The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which is sponsoring the Guardian’s Global development site is being heavily criticised in Africa and the U.S. for getting into bed not just with notorious GM company Monsanto, but also with agribusiness commodity giant Cargill.
Trouble began when a US financial website published the foundation’s annual investment portfolio, which showed it had bought 500,000 Monsanto shares worth around $23 million. This was a substantial increase in the last six months and while it is just small change for Bill and Melinda, it has been enough to let loose their fiercest critics.
But it got worse. South Africa-based watchdog the African Centre for Biosafety then found that the foundation was teaming up with Cargill in a $10 million project to “develop the soya value chain” in Mozambique and elsewhere. Who knows what this corporate-speak really means, but in all probability it heralds the big time introduction of GM soya in southern Africa.
The foundation has never been upfront about its vision for agriculture in the world’s poorest countries, nor the role of controversial technologies like GM. But perhaps it could start the debate here?
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In the meantime, it could tell us how many of its senior agricultural staff used to work for Monsanto or Cargill?
Read the full, original article: Why is the Gates foundation investing in GM giant Monsanto?
