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posted by martyb on Thursday November 16 2017, @01:24PM   Printer-friendly
from the speaking-of-bill-gates dept.

Retired judge Justice Patrick Tabaro writes of a proposed law in Uganda that looks to adversely affect its independence and, specifically, what is starting to be called these days "food security".

[...] science is not a magic wand for solving man's food security concerns, but must be applied in accordance with Ubuntu (humaneness).

[...] Since the advent of civilization, peasants have had capacity to plant their own seeds. With the advent of GMO farming, the peasants who constitute 70 per cent of the population have their fate sealed; they may fall into the debt trap, fail to service bank loans and will be in danger of losing their cherished land holdings to financial institutions – and this may entail food insecurity for everyone.

[...] God forbid that anyone should be targeting our scientists to make us vulnerable for easy domination.

He concludes that [w]ith GMOs, there is no Ubuntu, (human nature, humanness, humanity, virtue, goodness, and kindness).


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  • (Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday November 16 2017, @02:07PM (2 children)

    by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Thursday November 16 2017, @02:07PM (#597695) Journal

    GMOs can be designed by universities or charities [wikipedia.org], if not individual farmers in Uganda. The seeds can be freely shared, and if there is a problem with big corporations patenting or restricting seed use, that could be addressed with legislation (much like how India ignores most drug intellectual property and allows production of generics).

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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Immerman on Thursday November 16 2017, @02:58PM

    by Immerman (3985) on Thursday November 16 2017, @02:58PM (#597716)

    Could be. Mostly aren't. Most of the development and lobbying/bribery money is in the hands of Monsanto and friends. And wealth is apparently the most powerful force in modern politics.

    Personally, I think we should eliminate all GMO patents and related protections - remove at least the direct profit motive from developing GMOs and help reign in the most dangerous abuses. Wouldn't stop them from developing their Roundup-resistant grains to boost their sales of Roundup, but *would* prevent them from leveraging that into a stranglehold on the food supply. I wouldn't put it past them to make their plants extremely vulnerable to pests on their own, or dependent on specific patented fertilizers to mature - but anyone else could come along and remove their inserted vulnerabilities to get the yield, etc. benefits alone.

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Thursday November 16 2017, @06:00PM

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Thursday November 16 2017, @06:00PM (#597788)

    The university IP departments I have had intimate contact with are little better than mega corporations... they certainly seem to be aspiring to become mega corporations themselves, just haven't gotten there yet, so the terms they offer are a little more inventor friendly / less capital intensive for the inventor / developer.

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