“Our Land, Our Food, Our Rice!” Reject Golden Rice!
Since 2013 there has been fierce resistance against the introduction of GMO Golden Rice in 🇵🇭 Philippines.
In 2013 Philippine people destroyed a test field of GMO Golden Rice that the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) had secretly carried out behind their back.
Anti-Science Heretics
The opponents of GMO rice, grouped together in Stop Golden Rice! Network (SGRN), were badly depicted by the global media and denounced as anti-science Luddites
who are responsible for causing the death of thousands of children.
In citation out of Phys.org:
Global outrage ensued after group of Filipino farmers destroyed a test crop of golden rice. There has been little recognition of the Sisyphean struggle of farmers in countries such as the Philippines, Bangladesh and India, yet these farmers have been described as anti-science Luddites that cause the deaths of thousands of children.
Source: phys.org
The declaration of people as anti-science is a declaration of heresy that provides a basis for persecution.
The international science establishment is calling for measures against anti-science on par
with measures against terrorism and nuclear proliferation. The following 2021 article in Science American provides an example:
Antiscience is now a large and formidable security threat. Source: Scientific American
Anti-science is used to characterize opponents of GMO as being engaged in a war on science
to justify counter measures in name of war.
Academic philosopher Justin B. Biddle wrote a paper about the anti-science
narrative, and how it relates to GMO opposition, in 2018.
(2018) “Anti-science zealotry”? Values, Epistemic Risk, and the GMO Debate The “anti-science” or “war on science” narrative has become popular among science journalists. While there is no question that some opponents of GMOs are biased or ignorant of the relevant facts, the blanket tendency to characterize critics as anti-science or engaged in a war on science is both misguided and dangerous. Source: PhilPapers (PDF backup) | Philosopher Justin B. Biddle (Georgia Institute of Technology)
Protests Against GMO Today
It is not justified to depict and ignore people in Philippines as being anti-science Luddites
or to blame them for killing children for opposing genetically engineered rice.
In 2023 Philippines started cultivating GMO Golden Rice after the National Seed Industry Council (NSIC) and Department of Agriculture issued a biosafety permit in 2021.
Protests against the commercialization of genetically modified Golden Rice in the Philippines have been significant.
In 2022 various groups organized a protest action against Golden Rice during World Hunger Day. The protest was organized by the following organizations:
- MASIPAG
- Greenpeace Southeast Asia
- Peasant Movement of the Philippines (KMP)
- Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives For Community Empowerment (SEARICE)
- Climate Change Network for Community-based Initiatives (CCNCI)
- Salinlahi Alliance for Children's Concerns Inc.
In March 2023, MASIPAG (Farmer-Scientist Partnership for Development) and Stop Golden Rice! Network (SGRN) filed a petition for a Writ of Kalikasan
to stop the commercial propagation of Golden Rice.
In August 2023, a protest was held to commemorate the 10-year anniversary of the 2013 event in which a test field of GMO Golden Rice was destroyed.
Stop Golden Rice Network (SGRN)
We believe that GMO Golden Rice is unnecessary and unwanted and being peddled by corporations purely for their profit-making agenda. Golden Rice will only strengthen the grip of corporations over rice and agriculture and will endanger agrobiodiversity and peoples’ health as well. Therefore, farmers, consumers and basic sectors have been campaigning against Golden Rice since the mid-2000s, including the historical uprooting of Golden Rice field trials back in 2013.