Issue 435 of New Internationalist

Reader-owned global journalism

September 2010

September 2010

Millions of years of growing natural diversity are in real danger of extinction. There's a bid by industrial agriculture to take complete control over seeds – and thereby of all the food we eat. As for genetic modification – promoted as the only way to feed the world, its one real benefit is that it conveys corporate ownership. Monopoly and monoculture are the result, together with increased dependence on fossil fuels and reduced adaptability to climate change. So the New Internationalist reports from Latin America, Africa and Asia on what peasant farmers are already doing to avert catastrophe.

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In this issue

  • The fundamentals of digital activism are little different from its analogue ancestry, argues Adam Ma'anit
  • The world’s seed markets are being gobbled up by ‘life-science’ corporations – but peasant farmers still feed the world. David Ransom reports.

  • In many African societies seed preservation was once an almost sacred duty. Isaiah Esipisu explains why it is becoming vital again.
  • Slowing growth could help us work less, live better and save the planet. So what’s not to like about that, wonders Zoe Cormier.