in Mexico's arid northern Sonora state where, 63 years ago, American plant breeder Norman Borlaug developed the high-yielding, stem rust-resistant wheat that led to the Green Revolution, and for which he was awarded the Nobel prize.
The work also led to the founding of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, known by its Spanish acronym CIMMYT, which is based in Mexico City but still conducts field trials of wheat varieties in Obregón. CIMMYT will receive $2.2 million yearly from the award.
CIMMYT is one of 15 labs in the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), which conducts farming research for developing countries.
New Scientist has learned that CGIAR lab directors have been warned that the US is unlikely to renew its yearly grant of $56 million, which covers nearly half the labs' basic operating costs. No official explanation for the cut has been forthcoming....
Rust project coordinator Rick Ward of Cornell University called the cut "utterly incomprehensible".
/...
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13577-bill-gates-boosts-fight-against-killer-wheat-fungus.htmlRead the Asia Times article, and don :tinfoilhat: :
...One of the consequences of the spread of Ug99 is a new effort by Monsanto Corporation, the Swiss agrichemical concern Syngenta and other major producers of genetically manipulated plant seeds to promote introduction of genetically modified organism (GMO) wheat varieties said to be resistant to the Ug99 fungus. Biologists at Monsanto and at the various GMO laboratories around the world are
working hard to patent such Ug99 resistant varieties.
In 2004, Roundup-ready wheat, poised to be the first biotech trait in wheat released to growers, was mothballed by Monsanto. The company cited strong resistance from US and Canadian wheat growers who feared losing export markets if US wheat was known to be GMO.
That GMO technology would have allowed farmers to apply Monsanto's Roundup herbicide, glyphosate, over a growing crop to kill weeds. Were Monsanto now to unveil a patented Ug99 resistant wheat variety, large new seed markets formerly hostile to genetically engineered wheat would open. Syngenta, which has developed a biotech trait that provides resistance to fusarium head blight or scab, is also seeking regulatory approval. Now their attention is turned to Ug99.
Borlaug, the former Rockefeller Foundation head of the Green Revolution, is active in funding research to develop a fungus resistant variety against Ug99, working with his former center in Mexico, the CIMMYT and ICARDA in Kenya, where the pathogen is now endemic. So far, about 90% of the 12,000 lines tested are susceptible to Ug99. That includes
all the major wheat cultivars of the Middle East and west Asia. At least 80% of the 200 varieties sent to CIMMYT from the United States can't cope with infection. The situation is even more dire for Egypt, Iran, and other countries in immediate peril.
Even if a new resistant variety were ready to be released today it would take two or three years' seed increase in order to have just enough wheat seed for 20% of the acres planted to wheat in the world, CIMMYT agronomists estimate.
Work is also being done by the USDA's Agricultural Research Service (ARS), the same agency that co-developed Monsanto's Terminator seed technology. The spreading alarm over the Ug99 fungus is encouraging Monsanto and other GMO agribusiness companies to demand that the current voluntary ban on GMO wheat be lifted to allow spread of GMO patented wheat seeds with the argument they are Ug99 stem rust resistant.
The influential USA National Association of Wheat Growers reportedly is softening its opposition as fears of the deadly Ug99 spreading to North American wheat increase.
/...
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Asian_Economy/JD04Dk01.htmlRe. the CIMMYT's attitude to GM crops:
While plant breeding that utilizes non-transgenic approaches will remain the backbone of CIMMYT’s crop improvement strategies, genetically engineered maize and wheat varieties (popularly called genetically modified organisms, GMOs) will not be excluded as products capable of contributing to CIMMYT’s principal goals. Indeed, in tackling certain intractable problems, using genetically engineered crops may be the best available approach for meeting the challenges of food security and environmental protection.
CIMMYT is conscious that the development and use of genetically engineered varieties is controversial in many countries. However, it also recognizes that these varieties have been commercially available since the mid-1990’s, initially in the USA, but increasingly in other developed and developing countries. While no technology is risk-free, major environmental or food safety issues have not been identified. Recently, developing countries have also commercialized genetically engineered varieties, and benefits to resource poor farmers and consumers are being realized. While the initially available varieties possess input traits (e.g., insect resistance or herbicide tolerance), the technology offers to improve many other traits such as drought tolerance and nutritional quality, all important for resource poor farmers and consumers in developing countries.
CIMMYT believes that it is important that any variety, genetically engineered or not, released to farmers be safe and effective. Thus, efforts will be focused on evaluating the environmental and food/feed safety aspects on all new varieties. Equally important is to ensure the sustainability of the technology for farmers. Thus, efforts will also focus on issues such as resistance management strategies, intellectual property rights and seed saving technologies that allow farmers long-term benefits, inexpensive access to the varieties and the ability to save seed from generation to generation./...
http://www.cimmyt.org/english/wps/transg/gmo_stmt.htmGoing back to the Asia Times Engdahl article, we read this dire warning:
The first strains of Ug99 were detected in 1999 in Uganda. It spread to Kenya by 2001, to Ethiopia by 2003 and to Yemen when the cyclone Gonu spread its spores in 2007. Now the deadly fungus has been found in Iran and according to British scientists may already be as far east as Pakistan.
Pakistan and India account for 20% of the annual world wheat production. It is possible as the fungus spreads that large movements could take place almost overnight if certain wind conditions prevail at the right time.
In 2007, a three-day "wind event" recorded by Mexico's CIMMYT had strong currents moving from Yemen, where Ug99 is present, across Pakistan and India, going all the way to China. CIMMYT estimates that from two-thirds to three-quarters of the wheat now planted in India and Pakistan are highly susceptible to this new strain of stem rust. One billion people who live in this region and they are highly dependent on wheat for their food supply.
...
In short, with severely low grain stocks worldwide, expanding acreage set aside to grow grains for burning as fuel not food, spread of a deadly wheat fungus is a scenario pre-programmed for catastrophe. Given the fact that the scale of the growing US biofuel industry is well known, some suggest that the Washington Administration has other priorities than abating world hunger. It is certainly clear that we face a crisis of serious proportions even absent a new deadly wheat fungus threat./...
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Asian_Economy/JD04Dk01.html
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